What’s your junk worth?
Top 10 mistakes when cleaning house

You could be tossing $100 bills in the trash every time you clean out the house or garage.

The values of ordinary-looking items have skyrocketed in recent years, according to Tony Hyman, host of “What’s It Worth” on CBS-TV. Because many valuables were inexpensive or look like junk, folks don’t realize how much these items are worth to today’s collectors. In turn, they get thrown away or sold on lawns for pennies.

The top 10 items you should never sell at a yard sale include:

10. Halloween decorations: Papier-mache, jack-o-lanterns and cardboard skeletons have value as does anything, even crepe paper decorated with cats and witches.

9. Banana-seat bicycles: In good condition, these 1970s toys bring $500 and up and can be sold with one phone call.

8. Costume jewelry: Plastic and rhinestones that cost $5 or less in the 1930s and 1940s frequently bring multiple hundreds of dollars today (a plastic 1940s frog pin recently sold for $4,800).

7. Christmas decorations: The season may be over, but collectors’ love of glass ornaments, Santa figures and early artificial trees of feathers or aluminum goes on.

6. PEZ dispensers: These candy toys remain a hot item, with record prices being set for those without feet.

5. Electric trains: Experts predict values to fall sharply in coming years and advise selling now. Lionel model trains from the 1950s can put thousands of dollars in your pocket.

4. Hawaiian shirts: If it’s all silk or rayon and has a colorful print, a shirt will likely bring between $50 and $1,000.

3. Cast-iron cookware: Any skillets, griddles, roasters, muffin pans and other cast-iron cookware made in the United States are likely to be valued from $10 to $1,500, especially lids and odd shapes.

2. Cigarette lighters: Values of the big names like Ronson(R), Zippo(R), Evans and Dunhill(R) can range from $5 to $5,000, so expert advice is essential.

1. Pottery marked with a maker’s name: A $130 yard sale vase was sold by its new owner for $39,000 with the help of an expert referred by Dr. Hyman.

Other common items with uncommon values include beer mugs, pocket knives, electric guitars, briar pipes, war souvenirs (even Vietnam), transistor radios, calculators, 78 and 33 rpm records, cap guns, auto owner’s manuals, cookie jars, nodder dolls, Disneyland souvenirs, lace, yo-yo’s (especially rhinestone studded), board games based on TV shows and hundreds of other items.

To find out if you own something valuable you need expert advice; then you need to find out who wants it at a fair price. There’s only one good buyer of cigar boxes in the country, and people who want sewing machines and cocktail shakers can be equally hard to find.

For 23 years, Hyman has been helping amateurs sell their possessions by publishing names, addresses, phone numbers (and now e-mail addresses) of experts like those you see on TV appraisal shows.

The 640-page, 10th edition of Hyman’s “Trash or Treasure: Guide to the Best Buyers” introduces readers to the top 1,000 collectibles experts in the United States and Canada. To order, send $29.95 plus $5 shipping to Trash or Treasure, Box 3028-B, Pismo, CA 93448. Credit card orders call (805) 773-6777 after 9 a.m. Pacific. Give the name of this paper when you order and you will also receive “What’s It Worth? The World’s Most Accurate Price Guide.”

“It’s like having your own private roadshow in your home,” says one reader, “but even better, because I didn’t have to stand in line for hours and could ask about hundreds of items, not just two.”

“People are a lot richer than they think,” Hyman says. “But most folks don’t know how and where to cash in.”

You don’t need to know whether you have a $5 fishing lure or a $5,000 lure, Hyman says, as long as you deal with honest experts. Ask them what you have. Experts will know, and the honest ones will pay you fairly.

When a toy 1966 Hot Wheels Volkswagon can be worth twice as much as a real car, it’s important to deal with the right buyer.