Garage Sale 2 Ebay

First things first, the mapping software I prefer to use is Google maps, it is free and they allow you to add locations to the map as long as you have a Google account. (There are many other options you can choose to use, however I will be using Google for this writeup) If you do not have a Google account I recommend you sign up at https://www.google.com/accounts/NewAccount? You will also be given a @Gmail email account which is an added bonus as I believe they have the best free online email.

You may move on to the following steps once you have your Google account setup, and have the classifieds section of your local paper next to you. (Or any other local garage sale/estate sale location list) I also like to highlight only the garage sales that interest me. (skipping the ones that are mainly clothes or baby/toddler items)

*Sidenote a lot of people believe the best sales are in the affluent neighborhoods, and the worst sales are in the low income neighborhoods. In my experience this has proved untrue, the best sales for me have generally been middle class neighborhoods, with both low and high income neighborhoods performing about the same. If your town/location has any neighborhood that is mostly elderly and retired families this is often a great place to find vintage items.

1.) Go to http://maps.google.com/

2.) In the upper left corner of the screen, right below the “Google maps” icon you should see the 2 taps “Search Results, and My Maps” Click the my maps tab, and then click the “Create New Map” button afterwards.

3.) If you are not logged in already it will bring you to the Gmail login page, where you should enter your username and password and log in. If you are already logged in skip to step 5.

4.) Pick a title for your map (I usually just pick the date of the sales) and then click save

5.) At the top in the “Search the map” Enter the location you would like to map out and zoom/center the area of interest (The plus and minus along the left side zooms in and out, and to center the map simply left click anywhere and drag your mouse to move the map) I have centered my town of Grand Forks, ND.

6.) You may now begin adding your points to the highlighted sales on the map. Start with your first highlighted sale address. For example I have a sale at “2100 11th Ave N,” I would then enter that, followed by your town into the search the map function at the top. My search would be the following “2100 11th Ave N, Grand Forks, ND” It will then center the map at that location and bring up a bubble with a few options.

7.) Click the “Save to My maps” button. Choose which map you would like to save it to, click save, and then click OK.

8.) Continue adding all of the points of interest onto the map until you are done. Once you are done you will want to re-zoom and center your map.

9.) You may then print your map, You can use the print button in the upper right portion of the map, however the map will be a bit small. I usually only use this method if I am in a hurry. Otherwise I will click the print screen button on your keyboard. Then load up any image editing software (I use Adobe Photoshop) and then crop the map down to only the info you need and then re-size to a full page and print.

10.) You are now done, you have have a map looking similar to this, which you can then draw your planned route on.

I hope this helped make everything flow more smoothly and help you use your time and gas more efficiently, it sure helps me.

** Tip I like to make the map and have my route drawn the night before, so that come 7:30 AM I can just walk out the door.