Does anyone sell on eBay?

[ginlyn32]

Does anyone here sell on eBay?

Since I am not working right now, I have been thinking about either going back to school or starting up my own eBay business.

What I need is your experiences with buying and selling on eBay or similar websights.

Thanks and I will keep you all posted as to what I decide.

Ginger

[Alida]

I do sell on eBay as SierraBlueJay.  I use it mostly to sell things as I would at a yard sale (not a re-seller like many are).  This past month alone I put $375 in my bank account and cleared out a closet from selling things. I find it has a good audience for things and has been worth my time.

[willow2483]

I sold the clarinet I had in high school on EBay.  It was nice to get rid of it (I know I'll never play again) and I got $175  .

I've bought a lot of things on EBay.  The only problem I ever had was when I bid on a computer game for my dad.  After I won the auction, the seller emailed me, and in very broken English, said that he didn't actually have that game but that he would substitute something else that was similar.  I emailed back that was NOT acceptable, and luckily I hadn't paid yet.  The sale was cancelled.

[ginlyn32]

I think for experience, I will do the "clean out closets and garage" thing. I loathe having to set up and tear down for yard sales.

Plus, we don't really have any extra tables or anything to put the stuff on. It's mostly clothes. I also have some books and other misc. stuff to get rid of.

Ginger

[Brentwood]

I used to, but it hardly seems worth the bother these days. Years ago, there was less competition, and it was more like a giant garage sale/flea market; now many of the sellers who have the same types of items I have are selling in huge volume, often things new with tags.

By the time I take pictures of everything, upload the pictures, write the descriptions, pay the listing fees, package the items, pay final value fees and make a trip to the post office, I really don't feel like it was worth it. I can spend my time better doing other things.

Really, though, what you have to sell makes all the difference - if you have unique, in-demand items, it probably would be worth it. My husband wants to sell a popular discontinued guitar, and that'll be worth the effort.

[phred246]

My wife sells handmade doll jewelry and clothing on EBAY. She has close to 1000 feedbacks. One thing she finds handy is EBAY's TurboLister S/W. It lets you set up all kinds of defaults that can be used as templates, which makes creating future ads easier and faster. Also, set up a Paypal account. It protects both sides from fraud.

[Brentwood]

My wife sells handmade doll jewelry and clothing on EBAY. She has close to 1000 feedbacks. One thing she finds handy is EBAY's TurboLister S/W. It lets you set up all kinds of defaults that can be used as templates, which makes creating future ads easier and faster. Also, set up a Paypal account. It protects both sides from fraud.

Handmade doll clothes? Hmmm. What's your wife's seller name? I love homemade doll clothes.

[blue_bunny_paz]

You have to be VERY careful with eBay selling as you can find you've not made nearly as much as you think you have. By the time you've paid listing fees, final value fees and pay pal fees you often lose a big chunk.
I sold some comics for £30 but only ever saw £25 of it.

And if you're selling make sure you do a bit of research. Some things go for next to nothing, so check the prices things are on sale for. You don't want to, say, put up a horse ornament at the same time that someone else has something similar for a few cents less.

Bare in mind, half of the things listed on EBay never sell, and many things go for the starting price. Search for similar items (say, Powerpuff Girls Bag, for example) and do an advanced search and check the "finished auctions only" box to see how much the item really sold for.

It can be worth selling on things you have finished with, but unless you have a lot of money to buy stock with, and unless you do your research, you can find it's very hard to make money.

I'm not trying to be deliberately negative but you may find you can make a fair bit around Christmas time then next to nothing over Summer. Really research your market if you plan a business, it's not as easy as some people think.

If you have the right product you can do very well, but things like scrapboooking that you would think do well are really over saturated on eBay. 

[phred246]

My wife's current seller name on EBAY is tenderheartsdollfashions44.