eBay beginner seeks help

Regarding good deals on eBay, I think that those of us who say that there are too few good deals on ebay are a little spoiled.

Equipment that cost thousands new, can be bought for next to nothing on ebay, at prices many times below that of dealers. This especially applies to electronic test equipment.

i

It gets better. I go to yard sales. I bought a dozen casino slot machine shaped piggy banks. This guy must have been a slot worker, or a player, but he had lots of stuff the casinos give away to their players. I got 12 of them for $6.

I sold them all for $9.95 each in my store.

I bought a small child's lamp with bears on it, and a shade that lit up with pictures on it when you turned on the bulb. $1

I sold it for $23.

I bought a box of wooden Christmas ornaments from the fifties. One box of one dozen inch tall ornaments had the original ink stamp of 59 cents. There were about 30 ornaments in the box. They were cute as hell.

I got $42 for the box.

I bought eight hand painted real egg Easter eggs at the same yard sale. A quarter.

I sold them for $18.

I sold a Burro travel trailer I bought for $200 for $4300! My best ebay thing.

Wifey has long since quit ragging on me when I bring "stuff" home from yard sales. Hoo, boy, I heard about that trailer until the guy came to pick it up. Now she is an ebay junkie, too. She buys lots of quilting stuff, all her printer ink, and boxes of yarn on ebay. She gets huge boxes of yarn for a few bucks and gives it to the ladies at church who make afgans for the childrens cancer ward.

Ebay is good.

Steve

"Steve Smith" wrote

Good ebay tips and experience snipped

RULE NUMBER ONE, AND THE MOST IMPORTANT ONE -

Almost whatever you are looking for, there will be another one along soon. If the price isn't a deal, pass and wait for another. If it's that rare or you want it that bad, then let your wallet guide you. But for most stuff, you can win with patience.

A BIG TIP -

When searching, go to the drop down for NEWLY LISTED ITEMS. Sometimes people will put stuff in there at a very low Buy It Now price when they don't know the value. The first guy who sees it usually snags it. Just like a yard sale.

Steve

If a person thinks there aren't many good deals on ebay, they couldn't find an elephant with a nosebleed in a mall parking lot after a six inch snowfall.

Steve

Hi Ed,

I've been selling on eBay for several years now. My User ID is sage_tool.

For Selling:

There are a number of "community" boards on eBay. Take a look here:

might find it helpful to browse through those boards and ask questions. The Seller Central board is the one to go to if you are thinking of selling. There are a number of regulars who are always there answering questions.

Personally, I haven't found the alt.marketing.online.ebay Usenet group to be too helpful. It seems to me that there is a lot of complaining and not much help on there. But it's worth poking your head in.

If you are serious about selling, then here's a couple of points:

What everyone says about pictures is true. You need to take good, clear pictures. This is a skill that can only be developed over time. Most people cannot just pick up a camera and shoot a decent picture the first time. In addition to taking the pictures I photoshop many of my pictures to knock out the background and give them a bit more professional touch.

As a seller, you really need to accept PayPal. About 80% of my sales are made through PayPal. Yes, PayPal is a pain but the marketing advantage outweighs the problems.

I always reveal defects as forthrightly as I can. I never knowingly conceal anything. Funnily enough, that doesn't seem to reduce the selling price!

I start nearly all my live auctions a 1c with no reserve. I've sold plenty of $1,000+ items that way. People want to bid, it's a psychological thing. There is very little risk of losing the item for the penny (though it does happen occasionally, see 7562832487 &

7553465153 for instance). Obviously, that doesn't work for everybody.

People who buy tools tend to be reasonable, intelligent and business savvy. There are very, very few problem customers. In something like

5,000+ sales, I can say that I have only had one buyer who tried to cheat me.

For Buying:

I buy a lot of stuff on eBay. Believe it or not, I can often find things on eBay that I can turn around and sell for a 50% markup. But that's not most of my purchases. Most of them are for things that I use.

I've probably bought 500 items on eBay. Everything from a skate board for my son to a CNC Mill. I can't recall any one of those purchases as being anything but positive.

Yes, there are scams. And you do need to use intelligence. Unfortunately, cheating your neighbor is a part of the human makeup. Maybe I'm overdue for one.

Here's an interesting web site:

Type in something like Craftsman and you'll get listings where people have misspelled the name.

Wonder if this guy will ever figure out why nobody is interested in his saw:

As a buyer, you should use PayPal and fund your purchases with your credit card not your bank balance. That way, if the item is not as advertised or if it doesn't show up, you are covered with PayPal's Buyer protection. If PayPal doesn't see it your way, then you just do a chargeback through your credit card company.

Misc:

I use a different ID for buying and selling. Feedback is somewhat of a game and good feedback is much more important for a seller than it is for a buyer. In fact, feedback is virtually meaningless for a buyer. I don't want to risk my good selling feedback on a bad buy. Also, I might not want the seller to know that I just bought his "Cratsman" tool and relisted it for twice the price.

eBay claims that the Business & Industrial segment of their business is growing at 60% Per annum. My experience would lead me to believe that their number is a bit optimistic. However, I'd still say that it is growing at 40%. Even using my more conservative number, that doubles every two years.

I estimate that eBay is hitting about 1/2 of 1% of the world market for the stuff that I sell. Put those figures together and you are looking at a very attractive dynamic market.

Take the big plunge. It's fun, and you'll probably come out a winner.

George.

george at sagetool dot com.

I am not sure if that is truly a reason why no one wants that jigsaw. I sold a old jigsaw for only about $4.99. Otherwise, your post was excellent.

i

It happens that is the very thing I'm most interested in buying, but not in selling.

-- Ed Huntress

"SteveB" wrote in news:BwGhf.1931$1x.1216 @fed1read06:

I snagged a very nice Brown & Sharpe/Tesa thread pitch micrometer like that. It was listed for $20.00 BIN. It had most of the anvils, the seller also had a 1-2" with the missing anvils listed for $20.00. By the time I finished buying the 0-1" the first someone bought the 1-2". Still a screaming deal on a $400.00 (without anvils) micrometer, but it would have been nice to get them both.

Cripes. Just when you think you're covered, though, Martin Luther will show up and nail a list of demands to your door.

-- Ed Huntress

Ignoramus29530 wrote in news:3eIhf.8265$ snipped-for-privacy@fe37.usenetserver.com:

If you did a search for "Craftsman Jig Saw" you would not find it. He spelled Craftsman wrong.

That's right, but even if he did spell Craftsman right, the jigsaw would likely not sell anyway.

i

Ignoramus29530 wrote in news:YULhf.5359$ snipped-for-privacy@fe83.usenetserver.com:

Sorry, I mis-read what you wrote. I see what you're saying now. But that one has the "rare" magnet drive :)

And while this widget may be considered somewhat nifty to the neighbor kid, it may be a wonderous prize to a left-handed person who owns only a right-handed widget.

Ed Stay away from E-bay. It is additicting as a drug and will suck untold hours of time from your life if your not careful. If there isn't a 10 step program for e-bayers then there will soon be one. E-bay will suck up as much or more time than these boards and newsgroups. If you don't heed the above advise then also be aware that there are lots of e-mail scams that come along with e-bay. Don't ever click a link from e-bay or paypal and you'll be ok. lg no neat sig line

Selling stuff on ebay is extremely addictive.

It has all elements of gambling, but unlike gambling, it is actually profitable. Which is not to say that it is good, but there are fewer reasons to stop it, it is harder to stop. I am not sure if selling stuff on ebay is the right way to spend my time, but I cannot stop. As soon as I empty some space, I go out and buy a truckload of stuff somewhere. It is out of control to some extent. Fortunately, this addiction does not cost money, and I get free tools and stuff, but it is a huge drain on my time.

i

If there are likely to be few bidders for an unusual or heavy item, a one cent starting price is not a good selling strategy. Big ebay sellers like Reliable have enough traffic to get the bids- a guy selling a drill press out of his garage may not. If you're selling a Biesemeyer fence, it will probably get bid up to a fairly high price. A Van Norman horizontal mill, fine machine that it is, probably won't attract the bids like a Bridgeport will so you might as well set a realistic minimum bid. If someone close by wants it they will pay the minimum. I mostly buy on Ebay and I'm sad to say that more sellers seem to be setting higher starting prices on such items. At least it's better than reserve pricing. If I'm really interested in an item with a reserve I'll ask the seller what the reserve is. But usually when I see "Reserve Not Met" I go on and never look back. The reserve is usually ridiculous and the auction is a waste of time.

I used to sell alot of books on ebay. Some science fiction and technical books. Nobody sells books for much at garage sales. Usually under a buck.. Best one was a metallurgy book I paid 50 cents for and sold for 90 bux. I have sold stuff to people from all over the world... Australia, Switzerland, Finland, Argentina.... Just write an honest ad ad see what happens. Oh if anyone needs a Machinerys Handbook I have a couple of the compact

18th editions. Make offer

How do you make that pay? I've got lots of good books, but they're heavy to ship even at "bound printed material" rates. Do you sell 'em in bundles, or ???

I simply tell the buyer to send a money order and I send them the books. They and I are satisfied with the transaction. I usually toss something else like a bit of literature in the box just to sweeten the deal.