Generator Deals

One time my husband had an obsession with portable generators. He found a chain that was selling them incredibly cheap, so he went and bought out a couple of their stores and sold them on social media for a profit.

But this did not happen overnight. Instead, the majority sat in our entryway while the rest rode around in his trunk. Like John Grisham who sold his books from the trunk on his car in the early years, my husband would peddle these generators like a true salesman, taking cash, trading for things.

I remember when he had cleaned out another store of generators and completely filled up the entryway just after the front door. When I walked in from work I was greeted with this sea of fresh generators. I had been looking forward to watching their dwindling numbers as my husband sold them off, but here was a fresh batch. Even though he was making quite a bit of money, it was super annoying to step over them all the time.

He sold most for cash. The biggest trade he made was for a TDI Jetta, which would become his trusty daily driver. My husband looked over the car, then offered the guy a price under what he wanted to sell at. Of course the guy hesitated, so my husband immediately opens up his trunk to reveal the last two of his generators, and throws them in with his price. And that’s how we ended up with our first car that broke one million miles.

Eventually the stores caught on to what my husband was doing and raised the prices on their generators. Thus that was the end of the generator splurge.

Morale of the story: don’t be afraid to think outside the box and pursue something that works for you. We all thought he was nuts buying all those generators, but in the end he got enough money to fix up stuff around the house, plus he got a great reliable car.