For the fans of “Storage Wars” or “Auction Hunters” I bring you some information regarding some storage unit auctions in the Buffalo NY area.  Enjoy. Happy bidding!

Auction Hunters - Buffalo

Storage Units - Live Public Auction - Private Property
Nov 16, 2011  Wednesday 10:00 AM Bidder Registration Start at 9:30 AM	Please call 1-800-536-1401 x 110 for more information and questions about the auction.
	Sale held at: Colonial Mini Storage Click for directions  45 Gardenville Parkway, West Seneca, NY 14224
	DETAILS: Fleming – Unit # 391; Garbe – Unit # 227; Riverid – Unit # 435; Marinelli – Unit # 63; Willard – Unit # 385; Grant – Unit # 249; Walker – Unit # 17

Storage Units - Live Public Auction - Private Property
Nov 16, 2011  Wednesday 1:00 PM Bidder Registration Start at 12:30 PM	Please call 1-800-536-1401 x 110 for more information and questions about the auction.
	Sale held at: Lincoln Self Storage Click for directions  115 Great Arrow Ave, Buffalo, NY 14216
	DETAILS: Parks – Unit # E145; Lother – Unit # A105; Boger – H102; Ahman – Unit # D228

Are you in need of some inexpensive hardwood?  Do you like auctions, or just enjoy a good (perhaps great) deal?

Buffalo Hardwood Flooring Auction

There is a hardwood flooring auction going on at Auctions International.  They are located in Cheektowaga, NY and are the online auction site that CIL Asset Recovery utilizes.  CIL is located in Hamburg, NY.

Take a look for yourself (click this listing above).  You can bid online.  Bidding is priced per square foot of flooring and you are purchasing the entire lot when you place a bid.

STORAGE WARS – Buffalo, NY

Storage Wars - Buffalo Storage Unit Auction

Storage Units – Live Public Auction – Private Property

June 20, 2011

MONDAY 10:00 AM

Bidder Registration Start at 9:30 AM

Please call 1-800-536-1401 x 110 for more information and questions about the auction.

Sale held at: StorEase Self Storage Click for directions

33 Peuquet Parkway, Tonawanda, NY 14150

DETAILS:

Harrison 7-Fillmore Location; Kuntz 30-Fillmore Location

via Live Auction Schedule – Auctions International, Inc..

Over the past few years, as a commercial property owner in Lancaster NY, we have received many calls from small business owners and looking for a small and cheap office space. Often times, smaller space can be hard to find. Realtors won’t list the properties since there isn’t enough money in it for them to bother. Small property owners aren’t sure how to get it out there other than Craigslist. If you are familiar with the Commercial Real Estate section on Craigslist, you will know how quickly your property gets pushed down the list. Without a manual intervention to move it back up, your office space listing is hardly noticed.

I finally decided to set aside some time to create a web site dedicated to Office Space in WNY. You can find the site at:

WNY Office Space

For the time being, we are offering free listings of your commercial property.  You can purchase a featured listing for $10 per month.

WNY Office Space

Every user will have an account control panel to manage their listings and their listing agent profile.   In fact, I would encourage you to list your property if it is occupied, but coming up for lease in the near future. We will be creating a property alert system for users so that they can be notified when a property becomes available.

Feel free to use the contact form at http://www.wnyofficespace.com/contact/ to ask questions or request features.

December 2010 saw the premier of Storage Wars, A&E’s entry into the hot antiques and collectibles show space.  There are other shows with a similar theme such as Auction Hunters on Spike TV.

If you are based in the Buffalo area (WNY region), you too can join the storage locker auction frenzy and hope for the best (see below for details on a Jan 19, 2011 auction).  There are always storage auctions throughout the WNY region and one local site that will alert you to local storage locker auctions is auctionsinternational.com.

Auction Hunters - Spike TV

Expect the competition to be high and be prepared to meet local storage locker buyers who are fed up with all of the newbies (YOU!) entering their space. You win some, you lose some in the auction market but the big wins should make up for the duds.  With more competition fighting for the goods, the margins will get tighter and tighter. You should also ask yourself a couple of questions before bidding.

1. Do I have room for all of this junk (smelly junk)?
2. Will my significant other stick by me as I bring loads of stuff home?

The shows on TV are certainly fabricated to a degree. I am sure that they have made big finds in the past, but not at every auction. If you read the disclaimer the precedes the airing of the show, you will see that it essentially says that the items are examples of the finds that were made in the past.  My hunch is that they seed a single item for each show.  The hosts are good actors, but it is fairly obvious that they are “finding” items that have been placed to tell the story of the past find.

If you go to a storage auction, you might be entertained, or you might simply become disillusioned. I can tell you this, you will have a different view of shows like Storage Wars after your live auction experience.

Private Property - Live Auction - Storage Units
Jan 19, 2011 WED. AT 10:00 AM	Auction Starts at 10:00 AM – Bidder Registration starts at 9:30 AM Please call 1-800-536-1401 for more information and questions about the auction.
	Sale held at: Great Lakes Mini Storage Click for directions 1711 Union Road, West Seneca, NY 14224
	DETAILS: Koeppel – Unit E-4; Varley – Unit C-6; Weber – Unit B-24; Seifest – Unit J-2 + Outside Space (Boat); Karey – Unit B- 14, G-6, F-7; Cooper – Unit C-14

PS: If you come across my brother’s birth certificate, please forward it on.

This was an interesting find. When you are pulling apart a house that was built in 1889, you are likely to find some interesting things.  I must admit, there haven’t been too many with this latest project.  However, the plumbers had reading material in the upper bathroom and left a section of newspaper behind.  I was hoping to find some advertising from companies that are still around today, but there weren’t any that I recognized.  One interesting ad is for Zimmerman lumber. As it turns out, one of the family members (George J. Zimmerman) was the former mayor of the City of Buffalo.

Zimmerman Lumber Ad from 1919

If you are living in, or used to live in, Lancaster, you will appreciate this fantastic map from 1892.

Lancaster NY Map 1892

It is interesting to see the factories that dotted that town of Lancaster way back when.  The railroad, and the waterway allowed for transport of goods.  Take a look at the high resolution version.   You can view the high resolution image by clicking on the thumbnail below.

Lancaster NY Map from 1892

On August 24th, Channel 2 News and the Boy’s and Girl’s club of Buffalo are teaming up to collect backpacks and school supplies for kids in need. Check out the information on the channel 2 site to see how you can help.

2 Pack a Backpack

Channel 2 and the Boys and Girls Clubs will be at six Wal-Mart locations across Western New York from 7am to 9pm on August 24th collecting school supplies.

2 Pack A Backpack Locations

• Wal-Mart SuperCenter, 5033 Transit Road, Clarence, NY
• Wal-Mart 100 Thruway Mall, Cheektowaga
• Wal-Mart 4255 McKinley Parkway, Hamburg
• Wal-Mart 2055 Niagara Falls Blvd., Amherst
• Wal-Mart 555 Porter Road, Niagara Falls
• Wal-Mart 5783 S. Transit Rd., Lockport
• Wal-Mart 10401 Bennett Rd.,Fredonia

A friend of mine started a new clothing company in Buffalo. They are starting with T-Shirts and branching out from there. They have some cool stuff. Take a look at City Love Clothing

A friend of mine pointed out a real cool tool available at the Erie County website (erie.gov). The site is an internet mapping system. No, this isn’t like Google Maps, or Local from Live.com. It is much, much, much more. I have included a screen shot to show you some of the features and overlays. There is a nice search function that even allows you to search by name. Really. Are you wondering what Daniel Briere’s lot looks like, or where he lives? I am serious. You can easily locate this information. It is public record, after all.

One of the most useful functions, in my opinion, is the overlay of lot lines. This will show you the shape of a parcel of land or property in the county. This is especially useful when you are shopping for real estate and the listing agent doesn’t have that information available for you. You can use the flood plain overlay, a wetland map overlay and a number of other overlays such as school districts, and municipalities.

Do you prefer to view maps like you can at Google, with an aerial photo from a satellite? You can. In the left hand column, click on the selection to show the “2002 orthophotography” and click “refresh map”. You can use the “Pan” tool to drag the map.

Erie County Internet Mapping Project

The tools within the application take some getting used to, that is why I am linking to the help page as a start. Once there, click on the link that reads “Internet Mapping System”.

A couple of quick notes.

1. Pop up blockers will probably interfere with some functions. You should turn them off, or hold your ‘ctrl’ key while clicking on links within the map.
2. This works properly in IE (Internet Explorer web browser), but not in Firefox.