From the Los Angeles Times
COLUMN ONE
Bids on Lives Left Behind
At auctions of storage units, the contents are a mystery. Amid the junk buyers may find Rolexes and diamonds, or just someone else's sad story. By David Colker Times Staff Writer
May 9, 2006
The auction regulars arrive early in the morning, prepared for a day of bidding mostly on stuff they cannot see.
Some carry cups of coffee. One woman snuggles her pet Chihuahua under her coat.
Today could be the day they find treasure. Bidders have been known to snag diamonds. Rolex watches. Even the diaries of Paris Hilton.
But this is far from the rarefied formalities of Sotheby's or Christie's. It's a wind-swept self-storage facility near the end of a runway at the Riverside Municipal Airport.
During the last two decades, self-storage facilities like Airport Mini Storage have sprouted across the American landscape along freeways, under high-power electric lines, on land that could be used for little else. The self-storage business is booming thanks to a nation of pack rats who cling to such things as 8-track tapes and pants with waist sizes long surpassed.
But many renters lose their belongings when they cannot pay their bills. Or when they die. That has bred a little-known offshoot industry: legions of self-described recyclers who earn a living buying entire storage units at auctions, then peddling their bounty at flea markets, garage sales and on EBay.
Making money off of another person's misfortune requires a sharp eye for clues, some luck and a bit of stoicism when coming across the broken pieces of other people's lives.
"Sometimes you get a whole story out of someone's life," said Greg Daniels, among 30 bidders at the Riverside facility. "First you get the wedding pictures. Then you get the divorce papers. Then the drug paraphernalia, the letters from jail.
"You get the whole sad story."
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