Putnam County, NY Garage & Yard Sales: Frequency, Duration & Permits (2026)

The limit sits inside Chapter 195, Secondhand Dealers, as the carve-out that keeps an ordinary household sale from being treated as a licensed secondhand-dealing business. To qualify, under § 195-2B(1) the sale must be held on property occupied as a dwelling by the seller or owner, or on property a charitable or nonprofit organization rents or leases; the items must belong to the occupant or seller; no single sale can run past 96 consecutive hours; no more than three sales can occur in any rolling 12-month period; and none of the goods can have been bought for resale or taken on consignment.

Nothing in the chapter requires registering the sale with the Department of Consumer Affairs or the town, and no fee attaches to a sale that stays within those limits. The exemption exists because Chapter 195 otherwise regulates anyone who buys and resells secondhand goods, especially items containing precious metals or gems, and the Legislature carved household sales out of that licensing scheme rather than leaving them unaddressed.