Friend Sale

I'm wondering what everyone's policy is on selling things to friends.

I know that if I have something that someone else wants or needs, I do my best to just give it to them for free, but there are times when you really don't want to, like if it's a piece of baby gear or something brand new that you were thinking about selling. Kids clothes and most toys I will give away if someone is looking for them. Other things it depends.

If I DO sell something to a friend, I usually sell it to the friend for a lot less than I'd sell it to someone else. I call it the friend discount. It's because you want to help out your friends, right?

If it's something I really don't want to take a hit on, I don't even offer to sell it. Sometimes that doesn't work out with the Facebook yard sale sites, but I guess that's a chance you take. I'm in a situation right now where a friend is looking for a specific DVD for cheap ($2) or free and I have that DVD, but it's brand new. I don't want to sell it for $2 because it's brand new and I know I can get $7-$10 from someone looking to give it as a gift. So, I'm not going to post it right now - see? Easy.

Well, I've been looking for a rock 'n play for baby #3 that's due next month and on the Facebook sites they usually go for $10-$20, occasionally $25 if they're the deluxe version with vibration and in near perfect condition. They don't come up a lot and they normally go really fast when they do. One of the ladies in the moms club who I'd consider a friend messaged me saying she was selling her rock 'n play for $25 when she was finished with it. I wasn't sure which version it was, so I said I'd take a look.

Then I start hearing from other people that she has basically lent it out to the entire group AND she got it from her sister AND her sister isn't the original owner. This thing has probably gone through 6+ kids at this point. About a month after the original offer she sends me a picture of it and says she wants $30 for it - because she's selling it for her sister. That little line is what she includes in posts when she doesn't want people to haggle. That way, she can say oh no, I can't go lower because it's not mine, sorry. I know that because I know her. Also, it's not even the deluxe version! It's a plain rock 'n play in obviously used condition (not the "great" condition she says its in - you can see the wear in the pictures) and she upped the price $5!

I was kind of offended. That rock 'n play retails for $50 and like I said, it has been through 3 owners and at least 6 kids. I think it should have been discounted at least 50%, but here she was trying to sell it for $30 and to someone she knows no less! Was I not supposed to find out about its history?

Needless to say, she's a friend and she knows I had been looking and it was a $20 discount off the retail price, so I said sure. It was an awkward situation and I didn't know what to do. My husband told me to just take it to not offend her and "help her out" as her husband had recently lost his job again.

As luck would have it, a rock 'n play went up on the free site the day after I agreed to buy hers this coming weekend. I inquired, third in line and didn't think much about it. Then I got the message - the free one was still available, would I like it? YES! My husband picked it up last night on his way home from work and it's in perfect condition. I emailed the friend to let her know I wouldn't be buying hers after all.

She went ahead and posted hers on the yard sale site for $30 with the line about it being her sister's item. These things usually go like hotcakes, but 9 hours later hers is still sitting there, waiting to sell... I guess that's confirmation that it was overpriced. I'm glad the free one came up to get me out of a tough situation.

Let that be a lesson - mixing friends and business is a bad idea!