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Posted on 08/16/2026 7:25:29 AM PDT by DFG
Some people’s trash becomes Michael Haskell’s treasure.
The 18-year-old buys abandoned storage units in the New York tri-state area and sells their contents. His business, Mike’s Unique Treasures, brought in about $135,000 in 2025 from eBay and auction sales, and another $85,000 from January through mid-July, according to documents reviewed by CNBC Make It.
Haskell’s entrepreneurial ventures didn’t start here. Growing up, he’d sell books for a few bucks on eBay or buy rarer Legos and hold onto them to turn a profit after they went out of production. “I never knew what I was going to be doing” career-wise, Haskell says. But “I always thought I was going to be doing something on my own.”
It’s a notion many young people share. Gen Z is contributing “disproportionately” to recent growth in business formation, according to a July report from the Bank of America Institute. In June, business application growth among Gen Z was more than double that of Millennials and Gen X. The bank’s internal data also points to founders “getting significantly younger,” the report says, noting that “with younger workers navigating a tough labor market, starting a business may be viewed as an alternative path to income growth and career advancement.”
Haskell turned to storage units partly to differentiate himself from his peers. “I was looking around and seeing everyone have a 4.0 GPA and being a little self-conscious,” he says, since he didn’t have the same. As he thought ahead to college, he says he wondered: “How was I going to be different from the crowd?”
(Excerpt) Read more at cnbc.com ...
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I was at an estate sale recently and there was a room full of 100s of NFL collectables. Rather than look up individual items, I took several photos with my phone and uploaded them to AI with instructions to identify the items and rank them by value.
AI did a pretty good job with the task, including a lot of detail about condition and markings to look for, and this was using the free AI version on the phone.
An automobile shop owner tells me the Snap-On brand is now made in China...
That is the premise of “Storage Wars” which had been on TV sine 2015 at least. Nothing new there
I think ideas like this are indicative of how AI will be used going forward, once someone uses one of these AI tools and sees how useful it is, ideas will explode in their mind they will try new things that were previously impossible.
For me the ability to write code, then make a readme file with the actual code and instructions on how to run it has been like a giant slap in the face to me waking me up to the possibilities.
It's not a gamble if you have a 'good friend' who works for the storage company and you cut him in.
eBay will ensure a 1099 is mailed to both him and the IRS come tax season.
Anthropic is currently being sued for millions by every publishing company and authors for all the books they copied illegally. Discovery is going to be very interesting.
I think it’s called being an entrapranure. There have been thousands of them over time coming up with a way to market and sell products. Melanie Perkins (Canva), Brian Chesky (Airbnb), Jan Koum (WhatsApp), Sara Blakely (Spanx). Items that are included in the theory of capitalism are things like The Pet Rock, The Post-it Note, The Cardboard Coffee Sleeve, and everything out of every auto junkyard in the US...thouands. And that doesn’t include the hubcap stores and even eating roadkill has different laws in the states saying everyuthing from who cares to no. There is no ferderal law against it. And then there’s British inventor Stephen Perry. He invented the rubber band. One man’s trash is another man’s treasure.
wy69
Not always. My sister and her husband don’t ever have to work again but 2 more years adds so much to their stash that they will do it. Their daughter will be a senior in high school this year so no point in retiring yet. Pension and 401ks. They’re set!
Just read a post, recently, about a 19 y.o. young man making $10K/mo pressure washing.
He’s his own boss and is working hard to support his soon to be wife and baby.
Good for him! Good for any of these entrepreneurs.
How many of the items are reported STOLEN ?
This kid does not need college.
True. But he has snagged a pretty good deal, using his mom's basement and garage for his own storage. He said he gave her $34,000 last year ($2,834/mo). Seems fair for all that space, as well as probably a share of the house internet and utility bills and possibly his food, too.
He discusses the costs breakdown and shows it in writing in the video.
Are you talking Hallmark cards, or baseball / trading cards?
“How much did those storage units cost him? It sounds like a gamble because the contents aren’t disclosed until you pay.”
In the article it states he pays about $500 for a unit.
“After buying a unit, typically for $500 or less, he’ll spend a few hours clearing it out before transporting, sorting, listing, and storing the contents at his mother’s home in Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey, until they sell. Haskell says he sometimes uses tools like Google Lens or ChatGPT, or cross-references eBay listings, to estimate the going rates for items he’s discovered.
Today, he estimates he spends 20 to 25 hours a week on his business. In the hundreds of hours he’s poured into his business, he’s gotten a feel for some of the things people tend to hold onto, but there are often still surprises, he says. Every owner and “every unit is different.”
Also from the article:
“His most lucrative bet came early on, when he says he spent $450 on a unit he learned had belonged to disgraced Manhattan art dealer Andrew Crispo. It contained a painting by Man Ray, a leading figure of the Dada and surrealist movements, as well as several sketches by modernist painter Walt Kuhn, which cumulatively sold for $36,000.”
That one unit gave him a third of his revenue. I wonder how frequently he’ll find one like that.
All trading cards. He fronted the money to get a guy started and the business has been up and running for several years. Making money.
I am an avid baseball card collector for several decades and he learned from me the basics. He does some baseball card trading, but he specializes in trading trendy cards.
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