The Following is from Klangford, a member of the e46fanatics web forum. I thought this is the best write up about why people could go to yard sales for extra side cash

I've gotten several PM's asking for the details on how I make money on ebay.

99% of what I sell on eBay comes from garage sales. On any given weekend, I can spend between $100-200 and turn it into $800-$4,000 if I find the right deals. That said, some days I don't buy a thing. Believe it or not, more rides on building a good ad vs. having good product. Also, don't go to garage sales at trailer parks. Go to neighborhoods that you wish you could afford to live in. Successful people sell nice stuff but the usually DO NOT value it. They actually have garage sales to get rid of stuff, not to make money - therefore they will take whatever you offer. Trailer Park people want $20 for a used ash tray.

Don't buy anything you can't ship. I once bought a brand new drum set for $30 (retail $400) but it cost me nearly $75 to box & ship. Stick to small, shippable items.

Look in the Friday morning paper classifieds for NEIGHBORHOOD garage sales or CHURCH fund raisers. Neighborhood sales are great because you cover dozens of sales without driving all over town. Church fund raisers are nice because people who donate are not the ones running it so they have no idea what something is worth. You can clean up there. Bring a laptop or other wireless device with you. When I'm unsure of something, I go back to my car and look it up on eBay right quick to see if any are selling and how active they are. Then I'll go back and get the item if I can easily double my money. I come home with the weirdest stuff, purses, garment bags, girls brand name jeans (HUGE SELLER), model trains, gravity boots, alarm system, etc. I have some real success stories, here's one.

I was at a charity fund raiser/rummage sale at a church. There was an oriental run thrown across some boxes. I moved the rug and looked in the boxes underneath. No one else seemed to consider the boxes. Inside the boxes were 75 different model train kits from the 60's & 70's. These kits weren't plastic, they were the old balsa wood, metal, etc. I paid $40 for both boxes, .53 cents per item was my average. I listed all 75 as SEPARATE auctions on ebay. I cleared over $1,500 in one week on that stuff. My best single return was on some wierd contraption that is used to capture/charge freon on air conditioning equipment. The garage sale I came up on was a divorced woman unloading her ex-husbands stuff, I paid $7 for this shiny metal thing without looking it up, I was convinced it was worth something. That sucker went for almost $800. I always triple my money. That's enough about how to find inventory, my other secret to success on eBay is how to auction.

1. Make sure your auctions end at a reasonable time for WEST COAST people. If you live on the east coast and list at 10:00 a.m. Your auction will end at 7:00 a.m. West Coast time. Those folks may not be awake. Use the feature to schedule auction start time.

2. If you have many items that are similar, stagger their ending time so that people bidding on multiple items can watch each of them. For example, with those 75 train parts, I staggered the ending time 15 minutes for every one so that people could have a better chance at winning multiple items. If all 75 ended at once, they would've been out of luck.

3. This has already been addressed but I'll say it anyway, don't try to make money on shipping. Be reasonable. Do NOT use the eBay UPS shipping calculator. It isn't rocket science to figure out true shipping costs.

4. This is a bit risky but I NEVER set ridiculous reserve amounts and always started auctions at $.99. If someone was auctioning the same item as me but he had a reserve or high starting bid, I always had 2-3 times the bids and outsold them everytime. People don't generally bid if they think they don't stand a chance at getting a good deal.

5. Take LOTS of pictures and build an attractive ad. I pay $7/month for permanent web space to host my ebay pictures - I do this because eBay shrinks them if you use thier services. I just write my ads in FrontPage and copy/paste the entire HTML into eBay when I post the ad.

6. When listing brand name stuff, list your item and spell it correctly & incorrectly. Example, once I had a Louis Vuitton garment bag. I paid $3 at an estate sale. I listed under VUITTON as well as VITTON because people don't know how to spell - the item went for $400.

7. Don't panic if your item is going isn't getting many bids. Every item I sold double or tripled in price in the last 45-60 seconds of the 7 day auction. Successful winners always jump in at the last second.

Good Luck.

Sounds temping??? Go to www.yardsaledb.com and find a sale near you today!