Do you think an online consignment store could work for home furnishings? The seller would take pictures and describe the item and the buyer would bid on it. The difference between ebay is that it would a local service.

It would take some serious marketing, SEO and patience.
I think most people would still look at ebay and because of the enourmous product range and they are probably more likely to find what they are after.

do you already have items?, that would be another problem convincing people to use you other than ebay, especially when you have no other sellers.

www.stickybeek.com.audoes something similar in my area. they sell on consignment for car dealers etc.
Maybe you could approach some second hand furniture stores and offer to sell their stuff on consignment.

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The natural place for people to turn to is ebay because of the branding and the ability to earn the full purchase price in most consignment situations you only receive 50% of the purchase price. The one thing you have in your favor is shipping cost because the item can be delivered locally at considerable less expense.

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I would be careful of an online consignment of furniture. Once scratch could dramatically lower the price of an item and you could do it in the moving process

The other problem is the cost of shipment some home furnishings can be very heavy and cost a ton to ship.

I think anytype of consignment is a great idea because you are using other peoples products to make money. The biggest question I have is the logistics of how you would run the company would people bring you the furnishings? Or would they just send pictures? How would returns work? These can be complicated questions to answer when you are dealing with other peoples properties.