What Sells On eBay: Silver phone cover, old calendar, FM Converter, vintage Sony Cassette Recorder, super high end Amplifiers

I had another pretty good week last week on my end. Here are some highlights…

I acquired this set of two Walnut and Metal Weavewood serving platters at an auction. They came in a box lot so these came to about $2.70 for the pair. I noticed they were unused and still had the sticker still on them. I sold them about a month after listing for $40.
Weavewood Nordic Ware Platters

I pulled this vintage black faux leather art portfolio out of a Goodwill Outlet bin. It came to $1.59 after calculating everything I bought by weight. It was in pretty decent shape and had all the signs of quality materials. It even had the previous owner’s scrapbook stuff inside. I went ahead and included that in the sale in case it would entice someone to buy it. Well someone sent an offer and we agreed on $43.00.
Black Faux Leather Art Portfolio

Vintage kitchen utensils have been pretty hot this past couple of weeks. I’ll have to remember and stock up on some more whenever I find them. Here’s an example that sold. It’s a primitive farmhouse metal ladle. I got this in a box lot of old kitchen stuff and paid .31 cents for this item. It sold for $10. Though when it arrived, I received feedback saying that it was smaller than she expected, but she admitted that she didn’t read the description well enough. The size of the ladle was everywhere, including right in the damn title and pictures with a ruler indicating the size! I wonder about some people…
Vintage Metal Ladle

Here’s my goofy sale of the week. I nearly wanted to throw these crocheted stocking ornaments away when I pulled them out of a box lot I won (actually, the same lot as the platters mentioned above). But there were a bunch and I thought maybe somebody might want to decorate a tree with them. I listed them and I couldn’t believe when they sold not too long after for $25. I think I’ve sold more Christmas stuff in the past few months than around Christmas!
Crocheted Stocking Christmas Ornaments

Such a cool silver phone cover! You mentioned it was sterling – seems like it’d be worth more than $25 in scrap? Is it super thin or something?

Anyway, some of my interesting sales over the past 7 days:

1977 Star Wars C3PO Necklace
I bought the whole set at a sale about a year ago – already sold R2D2, Millennium Falcon, XWing. I paid too much at the sale, like $15 each, thinking they’d be worth close to $100 each. This one sold for $40 – still a nice profit, but not nearly what I expected.

Vintage 3″ King Wooden Chess Set
I always pick up chess sets like this. I never have a problem selling them. If they’re real wood, they’re an easy $30 and some models if you can determine date/maker can go for well over $100. Bought this one for $3, sold for $40.

NIB Waterford Snowflake Wishes Goodwill Champagne Flute
Bought a few of these at Marshalls after Christmas 2 years ago. Thought these and some other Waterford glasses would do very well. Not losing money on them, but paid like $60 and have only been selling for $80.

Dr. Grabow Pipe
Another pipe sold! I’m now officially in the black on the $300 lot of pipes I bought about a month ago. Still have several listed that will be pure profit.

(8) Hand Carved African Safari Animals Wooden Napkin Rings
These have been sitting for quite some time. Took a $20 offer to get them out the door. Thought they were cooler than they were and paid like $8 for them.

Not a great week of sales, but here are a few:

I bought an auction lot of placemats last September. They sell very slowly, but I’ve made my money back. I sold these 5 assorted beaded placemats for $30.56 on sale.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/182363946749

This is a Picasso lithograph I purchased in an auction lot of unframed prints, paintings, and photos. I paid about $1, sold for $25:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/182623475773

I have been trying all day to end some listings, but keep getting a “Page Does Not Respond” message. I finally talked to 2 different ebay reps neither of whom could do it either. The first one said there were no other reports of an ebay bug. The second one said there were a few reports of that problem. I was told it could take 72 hrs for IT to fix my problem. This is SO frustrating.

Another complaint that I told them is that it is SO NOT user friendly in how difficult it is to end an item, even when it works. First you have to find the item in your store, then figure out how long until it “ends”, THEN go to your Active Listings, THEN try to figure out what page that will be on, THEN search for it by day and hour and locate it on the page, and THEN finally end it. Both admitted that is the only way to do it. Both said they would report my complaint. But who knows?

Ebay’s systems are so archaic. Why not make our lives simpler? I have been ending a lot of listings this week in preparation of re-doing my store and thinning out the losers. This is not helping.

I love the fact that etsy has a simple device to end listing–a deactivate button that not only ends the listing, but keeps it stored indefinitely, I can’t understand why ebay can’t do the same.

Sales have been really slow for me the last week and a half, here are a few of my more interesting sales:

https://www.etsy.com/listing/533539187/vintage-bohemian-garnet-necklace-and?ref=shop_home_active_1

bought at the local auction house for $25, sold for $85

https://www.etsy.com/listing/526483375/unique-1960s-1970s-cool-mid-century?ref=shop_home_active_7

Very quirky, very folk art–found for $8 at a thrift and sold for $55

https://www.etsy.com/listing/522644236/hipster-10-gallon-cowboy-hat-miller-bros?ref=shop_home_active_17

found at a “handled” estate sale so I had to step up for it–>$30, sold overnight for $75

https://www.etsy.com/listing/500427418/vintage-black-americana-shopping-list?ref=shop_home_active_3

this one is only interesting because it sold one day before Etsy decided to not let us sell most “Black Americana” stuff, sold for only $12 (it was a box lot find) but still, 24 hours later and it would have been pulled down.

anyway, summer is its typical slow selling environment for me at least, I am concentrating on getting stuff up and buying since it tis the season.

One more thing Steve–puppy! (so adorable, yours?)

That’s Frisco, my friends collie a couple weeks after bringing him home from the farm in Missouri. He was the first of our collection that has reached 4.

I did a monthly what sold video so that it wouldn’t be a 1 minute video 🙂
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dn1GsKaIHU8

No way! I LIVE in Park Rapids, MN where the Wilson’s calendar originated!