I love Ebay.....I saved and made $$$$

by HappyDad 19 Replies latest jw friends

• 

  AloneinOh

  Oh yeah! Ebay is great. You need to be careful though....don't get caught up in the excitement of the auction and pay more for something than it's worth. I have been on it for about 4 or 5 years now and see it happen all the time. I see far too many people get excited and pay more for something than you could buy it new for. I have also gotten some outstanding deals.

  You can sell ANYTHING on ebay. There is always someone out there waiting to buy what you have.....no matter what it is. Type in keywords like smelly, nasty, booger, poop, etc..... you'll be surprised at what people are bidding on.

  If you plan on selling more than a couple items, get a PayPal account. Personally, I won't even bid on something that I can't pay for with Paypal. It has to be rare or I need it desperately before I will fool with a money-order. I know many other people that are the same way.

  If you are selling smaller items, get a kitchen scale from wally-world. You can find shipping costs online. I think USPS priority for under 5lbs is 3.95 anywhere in the 48. Include the charges in the auction ad. Some sellers do not put anything in their ads and then when it's over they will tack on an outrageous amount for "handling charges." These are ok, just don't over-do it.

  If you have a quantity of an identical product, don't sell them one right after the other. You'll flood the market and after the first one or two you won't get squat from the rest. I bought some high dollar tools from a guy that made the mistake of putting in his ad that he had a whole bunch of these from a factory that closed. After the first few sold for nearly 75% of original price I got mine for 5% of original. I bought 3 of them before the guy caught on.

  Have fun!
• 

  deddaisy

  BUY ON EBAY !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
• 

  JustTickledPink

  before you list it on Ebay, you should scan the information for someone who will archive it all.
• 

  scootergirl

  I agree. Some of the sellers really go nuts on shipping!

  I always check feedback too. That is very important to me to buy from someone that has good feedback.

  And as far as having a paypal account, I will not buy from a seller who doesn't take paypal. It is so much easier paying for it right from my pc.

  Aloneintheoh, good advice! As far as selling multiple items I have noticed when some sellers list them back to back on ebay and I think how silly! Lately I have been buying Italian Charms for my bracelet and have noticed that when I have lost an auction I have gotten a "second chance" email from seller (meaning first seller didn't follow thru w/auction OR seller has multiple items) offering me the item for my highest bid. Works for me!

  Do any of you buyers "snipe"? That is my favorite! Here is the program I use. Very seldom do I lose an auction when I snipe! http://www.auctionstealer.com/home.cfm
• 

  beebee

  I buy and sell too and have figured out a few tricks. When buying,

  1. Do your homework and decide ahead of time what it is worth to you. Don't forget to include the shipping costs when assessing value. Some sellers pad the shipping because they don't pay a percentage to eBay like they do on final value, and people get more excited and often bid things higher when they start low (auction fever ya' know). I stopped doing that because some buyers complain about high shipping (like they can't read ahead of time) and I was worried it would hurt my feedback.
  2. I usually don't bid until the last minute and put my max bid in the proxy bidder. That serves two purposes, 1. I don't cause the bidding to go higher by bidding early and letting competitors keep bidding too. Secondly, I don't get a chance to have second thoughts and pay more than I should.
  3. If I don't want to be around at the end, I use auctionsniper.com. For a few cents they'll do the last minute sniping (that's what coming in at the last second and bidding is called) for you.

  As a seller, I have found that nickle and dime stuff isn't worth placing. Sometimes the fee sucks up the entire price! I try to set my price relatively low but not so low I'll be sick if it sells. Also watch the competition, sometimes timing is everything. Make your ad as detailed as possible. I sell my kids clothes sometimes and I list any defects and sometimes measurements. I do often package multiple items in a lot. Just make sure they are similar quality as one weak piece often holds down the price on the whole lot. Donate the crap to Goodwill.

  Good luck. Usually I find I get more than I thought I would, and pay far less than I thought I would.
• 

  mkr32208

  A good program for ebay use is stamps.com they will send you a free 5lbs scale when you sign up and for $49.99 you can get a 50lbs scale that plugs directly into a USB then when you weigh your item the computer automaticly prints out the correct postage amount and shipping labels!

  As someone who's sold a bit I'm inclined to be more lienient about S/H. There's no doubt that some sellers over do it but when you figure out your time and REAL cost shipping it isn't cheap! Here's an example; I sell a video game and charge $5.00 shipping and handling- The padded envelope is $1.16 and the stamp is anywhere from .80-1.36 depending on the size of the instruction booklet so my total s/h expenses are about 2.50 right? WRONG I had to drive to Wallmart and get the envelope that is time and gas! I have to drive to the post office to MAIL the envelope that is time and gas! I figured it out once and it actually cost me about 7.25 to mail a video game... of course if your mailing multiple items that price comes down and if you go with stamps.com that saves the post office trip so you save some (but you have to buy the labels to print the stamps so it's still not free!)

  I sold a bowflex about 6 months ago and charged $200 shipping and handling I got hate e-mail from all sorts of whack jobers about how I would dare to charge that much for s/h! When if finally sold we packed it up and had to use 4 rolls of packing tape to reseal the boxes,,, cost $6.00 per roll. Then it had to be shipped UPS as it was to large for USPS so the closest center is about 30 miles one way so thats about 4.5 gallons of gas at 2 a gallon then we had to stand in line for about 30 min... my time is not free! So that is another 5 bucks... but this MF was HEAVY so my wife came along to help so $5 for her too! Then we had to pay the girl across the street $5 to watch the kids while we were gone... So we get all that expense and then the shipping cost... $215... Total=263 plus a whole afternoon gone... Don't assume that a high shipping and handling means that someone is trying to screw you over!
• 

  beebee

  Good point on the shipping. I had a lady bitch because several pairs of kids jeans cost $9 to ship. I thought that was cheap since I was recycling a box. If I'd had to add the cost of the box it would have been as much as $3 higher! I opened up a UPS account because they are often cheaper than USPS, and I can drop it off just up the street or arrange for p/u if its heavy. Plus they include insurance. Now you can buy priority mail with insurance online too. I bought stickers to print out labels here, and I think I got the sticker paper from USPS for free, some smaller boxes from UPS free. If you sell often it pays to look into it.
• 

  AuntieJane

  I also buy and sell on eBay. I hate the way we sellers are nickeled and dimed to death, esp. with the Paypal fees. Sometimes I don't list Paypal in my ads, and am happier to take personal checks if the buyer feedback is over 25 or 50 w. only positive feedbacks.

  Another tip: When I've seen something on QVC, or Infomercials that I might like, I go first to eBay. I have bought the same new clothes on eBay that are selling on QVC ...and saved a lot of $$.

  eBay is definitely Buyer Beware; read the fine print. I try to keep my ads simple but cover all bases. Some Sellers ads get so wordy that I end up skipping over them and move on to someone else.
• 

  HappyDad

  Hey gang.......thanks for all the good ebay tips.

  I agree on Paypal. I won't buy or sell unless it is Paypal. The aviation headset I sold.....I charged $9.00 shipping, took it to the post office to mail out "priority mail" this morning. The shipping and insurance cost $8.50. Pretty close guess on my part. But the box I bought earlier this week was $2.63 at the UPS store. From now on I will keep boxes to reuse instead of throwing them away. Once I list the book mentioned in my opening topic, I'll be curious to see how much I get for it.

  I've got to get into the attic and see what I might be able to get a few $$$ for. Found my old pre computer days electronic typewriter with word processer in a closet. A good typwriter was as necessary for prepairing talks as a nice bookbag back then. Sure did type a lot of talks and meeting parts on it. Wonder if I should list it under WT talk prepairer? I see a lot of WT books and bound volumes on ebay and someone is actually buying a lot of them. This past summer, I loaded up 35 years worth of literature and took it to Goodwill. There were a few really old publications in those boxes. Oh well........I still have the Faith On The March Book by A.H. Macmillan (1957) I'll list that too and see what happens.

  For now........it's time to get ready for the Jets vs. Steelers game.

  Have a good weekend.

  HappyDad

  
  
  
  
• 

  scootergirl

  If you ship USPS Priority Mail..the boxes are free. You can even have them delivered to your house along w/tape and labels. Just go usps.com and place your order.