Scavenger Life Episode 413: Yard Sales??

[RyanneKeymaster Location: Virginia]

 Hey, Ryanne and her sister, Ashley, restarted the Shampoo & Booze Podcast talking about Airbnb and Short Term rentals. They’ve also started to o
[See the full post at: Scavenger Life Episode 413: Yard Sales??]

[millionairedojoParticipant Location: Georgia]

It was a great weekend for yard sales! I filled our car up $88.00 🙂

I also reflected on my best sales on eBay since I got serious about selling a year ago. I’ve sold a few hundred items over the year and 23 of them were a profit of more than $50. There were a couple of sales in the hundreds.

You can check em all out in this blog post:

https://millionairedojo.com/top-selling-items-on-ebay/

[Retro Treasures WVParticipant Location:]

Oh yes, yard sales were awesome this weekend. This is usually the first great yard sale weekend around here.
I fill our van for $130. I’ve already created 13 listings from this haul for over $500. I’m only a fraction of the way into it.

I only did yard sales from 10-1. I don’t like going earlier because people don’t deal before 10. I may miss out on some awesome stuff, but my theory is much of the awesome stuff is overpriced and won’t sell till after 10 anyways.

[Kelly1mmParticipant Location: Maryland]

Totals for the MONTH of May 2019. I am mainly a mens clothes seller, free shipping, free returns, 1% promoted listings, no best offer, good till cancelled.

Listings/items at end of month = 3775 / 4278 Total listed value $91,160
Items sold = 282 up 7% YOY
$ sold = $6887 up 7% YOY
ASP = $24.42 up 7% YOY
Monthly sell through rate 7.5%

Expenses
Postage = $1453.24 (19.6% of gross)
Ebay fees = $835 (12.1% of gross) (includes Promoted listing fees of 55 sales totaling $1225.93 ($12.53-8.33 credit = $4.20) 19.5% of items sold/ 17.8% of $ sold) and return labels
COGS = $751 (10.9% of gross)
Returns = $341.60 (4.9% of gross)
PP Fees = 279.79 (4.0% of gross)

Total operating expenses = $3660.63 (53.2% of gross)
Total operating profit (my name for it – does not include expenses such as mileage, shipping supplies, depreciation, etc …) $3226.37

Notable sales:
Allen Edmonds Men Grand Cayman Shoes Loafers Horse Bit Black 9D 9 D (buy price $4.59, Sold $84.99)
Nautica Mens Seersucker Suit 100% Cotton Blue White Stripe 44R 38W 29L(buy Price $7.59, sold for $79.99)
I am trying to lot up some of my lower priced clothing items to a) move them, b) raise my ASP so ……..Lot of 4 UA Under Armour Heat Gear Mens T-Shirts XL 3 Loose 2 Gray 2 Red (buy price $4.16, Sold $49.99)

Sales breakdown by price range:
$100+ 0
80-100 = 1
60-80 = 2
40-60 = 13
30-40 = 25
20-30 = 104
10-20 = 137
YTD Items Sold = 1357 (+33% YOY)
YTD Gross = $36,234 (+46% YOY)
YTD Net = $17,924.51

[Steve ListParticipant Location: Richmond, Calif.]

Store: steve-list
Numbers for May 2019

Total Listings: 1013
Had 41 Sales for a total of $1110.00
Cost of Items Sold: $78.95
Highest Price Sold: $375 – Ships Engine Room Brass Plaque
Average Price Sold: $27.07 – Average Cost: $1.93
Spent on new inventory: $190
Number of items listed: 46
Longest Listed Item Sold: Set of Twin Sheets from June 2015
GSP: 1 Italy

The brass ships plaque was a late in the day estate sale find. It was out in the open on a table near the cashier for $15 – I ended up paying $10 for it. I assume that nobody else saw the value in it.

I’m happy to see there is a new Shampoo and Booze episode. I haven’t listen to it
yet or the Scavenger pod-cast yet but I will while listing later tonight.

Thanks Again R&J for all that you do.
~

[Mark SParticipant Location:]

2019-05-26 – 2019-06-01

Total Items In Store: 3014
Items Sold: 14
Cost of Items Sold: $ 70
Total Sales: $ 758.36
Highest Price Sold: $ 142 (CD Changer)
Average Price Sold: $ 54.17
# Items Listed: 14
Money Spent on New Inventory: $ 200

Gut Sales Report for the week: Sales were sparatic. Higher priced items still selling.

Challenge of the week: Trying to get all of the great items I bought this week listed.

Scavenge of the week: The story this week was subdivision wide garage sales. I hit 3 this week and they were all great. There was one in particular that was really big. They even had a hot dog stand so I got a hot dog and it was really good. Stopped there and spoke with the President of the HOA who was running the hot dog stand. There was one street that you couldn’t even finding a parking spot on – that is how well attended the sale was. I am finding subdivision wide garage sales really have a lot to offer, but you have to go to the right ones. What are the right ones? The ones that have a large number of houses involved in the sale in the sub. This isn’t always so obvious. Sometimes they will say how many houses are involved. A “Annual” sub sale is a good sign because it has a following. Trial and error also works. I have gone to some sub sales were there are only 1 or 2 houses involved in a whole huge sub. At this sub sale, I hit about 40-50 sales in about 4 hours. I had a lot of fun and got some great high priced items. Can’t ask for more than that. Did I mention the hot dog was good also?

Mark S

[totommytoParticipant Location: Naples, Fl]

Mark S,
Those big neighborhood sales are great the way you described. Our community was like that, we literally had return buyers every six months, and my family even listed particular collectibles on Craig’s List. Until that fateful sale where my regulars arrived one Saturday morning to a gate that would not open.
Story is below if you want to read. Ever since then, and even though we are open to outside buyers again, our community sales have never really recovered.

[Mark SParticipant Location:]

Totommyto,

Yes, those kind of sub sales are such a Great feeling. You get a real sense of community. I know from my experience that that community feeling was there when I was growing up. That community feeling is just not there much
Any more. That is another reason why it was so fun.

One other thing about that sub sale. I was at a guy’s Garage sale the week before up by our cabin about 200 Miles away. I ran into the guy at this sub sale and we were Both amazed.

Mark

[The Thrift RaiderParticipant Location:]

I actually forgot to comment last week about Pirate Ship. I was like, no guys, it’s totally free!! I check it against ebay all the time on priority items. Here’s a hot tip for ya: if you go to Pirate Ship and ask in chat (in pirate speak of course!) to get their Simple Export Rate for international rates, they’ll sign you up immediately. It basically lets you save on international packages. It cost me only $10 to ship something light to Malaysia, normally around $15, and $13 to ship to Canada, which normally would have been $17. Only bad thing is they don’t take PP.

[The Thrift RaiderParticipant Location:]

Scavenge of the week: I went to a garage sale on Friday, ended up being kids and baby stuff. I left after a few minutes and went down the road but realized I was going the wrong way. Turned around and spotted some 35mm slides in a trash pile on the side of the road. I stopped so fast! It ended up being a lot more than I thought. Literally hundreds of MCM 1957-70 slides of families at home, Christmas, Easter, graduation, Ohio State University graduation in the 50s. Most interesting to me was a box of advertising slides from a company called Stran-Steel that basically made prefab steel buildings. It’s about 50 slides ranging in building plans, tire factories, mainframe computers, one beehive hairdo, and a couple of very mad men type photos.

Problem is, no clue how to price. I’m thinking of auctioning just the Stran-Steel slides starting at $100. Might be worth something, might be worthless. Stuff like this is always difficult for me and I end up sitting on it, not sure what to do.

[The_SEAM_StoreParticipant Location: PA]

At first I didn’t like seeing the sponsored listings in the sold items. After I thought about it, it doesn’t bother me too much because that means someone is seeing my promoted items too.

On the Spring Seller update it mentioned that they are working on instant payments for Best Offer. See link below. It’s in the FAQ section of the Best Offer Enhancements.

https://pages.ebay.com/seller-center/seller-updates/2019-spring/growth-tools.html#m17-2-tb2

• This reply was modified 2 months, 3 weeks ago by  The_SEAM_Store.
• This reply was modified 2 months, 3 weeks ago by  The_SEAM_Store.

[totommytoParticipant Location: Naples, Fl]

Great Podcast as usual!
We used to do two yard sales a year (Our SW Fl gated community allows two per year). My entire family would make good money, not eBay prices, but well worth the trouble and cash in hand. My family actually set items aside for the yard sale months in advance. As happens in gated life, a resident complained that an ‘outsider’ yard sailor stole something from them. Now the bored board members, long retired members at large, and all the assorted busy bodies gathered to ‘fix’ the problem.
So, the next yard sale was slated for residents only, with the community gates closed to outside shoppers (which comprises about 99% of potential buyers!). They neglected to inform the couple of dozen of us that set up that warm Saturday morning to sell our wares. It was a beautiful morning. Where were all the people?! We made zero sales. I blew my top when I heard what happened and wanted a head on a platter. A weak General Manager blamed a contracted gate guard for making the call, and the board backed him up. All the steam was taken from my yard sales selling engine that day.
Kind of a funny story, especially for those who also subject themselves to live in these HOA and gated places. I was seriously pissed at the time. That was the end of my yard sales selling, several years ago.

[JayKeymaster Location: Virginia]

Yeah, you need the yard sale crawlers from the outside to really sell.

[totommytoParticipant Location: Naples, Fl]

I LOVED the Columbia Records Sign story, how it was found, the bargaining, and the very healthy sales price!
That is advanced scavenging all around, amazing.

5/26– 5/25/19 (no cross listing is done between platforms)

eBay store: totommyto

Total store items: 634
Number of items sold: 11
Total eBay sales (not counting s/h): $315
Cost of items sold: $13
Consignment payouts $17
Highest price sold: $65 – GM new in the box exhaust pipe tip (dealer threw it out!)
Average price sold: $29.00
Returns: 0
Money spent on new inventory: 0
Number of new items listed this week: 0
Sell through rate for the week: 1.7
Number International sales: 0

Etsy store oldfleatoymarket

Total store items: 639
Number of items sold: 7
Total Etsy sales (not counting s/h): $155
Cost of items sold: $13
Consignment payouts: 0
Highest price sold: $45 – Vintage wooden Globe recipe box w/ recipes, paid $5
Average price sold: $22
Returns: 0
Money spent on new inventory: 0
Number of new items listed this week: 5
Sell through rate for the week: 1.1
# International sales: 1

I needed a break this week from listing, and even from scavenging. Feel refreshed.

[simplicioParticipant Location:]

I’ve mentioned before that Chit Chats will take items across the border and ship them via USPS for Canadian sellers, allowing us to compete on US shipping. They opened up a domestic service just recently too. According to the lady who works there, they have a good deal with Canada Post so they can save you money. I tried it out on my shipments this weekend and… nope, ebay/shippo was still a better deal on almost all packages.

I had a pretty good week on ebay!

Sales: CAD$1490, 11 items, COGS: $245 –> Item profit: $991
Expenditures: $228 –> Cashflow: $1008
Hours: 8, $127/hr
Listed: $811, 6 items
Notable sales: Balometer $385 (paid $30), conference phone setup $200 (paid $15), respirator air filters $150 (paid $37 for 3 sets, this pays them all off).

There is a fairly major out of town auction ending tomorrow morning. Wednesday I am going to pick up hopefully quite a few items (3-4 hrs away). I have to go there for work anyway so the trip is NBD.

Really cool story on the Columbia records sign, by the way. Awesome find!

• This reply was modified 2 months, 3 weeks ago by  simplicio.

[SharynParticipant Location: Central NJ]

Ryanne – I don’t think that you need to ship out pottery items separately for safety. My concern is to not only protect the fragile items from the box being hit from the outside, but also protect the items inside from hitting against each other as they are moved.

Let’s say I have a set of plates and a set of mugs sold to the same person. I wrap up the plates in bubblewrap and cocoon them in cardboard. I then wrap the cocoon in bubblewrap. I do the same to the mugs; bubblewrap, cardboard, bubblewrap. Then, using packing tape, I tape the plate cocoon to the mug cocoon so that they don’t hit against each other when traveling. Then the box with packaging all around.

If I remember the next time I sell a number of fragile items to one buyer, I’ll put together a video.

I had a slow week:

Week of May 26 – Jun 1
* Total Items in Store: 1375, eBay, 3 Etsy
* Items Sold: 13 eBay
* Cost of Items Sold: $10.70 + $8 Commission
* Total Sales: $224.59
* Highest Price Sold: $37 Vintage rocking doll cradle
* Average Price Sold: $17.28
* Returns: 0, but one refund see below
* Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $5
* Number of items listed this week: 19

Things to do list: 3 vintage bar lights (from my death piles) have been rewired and listed!

My highest sold price was actually a typewriter for $42, but the buyer said that it didn’t work when he received it. He wanted the accessories that came with it, so I gave a partial refund.

I enjoyed the new Shampoo & Booze podcast, although I do not rent out anything at this time. Good luck!

[JayKeymaster Location: Virginia]

I’d love to see a video of how you pack 6+ pieces of large china in one box. The box we sent had a lot of large pieces that might have been the problem.

[SharynParticipant Location: Central NJ]

I’ve done it before, but sales of more than one listing don’t come all that often. Sometimes I feel I have a mini-replacements.com in my basement, and, if someone is trying to complete a set, I might sell several items at once. Several months ago, I sold 4 or 5 listings of one pattern and shipped them safely from NJ to WA.

I certainly don’t sell as much as you guys, so I can’t say that my way is best. However, I can try to at least explain my method and you can decide whether to implement it or not. Now, I just need the right sale and I need to remember. I’m not sure which thing is less likely to happen.

[RyanneKeymaster Location: Virginia]

yeah i think i said in the podcast that i essentially triple boxed everything. each mug was wrapped in bubble, then wrapped in cardboard. those were then put in a box together and padded. that was then put in the larger box with the other double wrapped items. it really should have been fine. but it wasnt. sigh.

[wellspringParticipant Location: TN]

Like you, I’ve shipped a lot of fragile items over the years. One thing I always do is fill any “void” open/hollow space with tissue paper or packing paper. Even the center of handles. I do this before wrapping in large bubble wrap.

For figurines, I place styrofoam peanuts in small spaces, then wrap with tissue or flexible packing paper in a spiral direction, starting at the corner of a square of paper or tissue. Bubble after that. I’m a big believer in large bubble wrap as the final layer before boxing.

• This reply was modified 2 months, 2 weeks ago by  wellspring.
• This reply was modified 2 months, 2 weeks ago by  wellspring.

[MDC GalleriesParticipant Location: Atlanta]

Sharyn: Pretty much the way we do it. We have used the term “cocoon” for our whole process for years and we have a ton of feed backs that mention our packing process. We add a layer of stretch wrap and 60# brown craft paper along with the corrugated cardboard and 2 layers of bubble wrap. We use 6 to 7 layers in total.

We also slide thin pieces of blank newsprint in between the handles, negative spaces of complex ceramic configurations.

On plates we use thin bubble and styrofoam picnic plates as spacers between them. Each bundle gets cardboard wrapped and cocooned. These cocoons go into a larger box. The key in placing in a larger box is to have at least an 1inch space all around. If you pack the exterior box slam full out to the bottom, edges and top, then you don’t leave any room for the outer box to “deflect” inward when heavier boxes are placed on top. As the outer box bends inwards from the weight [the deflection] that pressure isn’t absorded by any negative space or loose filling and that pressure gets transferred downward onto the cocoons and the objects inside them “burst” from pressure of the weight of the weight stacked on top.

Since 2002 we have had only 5 or six items broken and those looked like it got stuck in a machine or something ran over them and in those cases no amount of packing would save them.

Just wanted to throw in a few other comments on the subject.

Mike at MDC Galleries and fine Art

[Retro Treasures WVParticipant Location:]

Items in Store 1124
Items Sold 18
Total Sales $472.00
COGS $52.00
Total Profit $420.00
Average profit $23.33
Average sales price $26.22
New Listings 21

Another average week. Without doing alot of listing, $400-500 is about what my store makes. When I actively list alot, I can hit $800 a week pretty consistently. I have to list more for sure.

Great yard sales this weekend! I’m able to get alot of stuff in a short amount of time. I only yard sale from 10-1 usually. The local high school has two awesome yard sales each summer – one for the boys soccer team and another for the show choir. I always go in the last hour when they do bag sales – I clean up! Usually these school fundraiser sales suck, but this school REALLY supports their teams. Tons of name brand clothes/shoes, higher end electronics, and plenty of retired school equipment.
Last year I got multiple things I sold for $100+ there, some of them they gave to me for free. This time I got 2 $100 items.

The next one is at the end of July. Can’t wait!

Listing wise I’m not getting the listing done that I want to. I did get 21 items photographed and listed. This weekend I got plenty of listings created minus photos. It seems photography is my bottleneck right now.

I had actually planned on getting alot more done this weekend but by some miracle I actually slept in until 9am both days. That is very unusual for me! So I missed out on about 6 hours of ebay work this weekend. I apparently needed the sleep though.

We have a few financial goals that we want to do this year, and I know more listing is the key.

Goals:
1. Zero out balance on both credit cards every month.
2. Pay two car payments and house payment every month with ebay profit
3. Save $3k for vacation

I’ve already been able to pay off my credit cards so I am back to maintaining a zero balance on both of them. Tax return helped with that. Sucks that the dog cost me $2500, or else I’d be well into goal #3. I am getting closer to being able to pay car payments AND house payment every month. Lately since I can’t do house payment as well I’ve at least started paying electric bill and car insurance with ebay funds every month to go with the car payments. I have one year left on one of my car payments. It really isn’t worth paying off early – The payoff only saves me $94. No need tying up capital for Those kinda peanuts.

The other goal is saving up $3k to pay for a really nice vacation this year. I’ve never taken a 2 week vacation and I’d like to do it this year.

So there are my goals.
To meet my goals I need to average $700 net profit each week for June – August on ebay. That means I need about $875 in sales a week. I know I can do that if I list good. That number includes a scavenging allowance, but I’ll mainly be pulling from death piles. This week I have to start stepping my game up. My daughter is chomping at the bit to work for me and I will try her out this week.

I have set up a spreadsheet to track my summer goal. I’ll add it to my reporting numbers next week.
13 weeks. Can I do it? I’m sure gonna try!

[JayKeymaster Location: Virginia]

I love hearing these goals.

[InglewoodParticipant Location:]

Awesome goals – hope you achieve them! The two-week vacation seems like a fantasy I would like to come true one day for myself!

[DoublythumbsParticipant Location: Hopedale, OH]

May 26 – June 1
Total Items in Store: 2255
Items Sold: 22
Total Sales : $781
* BELOW yearly average of $884
Highest Price: $200 (Famous Artists Course School Books)
Average Price: $36
Returns: 0
Cost of Goods Sold: $14
Costs of Goods Purchased this Week: $0
Number of New Items Listed this Week: 24

Sales kind of picked up this week, especially when I utilized the Send Offer option. I sent out about 40 offers and sold 10 items because of it. It’s a nice way to sell older listings. And I don’t mind losing a small cut if it means getting it out of my inventory. Most of these items had Make Offer on them anyways so my prices accounted for that.

Regarding garage sales, we’ve had generally good outcomes with the few that we’ve held. When we lived in the suburban neighborhood right outside of the city, we would make $200 – $400 total. That was selling the piles of cast-off remnants of box lot items for $.50 – $3. These items could have sold on eBay for double that price, but I generally don’t like wasting my time with listing $5 items. But now that we live in a more rural area, I’m feeling like having a garage sale wouldn’t be worth my time and energy. The one we had last week felt like a dud. We may try one more time once we’ve made another pile of stuff, but if it doesn’t earn me more than a couple hundred bucks, then I’ll quit doing them. I understand how you feel now that we live in a less populated area, but I still feel like having a garage sale was worth it in a more urban setting.

I had a busy week last week, though not listing a whole lot. Instead, I built two new shelves for my basement, almost doubling my storage capacity. I also built myself a new computer. My 11 year old MacBook just wasn’t cutting it as a professional machine anymore. So with the help of a friend, I purchased all the new parts to build a top of the line PC. The difference in performance is mind-blowing! Now I need to get the hang of using CTRL instead of CMD on the keyboard again.

[SimonParticipant Location: San Francisco Bay Area]

Thanks for the podcast!

Here are my numbers for the week:
Total Items in Store: 3034
Items Sold: 49
Total Sales: $1203
Cost of Items Sold: $149
Average Price Sold: $24.56
Average Cost of Item: $3.05
Highest Price Item Sold: $119.95 Apple AirPort Express 802.11n
Number of items listed this week: 84
YTD Sales: $20892
YTD sales compared to this time last year: +13%
Average age of items in store (in days since listing): 386
Average number of days between listing and selling this week: 228
Median age of sales (in days, between listing and selling): 50
Sell-through rate (for the week): 1.62%
Hats sold this week: 30 (61% of sales) worth $521.13 (43% of sales $)

Great to hear Shampoo & Booze is coming back. Even though I don’t ever plan to have an AirBnB I used to enjoy hearing about the process of setting up and running one. Congrats on the big sign sale. That’s a fun sale. I see there are a lot of similar smaller signs on eBay and even some repops so you did really well price-wise. I would never have thought to ask for some much.

Another very good week for my store. This is my fourth week in a row with sales over $1100 which is historically a pretty good weekly total for me. My monthly gross sales in May topped $5000 for the first time ever since I started selling in early 2015.

After Jay asked a few more questions last week, I switched off Web Interpret. I really didn’t have a very good idea how it was going to work (long term) and I got concerned that I was going to get slammed with insertion fees. As I mentioned the other day, they actually create additional localized listings for each country. The free plan I had signed up for created 500 extra listings in 8 (I believe) countries so I had 4000 extra listings. I wasn’t certain that I wasn’t just in a temporary promotion period so I ended up shutting it off completely. I didn’t wanted to get a bill for $400 dollars of extra insertion fees. I did get a few extra sales to the UK in GBP from the program but didn’t see sales in any other country. I’ll be interested to hear if anyone else tries that same Web Interpret offer.

In regard to my area (north of San Francisco), we don’t currently have any auctions that I attend. There are a few very high-end art auctions but nothing where I can get box lots of lower value stuff. On the other hand, garage sales are plentiful and there are usually a number of estates sales within driving distance every weekend. (Estate sales are my favorite place to find buried treasure).

Hope everyone has a good week!

[SpartyQParticipant Location: St. Charles, IL]

I haven’t had time to run the exact numbers, but for the month of May, my profit after all expenses was roughly $1600 – so a bit slower than I had hoped. But the big change is that my last day of work will be this Friday. That’s not to say the change is happening b/c of eBay. With my wife and I both working, daycare costs for 2 kids is taking it’s toll so we decided to make the change based on that alone. Two kids in daycare around my area is almost $30k per year. So I guess what that mean is I am taking a full-time job to be home that pays a $30k base salary and the eBay profits will just assist with costs. Plus we have always lived below our means so no debt at all and mortgage has been paid for almost a year! I have hopes that I will be able to find some pockets of time to help with listings – but we will see, worst case I keep listing at night.

The sourcing has not been a problem as the weekly auction I attend keeps a lot in the pipeline. Garage sales and the occasional flea markets have been good as well. Recently sold a couple of Power Amps thru FB that I bought for $10 each at garage sale for $80 and $200. Also had someone reach out to me about a consignment item that I hope will go for around $2000.

The next step now that I will no longer have the day job is to seek out and take chances on higher dollar items and flip for larger margins. Time constraints make it so I can no longer mess around with items that are only going to make $5 – $10. Easier said than done, of course!

[wellspringParticipant Location: TN]

I would never suggest shipping multiple purchases from one buyer separately. A buyer can easily claim item(s) not received as I don’t believe we are unable to list multiple tracking numbers for one purchase. Unless there is something I don’t know about shipping. If I’m wrong, someone correct me. Thanks.

[Retro Treasures WVParticipant Location:]

I had an item I had to ship in two boxes and all the tracking info is there. If you send two boxes and two boxes are delivered you are good.

That still isn’t going to stop an unscrupulous buyer who claims something was missing from the box, but I don’t have time to worry about unlikely hypothetical scenarios like that.

[SharynParticipant Location: Central NJ]

Was this comment based on what Jay was saying during the podcast? I think he was referring to a buyer who purchased two listings. One was a cruet set and the other were mugs. Jay was concerned that putting too many fragile items into one box may cause damage, and he is suggesting that they not combine shipping when the same buyer buys more than one fragile item.

But what Retro was saying also – you can purchase a second label for one listing and both will track with the item. I sold a set of antique books where each book was 7 or more pounds and there were 8 or so books in total. I packed them in two boxes. I bought the first label as normal. Then I bought a second label under “print another label” in the pull down menu right next to the item.

[wellspringParticipant Location: TN]

Yes, I never knew that we could add another label to a combined purchase. Never had to use this step. Thanks for clarifying.

[xxThinkLinkxxParticipant Location: Hopedale, OH]

May 26 – June 1 (was out of town)
Total Items in Store: 1340
Items Sold: 5
Total Sales : $364
Highest Price: $90 (Small Industrial Electric Fan possibly a Northwind Emerson)
Average Price: $69 (did not include the electric fan)
Returns: 0
Cost of Goods Sold: $14
Costs of Goods Purchased this Week: $0
Number of New Items Listed this Week: 0

Hello all.

I’m back from my convention trip. Sold a few things while I was out of town. Still need to pack those this evening.
Was a great, fun time at the convention with my friends. Went to panels, photo-shoot, dawned new outfits, etc but I’m glad to be home and back into the swing of eBay. I also feel so old after these 4 days of con time, haha But it really is a good time.
Hopefully we’ll have some yard sales or auctions planned coming up.

Have a great day and week all 🙂

[call_me_raoulParticipant Location: USA]

items sold: 27
sales: $701.55 (i don’t include shipping revenue)
average selling price: $25.98
cost of goods: $102.33
returns: 0
purchases: $78.98
store listings: 998
inventory $ risk: $3,782 (what i paid for all existing inventory)
listed this week: 26
ebay hours: 7
what’s on my mind: is it summer?

Down 30% from $1k weekly avg, but I barely even thought about ebay last week.

Re: ebay shipping costs vs posh, mercari etc..etc…

Ebay is not revenue neutral on shipping and hasn’t been since the first day they offered an interface to buy USPS, this is widely known. I can’t recall if it was in a 10k or on a call, but they have a substantial deal with USPS & they have never shared all of that with sellers. In fact, they have clawed even more back.

[SilverFoxFindsParticipant Location: Virginia Beach]

Monthly totals have been nosediving since January, but then again, so has the regularity of my listing. Sales were up the week before last, but then came down down down again, as you can see here. Lots of lower dollar items moved. I’ve put a lot of long-term inventory on 25% off sale in hopes of moving it out.

My desire to source has been low, despite all the yard sales and auctions I’ve been seeing every weekend. Not wanting to spend $ right now, and esp not while I still have a goodly amount to list at home.

So glad that I’ve had a lot of freebies sell (and freebies incoming in general), hence the low COGS.

05/26/19 – 06/01/19
Total Items In Store: 1023
Items Sold: 11
Net Sales (Total Sales – Selling Costs): $233.17
Highest Sold Price: $60 – Vtg Small Anvil & Bench Vise Set
Average Sold Price: $21.20
Cost of Items Sold: $12
Returns/Refunds: 0
Money Spent on New Inventory Last Week: $0
Number of Items listed last week: 10ish

[RobParticipant Location: Surprise, AZ]

Unfortunately our yard sale weekend was a bust. Didn’t find a single thing. We live in the Phoenix area. Most people have moved here in the last 15 years or so, many even more recently than that. So they’re selling newer items: lots of baby items, kitchen containers, home decor from Target and Ross. We do live close to Sun City, a retirement community, but their sales typically start Wednesday or Thursday. Can’t get there with a full time job. Now I’m just complaining…

Jay, about a month ago on the forum, you mentioned having Accept Returns Automatically turned on, except for Items Not As Described, where people are trying to get you to pay return shipping. But it looks like all your items offer Free Returns. Doesn’t that mean you pay shipping for any return, your fault or not?

• This reply was modified 2 months, 2 weeks ago by  Rob.

[Marie in FloridaParticipant Location:]

Still listening to the show. Glad you restarted S and Booze. It’s easy to listen to.

Garage sale in our community 1) Jump starts garage cleaning 2) Reacquaints us with our neighbors 3)Brings in a little $ 4) Brought in a ton of discarded stuff from a neighbor. Donated 2/3 of it and the rest is sellingo

I’m looking at getting Expensify. The notebook is only working so-so. Any other good choices for a phone app that would help me keep track of mileage and receipts? I’m the opposite of Troy, I don’t know how to do a spread sheet. Not a techie

Total Items In Store: 481
Items Sold: 10
Sales: $160
Highest Sold Price: $59 – Size 17 Nike shoes
Most fun: 6 pc Irish whiskey glasses from 6 different distilleries
Average Sold Price: $20
Returns/Refunds: $45 shirt that had better come back with all the tags. Knew it was trouble

[TemudginParticipant Location: Washington DC]

I like Everlance (had been recommended by others here). It automatically generates your mileage by tracking your movement in trips which you then can swipe left or right to classify as work or not. It has an easy-to-use expense entry feature to manually enter amount and take a picture of the receipt. The free version gives you up to 30 trips a month which is enough for me.

[Retro Treasures WVParticipant Location:]

I have a paid membership with Everlance. It works decent. It isn’t perfect by any means but better than having to remember to turn the app on every time I drive.

At one point last year I went like 3 months without opening the app. Near the end of the year I spent a couple hours categorizing every single trip I drove for three months. If I didn’t pay for the app I would have lost several thousand dollars in deductions.

Being able to forget about mileage for 3 months? That is worth the $5 a month fee.

[TiffyKayeParticipant Location:]

Jay mentioned getting a creepy doll head. I had the ultimate experience with creepy doll heads at the end of last year. I went out in a blizzard to a storage auction, and won a locker with my dream inventory, countless vintage dresses hanging from the rafters. Unfortunately, with all the wonderful dresses, I could not see to the back of the 240 square foot locker, where I discovered shelves built from the sides to the back and up to the ceiling filled with DOLLS. The dresses blocked the light and when you walked into the darkness of the back of the locker, it looked like a doll graveyard. There were easily more than a thousand dolls, some warped from the heat and all with moldy eyes. There must have been over 200 boxes. The owner had been a 90 year old woman who passed away leaving behind no less than 8 storage units she had kept for two decades, half of which were full of dolls. Luckily for me, the girl who bought the locker next to me was obsessed with dolls. We made a trade that landed me more vintage dresses and fabric, and I rented her my locker full of dolls. I could have sold creepy doll heads for years with what I had. As you can see by my numbers below, I have been selling the fabric and dresses and couldn’t be happier with how it all worked out.

Total Items In Store: 94
Items Sold: 30
Sales: $1391
Highest Sold Price: $150 (vintage flocked dress)
Average Sold Price: $46

[JayKeymaster Location: Virginia]

How much did you pay fr that storage locker? Making $1300 last week with only 94 items listed means you found items people want.

[TiffyKayeParticipant Location:]

Jay, I paid $350 and then I rented it for the month. It got even better for me because I overheard the storage manager say that the owner of the facility had a whole unit full of even more fabric from this same person. I was allowed to make a charitable contribution to buy this locker at the same price. I have to say it was a lot of sorting and as any scavenger knows, 90% of what we come across at any given location is not Ebay worthy or should be donated. But I have gained so much knowledge about collectible dresses and fabrics. I actually had not considered fabrics when I started scavenging, but I remember Ryanne’s mom did an interview awhile back about identifying fabrics, and Ryanne talked about wool and denim remnants. I took nothing for granted when sorting and looking for value. Before I bought these lockers, I had no idea that little girl’s pageant dresses from the 80s could bring over $100 consistently. My eye for what is the right fit for Ebay is constantly evolving, and this Podcast has helped with this. Thanks to both of you!

[The_SEAM_StoreParticipant Location: PA]

Week May 26 – June 1, 2019

Items in store: 3883 Listings for 5928 Items
Items Sold: 63 Transactions for 69 Items
Gross Sales: $3833.60
Highest Price Sold: $215, 3 Piece Suit
Lowest Price Sold: $4.99(shoe laces)
Average Price Sold: $55.56
Cost of Goods Sold $209, Plus consignment
Number of new items listed this week: 102 items
$$ spent on new inventory this week $70
Repeat Customers: 5

Amazon
Items Sold 0
Gross Sales $0
Cost of Good Sold $0

Another slow week, took some time to work in the garden this week. I decided to DIY the broken spigot for the drip irrigation system, which involved some time in the furthest darkest dirtiest part of our crawl space….but it was an otherwise easy fix and I didn’t spend a dime because I found a new spigot in the “plumbing department” of my garage. I guess I picked it up at a yard sale at some point years ago. While I was at it I also replaces a leaky faucet in the garage sink, and a smelly trap in kitchen. I rewarded myself with a burger and ice-cream from our favorite local vintage carhop.

We’ve hosted a few garage sales, none with much success. It’s usually early to mid summer after we do a big cleanup, declutter of the house, stuff we would donate anyway. We have a 4 car garage, so I usually spend a day setting it up on tables and just open the door at 6. Usually only brings in $200 or so, but we’ve had a couple better ones, the rest just gets loaded up and donated. My wife hates doing them, so I usually end up doing it all. lol.

[T-SattParticipant Location:]

Week of 05/26-06/01
Total Items in Store: 3,308 (Up 53% YOY)
Number of Items Listed: 0
Number of Items Sold: 95 (Up 25% YOY)
(Includes 1 Etsy, 1 Poshmark, 0 Bonanza, 0 TrueGether)
Weekly STR: 12% (Down 3% YOY)

Total Product Sales: $2,212 (Up 24% YOY)
Sales Volume Variance to Prior Year: Up $446
Sales Price Variance to Prior Year: Down $19
Cost of Items Sold: $446
Cost of Labor: $0
Highest Item Sold: $100 – Cole Haan Boots
Competition: Highest Priced Sale: Veronica wins the week and Veronica leads for the year 13-10.

Clothing
# Listed: 1,977
# Sold: 68
STR: 15%
ASP: $20.74

Shoes
# Listed: 731
# Sold: 19
STR: 11%
ASP: $30.67

Hard Goods
# Listed: 600
# Sold: 8
STR: 6%
ASP: $27.28

EBay
# Listed: 3,308
# Sold: 93
STR: 12%
ASP: $23.19

Etsy
# Listed: 222
# Sold: 1
STR: 2%
ASP: $24.84

Poshmark
# Listed: 788
# Sold: 1
STR: 1%
ASP: $30

Took the week off as we were in Montana at my parents ranch. Lots of outside work, and hoping my dad gets better this week (couple of medical procedures this week).

Felt nice to get a break from listing, ready for the upcoming weeks!

[MDC GalleriesParticipant Location: Atlanta]

Hey troy: Welcome back. Thought you had been pretty quite. See now it was because of being out with the parents.

[Mark SParticipant Location:]

Troy,

Did you change to an anchor store?

You might want to switch before July 1st if you haven’t already so that you can get that extra coupon for shipping supplies. I can’t remember how much more it is for an anchor store.

I am planning on changing to an anchor store around August\September if I can get my listings up to the 3300+ level.

Mark

[tam from Tam’s Vintage & MoreParticipant Location:]

We listened on the way back from our Arkansas vacation where we saw baby clothes and beat-up toys at every sale. All we did were the slow drive-bys, no stops. Anyway we both related when you talked about shipping too much fragile stuff in one box. Last year I listed a bunch of Dixie Dogwood dinnerware. I grouped it in several listings and one buyer bought almost all of it. I tried to fit it all in just 2 boxes. Boxes in box, tons of creative padding on both. It got there safely but the amount of time and thought I put into it was ridiculous. We decided after that to think about ourselves first instead of concentrating on keeping the shipping as low as possible for the buyer.

[Julie BParticipant Location: Georgia]

My best Yard Sale score- New sealed Christian Dior face powder. Paid $1, took a best offer of $175.

I don’t typically go to yard sales. It’s a lot of driving around, digging through damp boxes on the ground and for very little return. And I hate when I’m the only one there and an entire family watches as I pull up, dig through their stuff and then leave without buying anything. For some reason I always feel like I have to buy something. But a yard sale sign was just down the street from me so I whipped into the driveway and was stunned to see a mansion I never knew existed and that close to my house. It was the end of the day so I can’t believe can’t believe no one else noticed the dusty Christian Dior box just sitting there.

[Steven SParticipant Location: South Dakota]

Toughen up Julie :).
I know it seems weird to go through peoples stuff but that’s why they’re having a sale, the worst is when they follow you around or watch every move and make a comment on every item you touched or even glanced at.
I always greet them with a Hi how are ya? it puts them at ease and makes you seem friendly and can also make for a better deal if you find stuff.
I know if I spend 2-3 hours going to garage sales I’ll eventually find $100-$200 worth of stuff or more.
Today was a good example, all the sales seemed like they were poor taste decorative items or baby clothes and VHS tapes, I ended the morning with some great stuff and the last house I went to I spotted under a table a Herman Miller fiberglass arm chair with no base for $1.00. Almost called it quits before all that.

[Retro Treasures WVParticipant Location:]

I LOOOOVE yard sales.

It is a great way to practice your negotiation skills and also great to expand your knowledge.

Julie, I challenge you to do yard sales tomorrow and do a few exercises:

1. Low ball an offer. Bonus points for the higher the price tag is. It doesn’t even matter what the item is. Pick something out you are on the fence about that is priced $5-10. Then without emotion, ask the seller if they’ll take a buck. Make it a statement rather than a question. Say “I will give you a dollar for this.” Note: I regularly offer $1 on $5 items and get them for $1. This past weekend I got a $10 item for $1.

2. Instead of doing a drive by of a bad yard sale, get out say hello, walk through, say thank you, and leave. These yard sales you know you don’t want anything make it much easier to be able to walk away empty handed, and also makes it easier to perform exercises #1 & 3, so try them out occasionally too on your way out.

3. Make a firm offer and walk away if they balk. Bonus points if you combine this with #1. Try this one a few ways. Make a firm offer, if they counter then look the item over real good. Take your time looking it over – at least 30 seconds. Silence can be a great negotiation tactic. After a good once over, restate your original offer. If they don’t take it then just walk away.

Another way to do this exercise is to make an offer and walk away without a delay if they counter. Find another item and make a firm offer again. You’ll have primed the seller to know you are stating a firm price.

These skills are applicable in other areas of your life and are important to cultivate. It develops condifence, negotiating skills, and people skills.

And remember this – you aren’t being sleazy doing any of these things! Get that thought out of your head! It is simply not true.

[ItemsfromthesouthParticipant Location: Florida]

Living in Florida, yardsales are ALL year long so that is my main scavenging area. After 25 years of full time employment, my last day is next Thursday at which time I go full time re-selling. I am excited about being able to go to Estate Sales on Thursday and Fridays (which I have never been able to do before). For 20 years, I only sold cheerleader uniforms on eBay and did fairly well…especially around Halloween. Knowing I could stop working full time if I could get into another niche, I started researching and listening to your podcast. I decided to sell anything and everything for 1 year, keep good records and see if I could make the plunge. So from January 2018 to December 2018 I sold over $15K worth just in my second store. This is on top of having my cheer uniform store and a full time job. I went back to work in January and gave my 6 month notice (I am a bookkeeper in a school and wanted to finish out the year).
I KNOW this will work and I wish I had done this 2 or 3 years ago!
I love how everyone posts their numbers here and shares their experiences!
CHEERS!

[Djett83Participant Location: Northern VA (Warrenton)]

Yard sales can be a pain. You really have to just look at it as a business deal. I go to so many where I walk up skim through what’s there (usually piles & piles of infant stuff) and walk away. I try to be friendly even if I know there’s probably nothing I’m interested in.

I did this just the other day though. As I drove up to a yard sale everything looked like tiny kids clothes and broken toys BUT as I walked to the back there was a ton of heavy metal CDs. I know nothing about heavy metal but I do like to buy large lots of things that I can list. So I asked how much for the entire lot and he said $40. There must have been 300-400 CDs so I said sure. So now I’m working my way through the lot so that my heavy metal pipeline is turned on! The first day I sold 2 groups of CDs that paid for the whole thing. I still know nothing about heavy metal and don’t listen myself but I’m glad to list them on ebay. If I had done a drive-by on this one I would have missed a nice pipeline!

So in most cases I’ll at least do a walk-by since I’ve made the effort to actually find the sale. Most of the times it’s just duds but you never know until you look a little closer. Plus I’m addicted to yard sales.

Donna

[DantheDinerParticipant Location:]

Store: SaveMeFromMyUnemployment
5/26 – 6/01

Total Listings: 7224
Total Sales: 1457.73
Quantity Sales: 113
Highest Price Sold: $59 – Monster Cable
Average Price Sold: $12.90

This has been the roughest quarter in a long time. A lot of my stuff has been low-price, so a lot of money going away on shipping and fees. The giant CD collection is beginning to sell, but not much of high value.

[JayKeymaster Location: Virginia]

Do you do Free Shipping?

[ChristineRParticipant Location: Southern California]

I’m pretty much on break mode and only sold one item last week and one the week before. Struggling to find a contractor for my dad’s remodel who is available, good, and reasonably priced. This and the kids being out of school is taking up my time for now and it’s been stressful.

Basically I haven’t bought anything or listed for over a couple of months now. I ran a sale today to try a little life support for my store. I do not particularly feel like taking on Ebay listing into my crowded mental space but could use the money for our summer vacation and Hamilton tickets, so plan to get some Ebay mojo back and list soon. This is the slow season of my contract work and projects have dipped over the last couple of weeks.

Wishing you all better than usual summer sales! I’m hoping to read about how you all did with make offer to buyers. I’m also interested in hearing about anyone selling home goods on Poshmark. Someone said on Youtube that it’s messy right now and limited.

[DantheDinerParticipant Location:]

I’ve never done free shipping before; just the high price, Best Offer strategy that you guys do. But recently, I’ve found that I can price some things more precisely with free shipping, particularly media and clothes, where I can get a very precise idea of what the highest price something will sell at.

[JayKeymaster Location: Virginia]

If you are correctly pricing in shipping costs into your Free Shipping items, then it shouldn’t feel like you’re losing money.

But as you know, we just think calculated shipping is the most fair and transparent. We like to think of shipping costs as the agreement between the buyer and USPS. We’re just the pass-through.

[Author]

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