Among Chris Lavelle’s collection of treasures on display at the 39th annual Wareham Historical Society Antiques Faire Saturday morning was a cigar store Indian figurine he calls “Punch.”

“He is estimated at about $5,000,” Lavelle said of the figurine. “A lot of customers at the Wareham antiques show were taking photos with Punch.”

Punch, like most of Lavelle’s other antiques, was acquired through a house cleaning job. Lavelle, who opened Not Your Average Antiques on Cranberry Highway last December, said he began the business through cleaning out houses people were selling in the Osterville area. He still operates the business like this.

“Realtors use us to clean [the houses] out,” Lavelle said. “The owners take everything they want, and then we come and take everything else.”

Lavelle said trading his cleaning services for some of the items in the houses has become quite profitable over the last few years, as Massachusetts’ property tax rate has forced some people out of their multi-million-dollar waterfront homes.

“We ran into one guy whose taxes were $40,000,” Lavelle said of one customer. “They have to sell their homes, and these antiques get left behind.”

Lavelle said he has been seeing more and more people purchase antique furniture to refurbish and use to furnish their homes.

"[The market] is just getting busier and busier," Lavelle said. "It's the new trendy thing to refurbish furniture, and paint it, and make things different than they were before."

But the business is not without its hitches. Wareham’s confusing, hot-button junk licensing issue, which is slated to be addressed at Fall Town Meeting, directly affects Lavelle’s business. The town only has five junk licenses, which are needed to operate any business that sells secondhand items. FOur of the licenses are currently held and Lavelle is one of over 60 other business owners in town who may need a license -- but he is unclear on that point.

“The state says anything used is junk … but [the town of Wareham] did give me a license to sell antiques,” Lavelle said. “I think they have to redefine [the law], or get more licenses for the town.”

Lavelle said the ideal situation would be for the town to get unlimited junk licenses, especially because the Cape Cod area is a popular antiquing spot.

“There is a lot of New England furniture on the Cape,” Lavelle said. “As people come and go, they sell their cottages off, and antiques become available.”