Are You a Regifter?

Seinfeld may have secured the word in our lexicon, but the practice of "regifting" goes back way before the popular sitcom. Do you have a stash of gifts you've never opened but think could be perfect for someone else?

Regifters are owning up on Regiftable.com, where people are posting their regifting stories in a contest for the top three tales. Prizes include Seinfeld and The Office DVDs, along with autographed copies of The Art of Regifting by Barbara Bitela.

The regifting web site is run by Money Management International, a credit counseling company, which basically recommends regifting as a budget strategy—if it's done well. There's a "Regifting 101" section, where you can find some tips on acceptable and unacceptable regifting.

Some tips, you'd hope, are obvious and unnecessary: "Never give partially used gift cards...Signed books and monogrammed items are off limits." (Judging by some of the stories on the site, however, these may not be so obvious.)

But some tips, including these, are a tad helpful:

• New, unopened gifts only. A general rule of thumb: If you have to dust it off, it is not regiftable, the site intones. (Regiftable? That may be an even newer word.) 

• Use common sense. Make sure to regift to someone who will not show the gift to the original gift giver.

• Don't just give the unopened gift to unload it. Ask, will the recipient appreciate it?

I like one of the last suggestions: give the unused, unwanted gift to a charity that will put it to good use, but only if you think someone else will truly like it.

Lifehacker's Rick Broida has another suggestion: You can whip up pretty, printable gift certificates for any kind of "personal" gift. Might I suggest babysitting a friend's kids? We parents love that.

The kids have given us homemade gift certificates, though my husband is still trying to collect on tennis games promised by our 13-year-old. (Good luck with that.)

Not sure I should admit this in print, but we've regifted a few kids' toys when my kids were younger. Kids get so many birthday presents and go to so many birthday parties, there's no need to open them all up. But you've got to use good judgment and not pull out five-year-old, dusty gifts that no one will want.

Where do you stand on regifting? Is it ever a good idea?