Where to Look for Antique
It’s important to understand where antiques originate because many antique buyers make the mistake of misunderstanding the process by which antique items are found. There are many collectors and dealers who waste much of their time in looking for places that they believe are hot spots for these items, simply because they do not understand the process fully. It’s imperative that any good antique collector or dealer learn exactly where these items come from in order to succeed at their quest.
If you want to find fresh-to-the-market antiques and collectibles, you need to go where they are in great abundance, and where they come from! They start in people’s homes. This may not be 100% true, but it is for at least 99% of all the antiques you ever see.
Primarily, these homes full of antiques are going to be the older people in the community. Typically, the younger generation does not own them as frequently as the older one does. The reason for this is simply because many older people are from a generation that saved everything and frequently have kept it all. The origins of antiques come from the older people’s inabilities to throw away the old toaster that doesn’t work, or the old toys they have from the 1950s.
Knowing these two fundamental truths about where antiques originate, begs a big question. How will you utilize the knowledge of antiques forming in older people’s homes when you are deciding where to spend the majority of your time? I wasted many valuable years in trying to grasp the following principles.
1. You are going to need to see more fresh antiques in order to buy more. 2. You’ll have to simply look at more and more household accumulations if you wish to achieve this goal. 3. You’ll have to get into more older people’s homes in order to accomplish this particular goal.
Knowing and understanding these principles will put you light years ahead of your competition! It is likely that your fellow dealers or collectors will use one of five methods in finding their antiques. Sources include the places that you might have previously thought were good ideas - garage and estate sales, auctions, Goodwill or a similar store, flea markets, and “pickers”.
Since you understand the above principles, you now know that the place where you will find the most antiques is actually in people’s homes. If you want to be incredibly successful, you have to go where the antiques originate. Stay the course and focus on the concepts you learned above, and you will find yourself going very far in your search!
