Scavenger Life

Trash to Cash. A podcast about making a living on eBay.

Scavenger Life Episode 66: Interview with Dave- How To Buy and Sell Cars on eBay Motors

Mikey interviews Dave, a regular listener our podcast, who had some knowledge of the online automobile trade. Dave describes his experience of selling a lot of vehicles online and how eBay Motors is a bit different than using regular eBay. He also has some tips on what scams to look out for and how to protect yourself when buying vehicles through eBay motors. Thanks for talking to us Dave! Check out his items for sale on ebay- mrvintageestateliquidation.

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Scavenger Life Episode 65: What’s Happening In Your eBay Store This Week?

A $5 box of antlers sold for $75 best offer!

Wendy and Mikey talk about what’s going on in their eBay store this week.

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We’ve included our weekly Ebay numbers below. In the comments, go ahead and post what you’ve done this week. And let us know if there are other numbers you want us to share. 

The Weekly Scavenger Numbers

Jay and Ryanne’s Store Week Nov 3-9, 2013

  • Total Items in Store: 2800
  • Items Sold: 45
  • Total Sales: $1422.66
  • Highest Price Sold: $149.99 (1970’s Vintage Leather Biker Boots)
  • Average Price Sold: $31.66
  • Returns: 2
  • Positive Feedback: 55 (because we shipped 190 items over the weekend after vacation)
  • Neutral Feedback: 1
  • Negative Feedback: 0

Mikey and Wendy’s store Week Nov 3-9, 2013

  • Total Items in Store:1037
  • Items Sold: 11
  • Total Sales: $386.01
  • Highest Price Sold: $110.00
  • Average Price Sold: $35.09
  • Returns: 1
  • Positive Feedback: 13
  • Neutral Feedback: 1
  • Negative Feedback: 0

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Scavenger Life Episode 64: How to Use International Shipping for your Ebay Store


Flickr Creative Commons photo by puuikibeach

Ryanne and Mikey dive into the subject of international shipping for eBay. There are lots of rules and regulations to look out for and hopefully we’ve covered most of them here. Check out eBay’s Global Shipping Program here. Also see their country and category limits here. We mention USPS 1st Class International mail and the new E-Delcon tracking, USPS Padded Flat Rate Envelopes and Small Flat Rate boxes, USPS Customs Forms Envelope and USPS insurance limited countries.

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Scavenger Life Episode 63: What’s Happening In Your eBay Store This Week?

Bought for less than 25 cents, sold for $230, Global Shipping Program. Oh yeah!

Ryanne talks about what it was like to ship 190 items after a 6 week trip to Europe. Mikey has a bum ebay week, but listing more for the holiday rush should solve this problem. Check out our interview on eBay Radio the other day. Also check out the info about the recent eBay sellers purge.

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We’ve included our weekly Ebay numbers below. In the comments, go ahead and post what you’ve done this week. And let us know if there are other numbers you want us to share. 

The Weekly Scavenger Numbers

Jay and Ryanne’s Store Week Oct 27-Nov 2, 2013

  • Total Items in Store: 2748
  • Items Sold: 38
  • Total Sales: $1544.73
  • Highest Price Sold: $230.00 (1970s Vintage Nike Running Shoes)
  • Average Price Sold: $40.60
  • Returns: 0
  • Positive Feedback: 4
  • Neutral Feedback: 0
  • Negative Feedback: 0

Mikey and Wendy’s store Week Oct 27-Nov 2, 2013

  • Total Items in Store:1031
  • Items Sold: 17
  • Total Sales: $391.18
  • Highest Price Sold: $85.35
  • Average Price Sold: $23.01
  • Returns: 1
  • Positive Feedback: 8
  • Neutral Feedback: 1
  • Negative Feedback: 0

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Scavenger Life Episode 62: Wendy Interviews Jodi An LA Mom Who Uses eBay and Etsy


Flickr Creative Commons photo by kla4067

Wendy interviews her life long friend Jodi about the LA eBaying scene. Jodi shares her perspective of using eBay not so much to make money, but to reduce the loss on items she no longer uses. Check out her Etsy store full of lovely handmade jewelry.

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Scavenger Life Episode 61: What’s Happening In Your eBay Store This Week?

Wendy and Mikey discuss the complexities of selling items worth over $2,500 on eBay. This episode covers the additional forms, shipping and expenses that one has to consider when moving high value merchandise.

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We’ve included our weekly Ebay numbers below. In the comments, go ahead and post what you’ve done this week. And let us know if there are other numbers you want us to share. 

The Weekly Scavenger Numbers

Jay and Ryanne’s Store Week Oct 20-26, 2013

  • Total Items in Store: 2785
  • Items Sold: 32
  • Total Sales: $1,091.56
  • Highest Price Sold: $120.00 (Harris Tweed women’s wool coat)
  • Average Price Sold: $34.11
  • Returns: 0
  • Positive Feedback: 1
  • Neutral Feedback: 0
  • Negative Feedback: 0

Mikey and Wendy’s store Week Oct 20-26, 2013

  • Total Items in Store:1020
  • Items Sold: 13
  • Total Sales: 409.94
  • Highest Price Sold: 199.99
  • Average Price Sold: $31.53
  • Returns: 1
  • Positive Feedback: 12
  • Neutral Feedback: 0
  • Negative Feedback: 0

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Scavenger Life Episode 60: Interview with Miriam Otto of The eBay Life Blog: How To Hire Employees For Your Ebay Business

Once we started listing consistently in our eBay store, the obvious thing happened: we became successful. The bigger our inventory, the more we sold. Like most successful sellers, we then hit a wall. Each month we can barely list enough to keep up with the amount we were selling. This makes it difficult to grow our inventory. Listing is the real bottleneck in the eBay workflow.

We’ve recently started talked about hiring employees. How would we train them? What would we pay them? How do you keep them from just starting their own store once they learn how easy it is to sell scavenged goods? The math has never made sense to us. We’re definitely skeptics.

This week we talk to Miriam Otto of The eBay Life Blog and Blue Frog Shoes. She has between two and three employees working for her at any one time. She mainly hires college students since they like
flexible work hours and aren’t stable enough to become her competition. Since hiring employees, she now works a full-time job while they list and ship with the help of her boyfriend, Johnny. They have more than doubled what they make on eBay since hiring employees. She’s even recently bought another house to live in, so their original house can just be for eBay storage/business. We like the way she thinks!

Miriam teaches an extensive online class where she shares even more details about how to successfully hire eBay employees. Check out the course here. Thanks Miriam for sharing your knowledge with us!

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Scavenger Life Episode 59: What’s Happening In Your eBay Store This Week?

Purchased this coat for $10, sold it for $300. Not a bad risk!

Ryanne and Jay talk about what’s happening in their store this week. Still in Amsterdam, we have been listing like crazy and selling pretty well. Had to make some returns for people buying clothes, especially overall shorts for Halloween. We also dive back into the Q&A from our blog sidebar and answer some questions. Be sure to weigh your items before you list them using a digital scale. These are the scales we recommend- Small Digtal Kitchen Scale or Larger Digital Postal Scale. Also, check out the USPS guidelines for what items can be mailed using Media Mail.

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We’ve included our weekly Ebay numbers below. In the comments, go ahead and post what you’ve done this week. And let us know if there are other numbers you want us to share. 

The Weekly Scavenger Numbers

Jay and Ryanne’s Store Week Oct 13-19, 2013

  • Total Items in Store: 2740
  • Items Sold: 44
  • Total Sales: $1615.21
  • Highest Price Sold: $299.99 (Shearling winter coat)
  • Average Price Sold: $36.70
  • Returns: 0
  • Positive Feedback: 3
  • Neutral Feedback: 0
  • Negative Feedback: 0

Mikey and Wendy’s store Week Oct 13-19, 2013

  • Total Items in Store:1034
  • Items Sold: 17
  • Total Sales: $415.86
  • Highest Price Sold: $47.97 (plaster wall shelves)
  • Average Price Sold: $24.46
  • Returns: 0
  • Positive Feedback: 9
  • Neutral Feedback: 0
  • Negative Feedback: 0

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Scavenger Life Episode 58: We Answer Your Ebay Questions and Comments

This week we realized that listeners have been sending in questions from the form on the blog sidebar. Since we accidentally
forgot to turn on notifications, all your important questions will now be answered. Like, “DID MIKEY SELL THE PIG BONES?!” (See all questions listed below.)

In the future, we’ll make sure we answer questions and comments as they come in. Just write us through the sidebar ===>>

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1.  I know you’ve talked about shipping options in the past, but would it be possible for you to cover when it is beneficial to use regional flat rate boxes. (charles in baltimore)

2. Talk about regional rate boxes, as per listener email.

3. Finances: How much of your net income do you take as owner’s draw and how much is left in reserve for purchasing inventory? Do you do it on a percentage or always keep a specific amount of money in your account for purchasing? (RoxyAnny)

4. I would like to hear the pros and cons of opening a store on ebay.  I list a wide variety of items and really don’t expect many return customers.  With that it seems like a store won’t do much for me and only listing 50 items at a time it seems I should just stick to the no store idea. (JParr)

5. What works more on ebay: auction or buy it now? (Maria Loyola)

6. I wanted to know if you guys use the “international site visibility” on your listings? I have always used it and am trying to find a way to lower expenses. At $0.50 a pop with 80+ listings it can get pretty expensive.  (Kim)

7. I was wondering since you two travel alot if you could do a show on money saving tip and advice on traveling.  Is your trip for business or pleasure.  (alan)

8. Seller Limits. I don’t think you have covered this subject. A new user gets a monthly selling limit of 10 then moves to 50 after verifying with paypal etc. and stays at 50 until ebay feels the need to change that amount. I would suggest you tell new users what to do to Ebay increase this limitation to get to a 2000 item store. (Tony Hoover)

9. Did Mikey ever get paid for selling the pig bones? (Brian)

10. How to list unusual items and get them noticed (especially choosing the right category)? (California Deb)

11. Do you think selling books is a good idea (on amazon or ebay).

12. Please discuss ebay seller fees. Are they cheaper if you have a store in opposed to not having one. Do you take fees into consideration when pricing the item. Between eBay and PayPal fees its hard break even sometimes. (Steve)

13. Is there a garagesale for android phones and PC’s. (Alan)

14. Would love a topic on hints to speed up listing, including using ebay Turbo Lister and “paid for” software such as Seller Sourcebook and Auctiva. (Rosemary in UK)

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