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Hi everybody!
I’m located in WV. By day I’m a full time Mechanical Design Engineer, and by night I’m a full time child wrangler and ebay scavenger. I live with my lovely wife and 4 kids, whom we homeschool. We’ve also had two of our children at home with a mid-wife. You could say we take DIY to the extreme. Trust me, every day is an adventure in this household!This whole ebay adventure started after I was laid off from my job at a chemical plant at the beginnning of summer 2015. I had sold on ebay sparingly for years to fund hobbies and Christmas presents, but all the sudden with all this free time I started listing stuff. Then I started buying stuff at Goodwill to sell, and I was off to the races. I couldn’t believe people were willing to pay good money for this junk I was getting for pretty much nothing. I liked to refer to my thrift finds as “$20 bills lying all over the place just waiting for me to pick them up”. After about 2 months, I realized I had $3k sales in a single month! All the sudden it dawned on me that this could potentially be a full time job! Around that time I was offered an engineering job, so I took an extra month off so I could have the whole summer off. I decided to keep developing my ebay skills and started to research long term goals such as setting up a legal business, taxes, etc. It was about this time I stumbled across Scavengerlife. Finding this site has reshaped how I look at many things in life. Who knew there were so many like minded folks that were willing to share and help others like myself!
Since then I took the plunge and created my own business – Retro Treasures WV – and invested quite a bit of time/money honing my craft, building inventory, and increasing my storage capabilities. I openly share about my ebay business to my coworkers, as I want to make it quite clear I have “F-U” money and they can’t push me around. With today’s uncertain job market, I am working to ensure I can ramp up to full-time ebay status within days if my day job goes away. I am also working to become fully self-employed by 2020. One way or another, my days of working for the man and giving the bulk of my time to someone else are numbered.
My favorite items to find and list are shoes, vintage toys & electronics, and 80’s/90’s windbreakers (the tackier the better). My least favorite items to list are dishes and knickknacks.
Well you can always send her a picture of your measurement and ask how she measured it. If you can get her to admit in casual conversation that she lied or screwed up, you would have a case. Don’t be accusatory – let her think she won and she may give you what you want. If not, just move on.
I seem to sell 2-3 random items a week. I haven’t sent anything in since before their announcement. I have plenty to send in but the motivation is killed due to the announcement of the LTSF and the higher 4q storage fees. I think I’ll wait until December to send anything in.
Sales are definitely slow. Life is busy and I don’t need ebay money right now, so I don’t sweat it too much. Keeping the listing going and I’m working on my storage this weekend. I’ve had 7 sales this week but two are still waiting on payment. Also got a return request from someone who “accidentally ordered the item”.
There are so many aspects to this business that you can just switch gears to rediscover something you like. If you need some downtime change handling time to 3 days and take some time off.
Go list that box of junk you have been dreading. Once you are into it I guarantee you’ll feel better and realize it wasn’t half as bad as you built it up to be.
Work on your record keeping systems. Do some research into new software tools. Go on a thrifting road trip to discover new thrifting spots.There is a ton of things you can do to keep things fresh and avoid burnout.
So I was just playing with the width of my browser window. There is some kind of glitch that forces the forum section of the site to get more narrow for certain widths of the window. If you resize the width to what the forum actually is, it is fine. Then I start to widen the window. After I’ve widened it about 3″, the forum reduces in width about 40%. If I keep widening the window about 1.5″ more, the forum goes back to normal size. I’m using IE11 browser on a PC.
Is it just me, or has the forum all the sudden become much more narrow. I mean it was already pretty narrow and non-adjustable to match window size, but now posts are at most 6-7 words per line.
I’ve recently had some great sales. Here are the highlights.
Vintage Joy Caros Print Decoupage on wood.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Vtg-1970s-Joy-Caros-SEPTEMBER-LOVE-Print-Decoupage-Custom-lacquered-Solid-Wood-/262331459014?rd=1
There was no market for this so I shot for the moon and happily accepted a $120 offer.BORN Telly Brown Leather Dyed Shearling Winter Fashion Boots
http://www.ebay.com/itm/BORN-Telly-Brown-Leather-Dyed-Shearling-Winter-Fashion-Boot-Women-size-6-36-5-/262521463051?rd=1
Got these at a yard sale for $3. What a find!Marantz Professional PMD620 Solid State Recorder With AC Adapter
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Marantz-Professional-PMD620-Solid-State-Recorder-With-AC-Adapter-/262683566330?rd=1Found a gallon sized bag at goodwill for $4 sitting on a random rack. The bag had two of these in it!! Plus a few other accessories that went to them – total list price for all items was $600. Finds like this is what keeps me coming back for more.
Women’s Orthofeet Leather Therapeutic Diabetic Shoes
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Womens-Orthofeet-Leather-Therapeutic-Diabetic-Shoes-Black-Size-9-1-2-Extra-Wide-/262562073056?rd=1What can I say – shoe sales make my world go round. Sold these for $70 best offer.
Vintage T Snap USA Synchilla Aztec Indian Navajo Patagonia Ski Fleece Jacket
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Vintage-T-Snap-USA-Synchilla-Aztec-Indian-Navajo-Patagonia-Ski-Fleece-Jacket-XL-/262556660120?rd=1Another off-hand goodwill find. The color scheme caught my eye, and I just got happier and happier the more research I did to drill down all my keywords. “Settled” for a $135 offer.
USA Wellco Military Army Combat Work Boots
http://www.ebay.com/itm/USA-Wellco-Military-Army-Combat-Work-Boots-hot-weather-Type-1-spike-protect-6W-/262702352676?rd=1Here is an example of being willing to spend more sometimes. I had to pay $15 at goodwill, but I knew I’d do well. Accepted a $51 offer within 3 hours of listing.
Yeah careful with all these exciting new changes j&r or We might just talk you into trying the “managing an eBay store with a baby” experiment. lol!
Averaging $5k a week? Whoah! You guys are such an inspiration. I’ve shared your story multiple times with my wife. You guys are living my dream!
I have the 5′ long shelves in the link. Currently I have 3, but plan to add two more eventually to finish lining my walls. Back when I got them they were $99 shipped with Prime. They are still rock solid 6 months later being fully loaded up the whole time. You can fit 4 of the cheap $5 18 gal tubs from walmart on each shelf if you situate them just right.
