Any ebay sellers here? Can you be able to make a decent income? (business, bill)
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
I have posted about this before. I have three relatives who all sell the same things on ebay, and have for years. They have 200-300 items on sale at any given time. These items are easy and cheap to ship. They have the intestinal fortitude that I lack in that they lose money and make money on any given day. In order to "feed the beast", they must go on buying trips and spend thousands of dollars. This is not for sissies.
They have said that ebay is very hard to make money on any more, compared to the old days. The cards are stacked against sellers in favor of buyers. Many times their buyers lie about not receiving the product, and ebay refunds them. One person has opened a store instead, but the other two are still hanging in.
A few years ago I sold a guitar amp on Ebay. The buyer (who was from the U.S.) claimed he never got it, even though the delivery driver had gotten his signature and no one else lived at that house. He put in a claim against me with Ebay. Then he claimed he "found" it in its box in his house but that it was not the one I had advertised -- mind you, I had taken several close-up photos of it and included in the ad the exact model number. Even with his sketchy, implausible stories, Ebay immediately ruled for him and against me and made me refund him the money. I never again sold and never will sell anything via Ebay.
I'm looking at ebay as the basis for a home business...Not as the primary place to sell though...Just using it as the primary source for finding under-valued products and then 'flipping them' on Amazon and getting Amazon to ship the products.
It's going to take a little investment capital to get up and going, but when it does, I see a nice monthly income potential, that's for sure!
I'm looking at ebay as the basis for a home business...Not as the primary place to sell though...Just using it as the primary source for finding under-valued products and then 'flipping them' on Amazon and getting Amazon to ship the products.
It's going to take a little investment capital to get up and going, but when it does, I see a nice monthly income potential, that's for sure!
A few years ago I sold a guitar amp on Ebay. The buyer (who was from the U.S.) claimed he never got it, even though the delivery driver had gotten his signature and no one else lived at that house. He put in a claim against me with Ebay. Then he claimed he "found" it in its box in his house but that it was not the one I had advertised -- mind you, I had taken several close-up photos of it and included in the ad the exact model number. Even with his sketchy, implausible stories, Ebay immediately ruled for him and against me and made me refund him the money. I never again sold and never will sell anything via Ebay.
I have to say that ebay is extremely buyer friendly and it is definitely not fair to the sellers.
I'm going to start with this: Yes, ebay has become a more challenging market for the small users. I have some experience in making it work though.
The first major point to be made is a recent change in policy, whereas anyone who doesn't have a subscription to their online store feature, gets charged TEN (you read that right, TEN) percent final value fee. They snuck this in very queitly because they're greedy. They're the top market of their kind and they know it. The store subscription isn't so heavy though. its $15 per month at the low end, and brings the final value fees back to the more traditional range of %4 - %8 (varies on category you sell with).
Second, many people vastly overspend on Shipping and packaging.
Packaging: Go to Walmart or a similar superstore during stocking hours. They will often have hundreds of boxes stuffed into carts, and nobody gives a damn if you take them or not. Free. Need a bigger box? Lowes now sells sizeable carbdboard boxes FAR cheaper than any Shipping Center will.
Shipping: USPS. They're just as good as the big name brand shippers (Or should I say "not worse"?). Use the cheapest available shipping method. As long as your package has a tracker and arrives before ebay's longest estimate for shipping, you're fine. And a note about insurance - mathematically you're better off taking the total loss on that 1-in-500 shipment that actually goes badly, than you are by paying for insurance on 500 shipments. Many, many times over, in fact.
He wasn't. I think the way you posted the question sounded ironic, as if you did not believe his figures.
Sales mean nothing. What matters is the margins. I understood he was making around 200k a year, and the way it sounds I think he even makes less than that since after that post said his margins are 8% and he didn't include some costs(not sure why he didn't include those costs) Remember also, he still has to pay taxes out of that money.
Selling online is not easy and the margins can be very low. Sources can dry up, competitors might get figure a way to buy products at half the prices you buy them and leave you with a bunch of useless inventory. Inventory expires, consumer taste changes quickly. Low margins are today's reality even for retail stores, Amazon itself has very low margins for the products they sell themselves. Walmart has ridiculous margins. I have heard figures like 3%, so if you sell a million dollars but your margins are only 3% you are not really a millionaire, you are just making $30k Before taxes.
hey guys sorry didn't mean to stir anything up. yeah your exactly right, i kinda took his so your a millionaire to be sarcastic and doubting what i said. when i hear people say ebay is dead and i come out and say my sales numbers, again not that they mean anything in relation to what im making but heck 250k a month still isn't too shabby, i always get that reaction and not that i really care what people think one way or the other on certain occasions ive posted screenshots of my paypal with sensitive info deleted obviously just to shut people up or prove a point you can make money online and with ebay.
my partner is more the numbers guy and honestly our numbers are kinda hard to figure margins because so many variables some items get combined shipping if one person orders like 5 products and since i build shipping into cost i essentially profit on shipping 4x off that order, also sometimes i shift prices around depending on how im ranking in ebay search and so margins are either bigger or smaller. long story short if i do 200k to 250k in sales ill make anywhere from 18k-25k a month but again that's before taxes and i do a lot of advertising outside of ebay, pay people to make templates and stuff, pay for terapeak every month, am always getting design work done on logos, and marketing materials, etc.
Not sure if this is the proper forum to post this thread.
Anyway, I am a part time ebay seller, ebay business is a side business which generates pretty good income for me. Several years ago, I could be able to make anywhere between $2000 - $5000 / month, but now, I list the same amount of stuff and can only be able to generate $1000 - $2500/month. It still is considered to be pretty good income for a side business. Plus, I only need to work 2 hours a day, 4 days a week. I don't need to rely on this business to pay bills, thanks God.
What have you been your experience selling on ebay? Do you think it is still worth it? Thank you.
How to list 100 items per day? how many hours does it take ?
I can only list up to 30 a day maximum, I sell clothing and collectible items, I find it very time consuming to list items,
can you please give some advise how to list faster? Thanks.
We are a power seller at work, and I'm a regular guy at home with a side business (dedicated a room for inventory). We sell around $75K/month, and are always improving our listings (pictures, best shipping options, etc.); profit on the front end is definitely not great, but the turns on our inventory earn us a greater discount on all our purchases across the board, so it's worth it.
If not for the added buying power it affords us, I'm not sure we would continue - picture 3 guys working full time between one to admin the site/listings, and two to answer questions, address problems, and box up and ship the sold items.
I want to know what people sell to make thousands per month but it sure as hell isn't clothes.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
but that it was not the one I had advertised -- mind you, I had taken several close-up photos of it and included in the ad the exact model number. Even with his sketchy, implausible stories, Ebay immediately ruled for him and against me and made me refund him the money. I never again sold and never will sell anything via Ebay.
