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Good podcast this week. When I restarted selling on eBay after I retired it was for extra spending money. At the time I was grandfathered in on health insurance so extra $$ was for fun stuff. In the last two years, the grandfather clause ran out and I am now paying an much larger chunk of my monthly pension for the same health insurance. eBay has transitioned from fun money, to money to help get us through the month. I am also still working on getting out of debt. All that being said, my goal for 2019 was to step up on listing to increase my eBay sales accordingly. We have had so many emergency expenses in the last six months (furnace, plumbing, unexpected car repairs) that I also need to rebuild our emergency fund.
With that in mind, I have been diligently plowing through my death piles while waiting for estate sales to kick back in gear. I have given up on Goodwill (which used to be a major source for me) because my local store has become so trashy and their prices in some cases are downright ridiculous. When I found out they were spraying for bedbugs a minimum of once a week I said no more! My sales aren’t where I would like them to be, but I am an optimist, so I am hoping for improvement as the year progresses. Still working on weeding out the lower price items and replacing them with higher priced better quality items. I also seem to have been having a rash of items people make offers on and either don’t pay or ask to cancel the sale. My numbers would be much higher if I hadn’t had all the cancellations. I also haven’t been able to list as much as I wanted because I signed my dad up for Hospice and have been spending lots of time working with them.
eBay January 13-19
Total sales. $133.96
# sold. 13
Avg. sale. $10.30
# listed. 17
# in store. 1110
Returns. 0
Unpaid items. 1
COGS. $12.25
$ spent on new. $26.95
Highest sale. $24.99 Los Angeles Pottery Bread dish #51 1962I’m on the last week sucked band wagon. I am NOT posting my numbers because they are beyond pathetic. I had more days without sales than with. It was also the week of the cancelled offer. It felt like I had at least one everyday. So far this week has been better, but still nothing to brag about yet. It particularly sucks because it’s tax month on top of poor sales. I’m going to consider last week an anomaly and hope things pick up as this week rolls onward. I still think things are going to pick up, there’s just a lot of uncertainty in the economy right now and people are probably being cautious .
With the holidays, I just listened to last week’s podcast yesterday and am listening to this week’s right now. Being the end of the year, I have spent time reflecting on last year’s sales and my store and where I would like them to be in 2019. I think 2018 was a transitional year for my store. My sales were not where I wanted them to be, but I was also spending lots of time tweaking my inventory to higher quality items. I also didn’t have an entire estate sale dumped into my lap (moving my dad) like I did in 2017. I know that I have become more discriminating as a scavenger, I didn’t buy as much junk this year, just because I needed things to list. I discovered my sweet spot as far as the size of store I can handle on my own, plus the type of things I am comfortable selling, storing and shipping. I also realized that because my monthly health insurance cost went up dramatically last year, I was much more dependent on my eBay income for living expenses and not just for fun money.
With all those things in mind, my store resolutions for 2019 are continuations of what I started in 2018. I am going to continue to upgrade my inventory. I would like to get my store up to about 1,500 good quality items. Last year, I could never build up a cushion in my account for emergencies because it seemed like there was always an emergency. So my goal is to increase my sales enough to be able to build in a savings cushion of at least $500. Lastly, I am going to get some totes and reorganize my office so it looks less like an episode of hoarders.Since I missed last week, here are my numbers for the last two weeks.
eBay Dec 16-22
Total sales. $263.83
# sold. 24
Avg. sale. $10.99
# listed. 10
# in store. 1103
Returns. 0
COGS. $10.15
$ spent on new. $25.02
Highest sale. $100 vintage hand sewn quilt pieceseBay 23-29
Total sales. $119.93 (1Bonanza sale)
# sold. 12
Avg. sale. $9.99
# listed. 8
# in store. 1096
Returns. 0
COGS. $5.47
$ spent on new. 0
Highest sale. $29.99 Aitkens Pewter Handled spreaders (3)I was so busy last week, I didn’t listen to the podcast until Friday and never did post numbers. I was pleasantly surprised when I did numbers yesterday-actually pretty average for me. This week’s schedule is looking just as hectic, but I’m hoping to hit at least my minimum of 3 new items listed everyday. It’s way less than I would like to do, but it keeps the flow going. Here are my numbers for the last 2 weeks:
eBay November 25-December 1
Total sales. $150.68
# sold. 13
Avg. sale. $11.59
# listed. 19
# in store. 1118
Returns. 0
COGS. $9.29
$ spent on new. $4.60
Highest sale. $21 set of 8 Indiana glass amber goblets. Went to Korea.eBay December 2-8
Total sales $172.93
# sold. 19
Avg. sale. $9.10
# listed. 12
# in store. 1112
Returns. 0
COGS. $15.75
$ spent on new 0
Highest sale $22.99 Stechol Gracie China tea for oneHappy Thanksgiving to all! It’s been a crazy busy couple of weeks, but I have managed to squeeze in eBay here and there. My office is back to looking like a bad episode of hoarders. Two of my daughters dumped stuff on me to sell (one just bought her first house) and I went overboard at an online auction. It’s going to be a quiet Thanksgiving so I am hoping to have a listing marathon this weekend. The first week of November went great and I thought here we go….but then things slowed down again. That being said, I can handle slow, as long as things keep going out the door! Here are my numbers for the good week and the slow week. Jury is still out on this week!
Nov. 4-11
Total sales. $269.33
# sold. 22
Avg. sold. $12.24
# listed. 23
# in store. 1102
Returns. 0
COGS. $13.31
$ spent on new. $22.76
Highest sales $49.99 Vtg Hakata Urasaki Washable Doll, $39.99 book Beethoven Klaviersonaten Band INov. 12-17
Total sales. $108.20 (1 Bonanza)
# sold 9
Avg. sale. $12.02
# listed. 20
# in store. 1106
Returns. 0
COGS. $5
$ spent on new. $25.00
Highest sale. $26.00 Waterman fountain penI’m behind on everything but I at least wanted to get my numbers posted! I seem to be in a good week-bad week pattern. Last week was saved by a couple of higher priced items, but I actually went 3 days with no sales! Thank goodness I was busy with other things or I would probably have been freaking out. Yesterday was great, but there’s a lot of week left….
I’m working at the polls tomorrow. I don’t care who you vote for, just keep your local poll workers busy by going to vote!
eBay Oct 28-Nov 3
Total sales. $156.35
# sold. 12
Avg. sale. $13.03
# listed. 18
# in store. 1,112
Returns. 0
COGS. $8.03
$ spent on new. $46.90
Highest sale-$50 Vtg Magazine Ceylon (Sri Lanka) Times 1959 This was one of my parents items, so no cost involved.The online auction I use is about 45 minutes away. I just use it as an excuse to make a whole day of scavenging. My small town only has 1-2 estate sales a month. The city the Auction house is at, Beavercreek, and the surrounding cities always has an estate sale going. Not to mention all the thrift stores in the area. First thing I do before I bid on any online auction is to check the pickup times and location. If it doesn’t fit in the schedule I don’t bid. I have bought enough stuff from Innovative Auctions that they know me and will open hold my items if I can’t make a pickup on the regular date although I know they don’t do this for everyone).
This is the one I use. It’s a bunch of individual auction houses that run their auctions through this website. They operate in most states from what I see. The company I prefer in my area is Innovative Auctions.
EBTH seems like it has cut back on the cities they operate out of in the last few months.
Everything But The House has nice stuff, but the shipping will kill you.
My two cents on online auctions. I think a lot of them aren’t worth the time or trouble. The only way to figure out if a particular company works for you is to try it a time or two. I always check pick up times before I bid on anything. If it doesn’t fit in my schedule, I don’t bid. You also have to watch the premium they charge over the auction price. I’m really lucky to have found one that works really well for me. The auctions end on a Sunday evening. Pick up is usually on a Friday. I do have to drive an hour to get the items, but more often than not it’s been well worth the drive. I rarely spend more than $10-20 dollars and often fill the back end of my car. I have had a few jackpot items and some that go straight to Goodwill, but I imagine that’s true of table lots at regular auctions too. Lots of good solid $10 to 30 dollar items. This online auction is rapidly becoming my main source of items.
I forgot to mention in my post above, is anyone else getting the ‘Want to sell this faster?’ emails and notifications? They are starting to really annoy me. Is there a way to opt out of the darn things?
Finally had a better week. Not as good as I would like it to be, but headed in the right direction. A real mix of high and low end items. Still listing my old low end inventory as auctions. Most sell for cheap, but a couple have had some bidding action and gone for decent amounts. Gets ‘em out of my storage and brings in some revenue.
Ryanne I agree that the EBay app on my phone is awful. It’s marginally better on my iPad, but it’s amazing to me how backward it is considering everything these days is about the app. Today I got a counter offer on an item and it wouldn’t show me the offer history. It’s stupid stuff like that and invoices that make me have a love hate relationship with the EBay app.
Question-yesterday I had someone buy and pay for an item and then ask me not to ship it until October 27 because they are out of the country. How does that work without EBay dinging me for late shipping? Since my new mail carrier my numbers have been slowly improving regarding late deliveries so I really don’t want to take a hit.
eBay September 30-October 6
Total sales. $211.05
# sold. 24
Avg. sale. $8.79
# listed. 26
# in store. 1,085
Returns. 0, but 1 canceled sale
COGS. $15.52
$ spent on new. $11.75
Highest sale- $24.99 Anne Klein black patent flats going to ChileListening to the podcast now. Quite simply, last week sucked. It was my lowest numbers since March 2017! As I mentioned last week, Monday, within a one hour period I had two return requests and a cancelled sale. The week never really recovered from that hour. My cancellation was exactly what you were talking about, bought it and almost instantly cancels it. To make matters worse, they paid with an echeck. I hate echecks. They are a royal pain in my patoot. So the buyer didn’t get an instant refund because the darn thing was hung up in the clearing period. It cleared Saturday, but so far neither PayPal or eBay has refunded it yet. I will probably just go ahead and do it tonight and hope it doesn’t end up being a double refund out of my account. Or I will break down and call eBay and hope I get a decent rep.
Speaking of thrift stores, my Goodwill has become somewhere I don’t want to shop anymore. I’m wondering if it’s just my local Goodwill or if they are all on a downhill slide. Not only is it trashy, I have been told they get fumigation for bedbugs a minimum of once a week. They have also started using labels on the hard goods that won’t come off without causing damage to the item. My current favorite choice for sourcing is an online auction. The auctions close on Sunday evenings, pick up,is the following Friday. Love to scoop up lots of things for just a buck or two!
I am not posting my numbers this week because they are so pathetic. Between low sales and the returns, I think I barely broke even this week. At least I didn’t go in the hole, right? Ok-onward and upward!My first reaction to this week’s podcast was-NO NOT NUMBERS! Usually when you guys go to town talking about numbers, my eyes glaze over and I need a nap. I listened and I did learn a few things in spite of myself. I have been feeling guilty about scavenging because of my death piles, but in reality, this is the season to ‘get the good stuff cheap’. By the end of October, garage, yard and rummage sales are winding down. I find that by tackling my death pile I have become a more discriminating scavenger. I have been tweaking my listings and between that and taking the ‘What the hell was I thinking when I bought this item’ stuff out of the death pile, I made $68 by putting the stuff in a friends garage sale. She’s having the Vietnam Vets pickup the leftovers, so it’s not coming home. Still tweaking listings, having some moderate success with auctions and putting a dent in the death pile, so progress is being made! Actually sold more last week than I thought I did, and keeping my fingers crossed the upward trend continues!
eBay September 9-15
Total sales. $187.12
# sold. 21
Avg. sale. $8.91
Items in store. 1,076
Returns. 0 last week, yesterday I had 2 returns and one canceled sale in a 30 minute time frame-yikes
COGS. $25.42
$ spent on new. $9.95
Highest sales. $19.99 Noel Angel Candle Holders/$20 Nottingham Lace tablecloth
