Buying & Selling on eBay

Clear out clutter or trade specialized items on ebay!
Hobby or supplementary income - try it !!

I doubt if there is a person that has not heard of ebay , but I doubt that everyone has had a peep at this enormous website which sells anything from a piece of string to an aeroplane!

Being a fairly regular buyer and seller, it would seem there are various categories of ebay followers;

1. The professional - He who buys to sell or has a product which he wants to sell with the smallest overhead possible

2. The Collector - maybe linked with the above, but often a genuine collector of anything. I don't Collect anything, but I must own up to browsing a few of the chicken ornaments now and again and have, as you see right, dug deep in my pockets.

3. The clearer of unwanted things - This is usually where the person has brought the latest LCD TV and wants to sell thier old one to off-cost etc.

4. The 'Dabbler' - He who sees a bargain somewhere and buys it solely to sell at a profit.

There's nothing atall wrong with any of the above and it's the mixture of things which makes ebay a worldwide concern.
For example - if you want to buy PC Ram, you may find it less expensive to buy it from the USA. It may take 4 / 5 days more to get to you, but you may be saving a third of the cost it would be over here.

Here's a few observations I've picked up along the way...

The first thing to do before buying or selling is to get an idea of what something is worth and what it would be to buy / sell brand new along with the guarantee etc.
A fine way of doing this is to go on ebay and type in the item you are selling or buying, when the list comes up. find something similar and go to 'Completed Listings' on the left and type it in there (if it's a 'buy it now' the chances are they've already sold some, so copy and paste the whole item). This will bring up a list of all recent sales and non-sales.

This is a good guideline, but you can only do this if you are registered with ebay. You can do this by clicking here. Register on ebay here

If you are going in for the 'small wheeling and dealing' for extra cash, don't just think about the money ! Think about the work it's going to involve - and the time. For instance, I made a healthy profit by buying some old radios and selling them, but getting the cost of parcel post, wrapping them up and being in for the parcel company to collect was a bit of a drag to say the least.

Best buy things which will pop into a jiffy bag . This keeps the postage down as well. It's all very well saving £5 on a product, but by the time you've paid £3.99 for the postage - is it just as easy to go down the shops and buy, plus have the satisfaction of being able to return it easily.

Books I found were hard work and unless they're quite rare editions, they are difficult to move. Also, if anything has been affected price wise, it is collectable books. Ten years ago you may have got £30 for your 1952 Rupert book, now it may be £10 at best - and that's if it's not signed, not got any marks and almost as good as the day it was brought.

Collectables are always a winner, but only if they are 'niche'. Again, have a look around the ebay site and see what has the least amount of items - look at
how many people have looked at it (hit counter at bottom of each page usually) and watch the items the
whole way through. For instance pottery (although you've the wrapping problem), blue is always good.

The other in-thing is Retro of course and it's quite likely we have a few things gathering dust up in the Loft; 60's china sets, lampshades, almost anything really.

There are ebay millionaires out there. They are the one's who have found a little gap in the market, spent a bit of time doing their homework, brought the right stuff at the right time and used a bit of good old chat to get it through.

It could be you !!