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Originally Posted by krash
I sell on eBay, but am not interested in selling for others and here is the reason why... it takes a lot of time for research of item for correct price range and accurate written description, quality pictures, cost for shipping supplies, taxes for IRS, and putting my reputation at risk for the sale of your item. Be prepared to only get 40% of the sale price AFTER costs associated with the sale: ebay listing cost, mailing and packaging costs, PayPal costs, and gas to post office.
I would suggest investing the time to learn how to sell it yourself. It's not as easy as you might think. Or, sell it locally on Facebook Marketplace, and be prepared for bottom dwellers and no-shows.
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Well said. I’ve sold (and bought) on eBay for a good twenty years and have a 100% feedback rating of something over 1300 sales. My current project is selling all my CDs (over 400) and most of my DVDs (over 200). I search on eBay for, say, what a specific CD is being offered for and price it equal with the lowest or a little lower. That is almost never above $10. (Yesterday I sold one CD for $10.) The absolute lowest price I’ll offer is $9, but sometimes I bundle several related CDs together to reach that. For example, last week I sold about fifteen Bob Dylan CDs for $15. On a $10 sale, I make $6.50. (That’s after buying shipping through eBay for a good discount.) If shipping costs more than my estimate, that extra cost comes out of my profit. But for one CD, the packing material costs me about fifty cents. I have to pack it carefully, which takes time. They I have to drive it to the post office or Pack’n’Ship, which takes time. (My electric car costs about two cents a mile in electricity, so that’s forty cents, but if I had a big gas SUV the same driving might cost me $3 or more.) Lots of CDs or DVDs I get $1 each, bundled in a group. I donated about a hundred DVDs to the Lady Lake Public Library. They’ll sell them for about a dollar each.
For each sale, I also have to take good photos on my iPhone and write an ad. That takes anywhere between twenty minutes and two hours. I’m currently selling nine musical instruments for a friend who has had a couple strokes. Six gone so far, and I’ve made him over $7,000. (I’m not charging any commission.) But photographing and writing the ads took about two hours each, and I had to repair and polish the instruments as necessary, put on new strings, make sure they work, describe them accurately.
It’s a lot of work. Giving something away is often the better option. The goal is emptying out the place so my heirs don’t need to.
I’ve bought my suits and sport coats on eBay for years. I usually pay ten cents to twenty cents on the dollar.
I have books for sale. I always have the lowest price, but no lower than $5 or it goes to the library. I mostly sell books on Amazon. Some have been for sale five years, but for those, there is no giveaway value, and they may be rare.
There’s no room for sentimentality in this market. It’s worth what it sells for. Some things sell for a lot and some don’t.