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How we got rid of our stuff. The short and sweet version. We sold about 90% of all of our household belongings (or more) and made roughly $3500.
Here's how we did it:
1) Garage Sales - 5 of them. It was a pain to drag our things in and out of the garage but it did pay off. We yielded the most money from them. I advertised on Facebook and put several signs out. We also made sure to participate in the City Wide Garage sale.
2) Consignment - Here We Grow Again is a Kansas City Area huge kids consignment. They hold events throughout the year and offer a tagging service. If you tag everything (very time consuming) you can make 70% of the profit but the tagging service still gives 40% and none of the time involved. We made about $220 effortlessly - they donate all the leftovers to local charities. Bonus!
3) Facebook Marketplace - I sold many items this way. It got very tiresome to arrange pickups for a $5 item though so I eventually only used it for bigger items and made them come to me. I never had to use Craigslist because Facebook Marketplace was so responsive but it would be a good choice as well.
4) Half Price Bookstore - While you won't get a lot of money - this is a great options for books, dvds and music.
5) Game Stop - we took all of our old consols and video games there. They took what they could sell and the rest we donated. We got a nice chunk of store credit. They give more when you take store credit vs. cash.
6) Bike Shops - check your local bike shops to buy back quality bikes you might have lying around. We went to the Re-cyclery in Lawrence, KS.
7) Goodwill - of course you can't sell everything. We took a couple loads to Goodwill for donation. No money but you can write off the value of the items donated for taxes.
8) Local swap groups - we contacted a group called Johnson County Pay it Forward to come get some of our garage sale leftovers. What we loved about this is that our things would go toward other people in our own community how needed the help.
9) Bless your family or friends - We had a few things that were in good condition or that were family items that we passed along as we would not need them anymore.
10) Digitize all paper and then recycle - Easier said than done - it only costs your time and saves you a ton of space.
Other quick tips:
Involve the whole family - our kids did really well knowing their stuff would turn into cool things we got to do as a family. Time together is more important to them than any "thing" we could have. Plus they had fun stetting up a lemonade stand!
Don't expect too much - We didn't price things at garage sales but I was shocked by how little people would offer to pay. Selling an item for anything was better than getting nothing so we took several low offers.
Give yourself Grace - it's hard to let go. It's a process and if you aren't ready to part with something yet, don't. Hang onto it for a few more months and then revisit. There were a couple of items John and I had a hard time with even though they had no function or purpose anymore. We made the other person get rid of it so we didn't have to see it go.
Take your time - It's a process. You took many years to accumulate it. It might take some time to let go of it.