Simon Leon has created Northwest Island Collections to help people find buyers for items they have had for years but no longer need or want

Many people have items in their homes that they no longer want, but they aren’t sure of the values of these items or how to find people who would want them. Simon Leon created Northwest Island Collections to help people find buyers for these unwanted items.  Simon realized that many of these items might be valuable to someone else.

His path to living on Whidbey and creating his business followed a serendipitous route common to many who have come to live on the island. He had studied meditation with a Zen teacher in Okayama, Japan, who was the founder of the One Drop Zen Monastery on Wahl Road in Freeland. His teacher sent him to Whidbey to assist the head monk in taking care of the monastery.

In 2002, he left the monastery and married his American wife, Jessica, who had been a student in Japan. His life on Whidbey began by creating a business as a self-employed landscaper.

Simon had always loved treasure hunting, and this love of treasure hunting became the inspiration for his new career path. .In 2013, he decided he wanted to make a career change. He began learning how to resell items online while continuing to run his landscaping business. Eventually, after several years of learning the business of reselling online, he found that the items he most enjoyed dealing in were in the category of antiques, collectibles and art.

He does the selling on-line, so there is a worldwide market for the items he buys and sells. After more than 10 years of dealing in antiques, collectibles, and art, he came to appreciate several factors:

• What gives an item “value” is not always immediately obvious.
• It’s often not easy for people to part with items they inherited from relatives and have owned for many years.
• There is an energetic component in every exchange, whether he is purchasing items from someone who no longer needs them, or selling an item to a collector.

Simon notes: “My greatest joy is in finding the ‘win-win-win’ whereby all three parties involved in a transaction are happy: the person who sells their item to me, the collector who purchases the item from me, and, of course, myself, as the intermediary.”

He adds: “Integrity is important to me as a dealer, and I go to great lengths to ensure that a fair price is paid to the clients who sell me their items for resale. Sometimes, the resale value of an item is not always known in advance - so if an item sells for a price which greatly exceeds my expectation, it is my policy to pay extra to the person who originally sold it to me.”

If you have any antique or collectible items you would like to sell. and you want to check with Simon Leon to see what they might be worth, give him a call at 360-661-7298 or send him an email at info@northwestislandcollections.  And, if you want to see if he has anything you would like to purchase, check his website: www.northwestislandcollections.com.