West-side neighborhood consumed by growing yard sale
INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) — Barring inconvenient weather, the 300 block of South Vine Street on the city’s west side will be loaded with traffic, people and noise this weekend for what neighbors call a “flea market” that is held on one of the resident’s yards.
The city has been out here twice to investigate but the inspections have been during the week when nothing is happening.
“It is like a variety store, I call it a flea market. That is not a yard sale,” said Bill Howard, who can hardly stand the weekends these days and says the city isn’t helping. “Nobody will do anything.”
Just before 7 a.m. most weekend mornings, trucks and trailers loaded with merchandise are unloaded onto waiting tables and tents in the front yard of the house. Howard started taking pictures and has filed at least one complaint with the Department of Business & Neighborhood Services.
“It started out being every couple of months, every month, something like that. Then it expanded to a couple times a month,” Howard said. “I think by the end of last year, it was about three times a month, whenever the weather permitted. This year, anytime it is a nice weekend, you can expect it.”
Caesar Perez lives in the house that holds the sale.
He said he makes a living selling a variety of merchandise not just in his yard, but at flea markets. Perez said that he holds a yard sale when the weather is decent, but not every weekend.
“It shall be unlawful for a person to hold or allow to be held more than two (2) garage sales at the same location during the same calendar year,” reads a Marion County ordinance to regulate yard and garage sales.
A spokesperson for the Department of Business & Neighborhood Services sent a statement to I-Team 8.
We will be sending an inspector back out to check on the property and make sure activities that are not allowed are not taking place. In order to issue a violation, we are required to get photos of the violation occurring.
If the property owner is selling items that are not personal tangible property, so items that are purchased in bulk for resale, it is not considered a garage sale. However, these types of sales are not allowed in residential areas and the property owner would be issued a violation.
Department of Business & Neighborhood Services
Howard says he has endured months of people parking in his yard, the street blocked by traffic and a constant stream of people and noise and their trash left in his yard. He is ready to give up on the house and move on.
“I’m going to sell my house,” said Howard. “I’m tired.”
Howard told I-Team 8 that cars parked in front of his house by people attending the yard sale/flea market have blocked the postal service from delivering the mail and that on more than one occasion he has been forced to drive through his own yard to get to the street