What reason do people clean out shop and sale it all

A family tree with more roots than branches. Are you the brother from the uncle-cousin from your aunt-granny's side?

All joking aside, I was NOT born here! I moved here from So.Cal in 1984...BIGGEST mistake of my life!

 

Ha ha. I just moved away a year ago. I don't know you, but I think my brother knows who you are? His name is Chris Swenson.

 

Yep! He knows me.

 

The cure is to build more buildings. In 1987 we bought our house. I was always going to build a shop and built a tiny 900 sf 3 car shop. We filled the house garage instantly and then filled the shop. Then I built a two story shed thats really cool but filled it up ,its about 300sf. Then I built a roof between the house garage and shop which gave me another 200sf. Well then after all was bursting at the seams, we built a 2 story barn , its about 2600 sf and we filled it pretty much instantly. I'm slowing down some but I'm not done yet!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

Quit racing five years ago, Haven't watched a race since I quit driving. Same with motorcycles. I hot rods will keep me busy till I get sick of people pulling up in my driveway wanting me to work on their crap all the time.

 

We sold 12 acres of land our 4 56 ford,s a 70 camero Z28 and a lot of small items a few years ago so we could pay cash for our home. I love my wife and children but i just like my old cars. Just this week i sold a 67 ford fairlane 2 dr htp because the buyer had cash. I liked the 9 $100 bills better than the ford. We had owned the 67 for more than 20 years. As you get older your priorites sometimes change. I would sell my tools and guns only as a last resort. OldWolf

 

They are just machines, the cars, the tools - all of it.

The beauty of them is you can sell everything you own if you get into a financial bind or get bored and replace them with different machines at a later date. None of it is irreplaceable. It might be a little more expensive when you go to buy a replacement, but you do what you have to do...

 

It'll take a auction 3 days to clear out your #$&^#@*&.

 

Sometimes you're just done with something. I got into VW drag racing in the '70 s & went at it hot & heavy for a few years. In 1983 I walked away from that & sold every part I owned including my collection of Mahle slipper skirt pistons which were to VW's what Ardun heads are to flathead people.I was done with it.

 

You're just jealous Dave. You should see the crap I got off Larry Cole last week...

 

You people have convinced me. I'm getting rid of all of it. Now.

 

cars and objects are so easily replaced.......... im considering selling off 99% of all my shit and simplifying my life.......smaller shop= smaller head ache.....Im getting burned out and dont want to lose my love of it all. getting back to basics so to speak.

 

I love cars and car parts and old memorabilia, and rusty things and and and........... I love it all!! And I wont get rid of it until Im dead!!! Or if someone needs something and I feel like giving them the part, I'll do that, which I have done quite a bit. It frees up some space for new shit!!!! Life is good!!!! I get into collecting stuff and then I move on to collecting other stuff. I started collecting grill shells then heaters, license plates, guitars, magazines, carburetors (just bought 3 more), tractor seats, bowling pins, old battery chargers, intake manifolds, old bi-focals, old model A rims.......................... So cool!!!! I love it all!!!!! I did make the decision to stop buying cars at 10 because thats all the covered space I have.

 

Stuff is stuff, regardless of what it is...you can always get more stuff later. All you are is a temporary owner, in any case. When you die, stuff doesn't matter. I bought my first car at age 12 for ten bucks, so I've been around this shit for a long time.

I bracket raced for several years, then quit one day. Haven't raced in over 20 years. Doesn't mean I don't like it, I just don't do it anymore.

If I were ever to go into the pure "purge" mode, I'd keep my '66 Dodge (owned since 1980!), my spares for that, a spare 440, and my tools. All the rest would GO!

I'm working real hard to get back to TWO hobby cars from the eight I had this time last year. I knew I was never going to build all of them, so I have two complete, restored cars and one hot rod project; but still have two complete runners and one roller project (it is traded for work on one of the restored cars I have) to get out of the shop. Three is very manageable, plus it'll give me a BUNCH of room to work in again! I hate tripping over shit.

 

it could be worse i had a former buddy with a shop he was trying to clean and he just pulled a trailer up and started throwing everything on it to take to the scrapyard, including a nice running red ram hemi, 30 model a coupe decklid and other sheetmetal, and a 27 rpu body, i was too late to save it or i would have...and he is a hamb member

 

All my stuff can be bought, just don't expect me to give it away.

 

I hear ya, sometimes it's good for a person to reinvent themselves. When I went in the service, they took everything, even my hair. There I stood looking like everyone else, and it was up to me to find my potential, a lot of guys bitched, but I kinda liked it.
As others have said here, your stuff starts to own you, and if you are too involved in the pursuit of "things" sometimes you lose yourself, or at least miss out on the other events going on around you . Today my wife told me the baby blue and white swallows nesting in my yard flew for the first time. The parents were teaching them to fly and how to dip water from my pond, I wanted to see them, but spent all evening cutting down the vent windows on my 54 chevy, it could have waited. It made me think of how much of my life has passed while I'm "holed up" in my garage. I do enjoy it, but sometimes I gotta wonder if it's really the best use of the one life I have. But then again, look how many people spend their days watching Springer and all that other crap!
I sometimes wish I had the balls to dump everything and start over but it took me so long to accumulate all these tools, and I do love my tools.

I guess we all gotta make choices, when I was younger I was really good at art, but I gave up on it to start a business where I could make some money. Now I check out the Friday art show and get a little depressed, I try to rekindle my old talent, but it's just not there anymore. Letting that go was a bad choice. Stick to what you love TINGLER.

 

In the early 1980's ... I basically " SOLD DOWN to almost nothing "
But kept my tools.

A older gentleman came with his son to look at some Chevy engine parts I had for sale. He saw all the cars, trucks and parts and then he asked " Which one of these cars do you really want finished ? " I said my 32 Ford roadster. He asked how old I was and I said my age and he then pulled a tape measure from his pocket and pulled it to 72 inches. He then took his other thumb and placed it at my age. He said This is how time you have used up and this is out much time you MIGHT have left. He then said " well then ... you should sell all this extra stuff and concentrate on that 32 ". I laughed at him ( inside ) and discounted his advice. About a week or so later ... he was making a LOT more sense.

So much so, that over the next few months I sold a real nice 56 F-100 Big Window, a 49 Mercury coupe ... a few O/T vehicles ( muscle cars ) and about 10 engines ... most of them complete ( 67 - 427/435 Corvette engine, 70 LS 6 454/450 engine, 69 Z-28 302 engine, a few 327 Corvette 300 and 350 HP engines, a couple Corvette FI units and almost 75 factory Chevrolet aluminum high performance intakes. I only kept 1932 Ford stuff.

For once in my life, I had a REAL big pocketful of hundred dollar bills. That I could spend on 32 Roadster stuff. Within a year ... I had the 32 Roadster ... back together/painted/upholstered and ready to go anywhere ...
Had the money and the time to work on the 32 ... got it going.

Best move I ever made ... car wise.
I was too busy collecting and wheelin/dealin to make any progress on the 32 Roadster. All that stuff basically owned me ... instead of me owning it.

NOW ... I just mess with 32 Ford stuff ...

 

Exactly my philosophy. The problem is I have too much shit that I wouldn't be able to give away if I wanted to.

 

I can't imagine getting rid of my junk. It owns me and I love it ( we have an understanding). I got most of my stuff for very little and could sell for good profit but I can't imagine walking into or hanging out in an empty garage. Maybe I'm the weird one.

 

I haven't read the thread yet, but I almost choked when I saw the title. Crap, I would have to live another 66 years to sort all my stuff, then I would need to live another 66 years to sell the lovingly selected items. Every spare inch of the basement, garage, and yard is full of neat stuff that I can't bear to part with. The list is too long, but I'll just start it with the 55 big block Cameo, 67 Comet big block conv, 79 Buick turbo Regal, a bunch of late 60's big block engines including a 435 horse 427 Vette engine.....
I figure it is better to let the kids fight about dividing it up after I croak. ( They are car crazy, so it would be quite a fight.

 

I'm a convicted autophile. I'm listed on the autophile offenders list and cant go within 300ft of schools and/or public places. One of these days my wife is gonna take me to be on the Dr. Phil show... or maybe Jerry Springer.

I dont have a problem with collecting some 40 vehicles now. I just consider them inventory and stock. When I get rid of stuff it goes out of here on a trailer to the scrap yard cuz if I cant get anything else out of it Nobody can. I cant help it, I'm Scotch-Irish with some Jewish ancestry. Its in my bloodlines.

 

Being 45 and never sold out completly, I've seen too many that done that and I know some that some of them deeply regrets that they never can walk the path back. With family and house its way harder to start once again, so a good advice will be: What ever you do, no matter of a growing family, keep your best stuff...

 

After reading everybodys post---- I really got thinking about Purging again----sure I sort of miss the things that I sold-but I did get more-different things out of it. The current economy has me thinking about it. After selling my business I reenterd the workforce after a few years. Now I see myself in a job with no real pay increases in the future, and with the rising costs of every trip to Walmart for groceries--I see it as a losing proposition. .I have a garage full of expensive toys to maintain,and really can't think about having a different one unless I sell something. Less than 10 years away from retirement and owning a house that the property taxes will take half of my SS. Not trying to be a bummer here. I see it as an eye opener. Think I will sell everything again within the next year, go buy a peice of land in NM, and spend the rest of my time on a major project of building new house-shop-and toys--quit worrying about economy and job!!!

 

Been wrenching all my life, models, bikes, then dads car, and then my own cars and boats. I'm am tool maker/machinist semi-retired and wrenching is all I know, still have the s shaped tools dad gave me. I would sell the projects, the tools are what define me. If there was an astro. sign of wrench ( I'm a pices ) that's what I would be.

 

Three years ago, while going through a divorce, my wife at the time cleaned out my shop. My whole life's accumulation of stuff was gone. All that she left was my roll away and tools (locked and too heavy to move). Gone were my drill press, workbenches, blast cabinet, compressor, everything. My walls were pretty well stocked with 20 years of accumulation of cool parts too. I had a very nice collection of valve covers and intake manifolds. I had nearly a dozen 15x3.5 inch Cragar SS wheels. All gone.

The Sheriff explained to me that since we were not divorced yet at the time, that she could legally take it all like that. Since she had a key to my shop that kind of implied that I gave her free reign of the place. I didn't know she had a key either.

I was 33 at the time, and I don't believe I will ever get caught back up in this lifetime.

 

The closest I came to selling out was about 3 years ago when work was slow and I wanted to get my 55 Ford convertible on the road so I found most of the extra parts for vehicles that I did not own and sold them and got it driveable,I kept those parts in case I found a car to put them on and now I have no reason to buy another car and finish what I got now.

 

Damn, I hope you got rid of every shoe and piece of clothing and jewlrey she owned....

 

Damn dude, that's rough... Mine just cleaned out the bank account, but she's too damn dumb to realize what anything in the basement's worth. Plus she knew I'd call me up some big corn-fed hillbilly chicks to take care of the issues .

 

When you are in the "Hobby/Lifestyle/Business" things accumulate..I just traded eleven cars for three, I'm down eight cars. Thats progress right?..I looked at that 72 Cutlass convertable, that in my mind, I was going to get running, put a new top onnit and get what it was truly worth. After a while I realized that at my age and in this current economy it was a lost cause. Get your hands on that 34 Ford Pickup, what I really wanted, and let somebody else speculate on that Cutlass,Charger,Packard etc...Then my buddy shows up with a nice 54 Kaiser Golden Dragon with a Paxton supercharger, Dammit! and it starts all over again....