Estate Sales

I own an estate sale company and if we have records & stereo gear I feature it in our ads. I will have photos of the bins of records & setup the audio gear, so it is all working if space permits. Checkout Craigslist under garage sales and  https://www.estatesales.net/  and   https://estatesales.org/  for local sales in your area. I go though all the records and price the better ones accordingly, but most are $2.00 each. I use a national Craigslist search, eBay, Reverb and Orion Audio Blue Book to price the gear. After 24 years in the business, we have not come across very much high end gear, mainly mid-fi and below.

I’ve  read about LP guys who pick up great albums, old classics , etc  at an Estate Sales

Yeah because when you find a record actually worth buying at an estate sale its so astronomically unlikely you just have to brag about it. 

Its hit or miss with alot of misses .The ones I found want alot for the records but I am on long island  ny.But one person had a lot of 50s jazz in great condition and only wanted 5 bucks an album.

It's a great way to build your Pat Boone collection.

You have to realize, we as an estate sale providers, have to deal with a household full of items of all sorts of value and records, mid-fi stereo gear are not a big priority. Record buyers and book buyers are very minor contributors to the success of a sale. Jewelry. silver, coins, paintings, collectibles, knives, guns & ammo, furniture, cooking gear, yard tools, hand tools, power tools, cars, boats, campers, etc. are all more popular and lucrative.

Depends where you live.  College towns are better than farming towns for records.  Most sales are listed either in the newspaper or Craigslist.  I find lots of great records at estate sales in my town.  You have to get there early these days though!

I'm gonna give you all a little pearl..

Storage companies, like Mayflower, Global, you know the ones with TS facilities. Have TONS of LPs stashed in the little cubes, THEY rent then they are loose the "BOX" the owners of the TS (temporary storage), ALWAYS gets first shot at the goods. It's really not like on TV, the owner gets the first shot, believe me....NOT the bidders.

In Martinez Ca, I saw 5, cubes full of LP, there were twice that, NOT being sold. 1000 record lots... 50,000 sold right in front of me..for 10K

Try moving that many LPs.. pretty funny to watch, old fogies movin' and a huffin' and puffin'

Regards

It really all depends on the company and how they sell , I personally have found that it's a lot easier to find records of the public then it is to buy them from major estate companies. I personally sell record at my sale depending on the record if the stuff Is just ok I sell them dirt cheap . So go out there and hunt any questions don't hesitate to ask.
Palmspringsestatesales.com 
Sandiegocountyestatesales.com 

I know that our group is gray haired. Or does everybody know what our stuff is worth , and sell online ?
Jeff

Jeff, regarding Vinyl or CDs you or anyone can check sales history of every release on discogs.com and it will give you an idea of going rate for almost any record if you will find them in discography, basically discogs.com is huge database (discography) for records, cds etc (any genre of music). This is how you can make sure what people are ready to pay for particular LP for example. You can always list your vinyl or CD on discogs (all you need is to find particular release and click one button, picture and all details already there in discography). They charge 8% sales fee in 30 days after your item sold. What they are buying on estate sales will be there for higher price :) 

I check craigslist ....  word of mouth...   my brother went to one last week and bought an Acurus 200 x3 for 150 and a Velodyne has 15 for 195

I picked up a nice Fanfare FT 1a tuner for 200 today....