My eBay Garage Sale

This was my plan. I've got a bunch of stuff. Why don't I sell it on eBay? I'll take pictures, buy a scale so I can estimate shipping. . . put all my stuff on an eBay page, title it Edem's Garage Sale. . .people can come and browse and buy my stuff. It was a brilliant plan.

Except eBay doesn’t work that way.

You can only list 10 items at a time. And the listing time is limited.

And if you sell some but not all of your items during the listing period, it reduces the number of items you can list or re-list. That is, not only is there a 10 item list limit, you can only sell 10 items per month.

The first week I listed 10 items on eBay, I sold 3. This meant I could list 7 items the next week. I sold one from that batch. Which left me 6 slots for the next week. And so on. It's a bit confusing, I know.

Still, I was excited to sell 10 items my first month on eBay. I had listed a total of 25 – a 40% sale rate! That's pretty good, eh? (This second month, I've only sold 6 out of 18…I'm slippin'.)

The hardest part about selling on eBay is the shipping. Even with the scale, I was still over- and under- charging. I've since learned to weigh an item in its packaging before I list it.

See, anything under 13 ounces is First Class. And the packaging – even a seemingly weightless envelope – makes a difference. Not much ($3.14 vs $3.30), but I'd rather not overcharge if I can help it.

Then there's Priority Mail. The cheapest is the $5.15 flat rate envelope or small box. . .but nothing I sell is small and heavy. Then there are the rest of the flat rate boxes - $11.35 for medium, $15.45 for the large. Perfect for heavy things. But most of my stuff would go in a plain Priority box or envelope. Those start at around $5.30, with the actual price depending on weight and destination.

Of course, one doesn't know an item's destination until said item is sold.

It's a bit of an investment, selling on eBay. There's the time for taking decent photos (and the discipline not to run out and buy a fancy camera). There's describing the item – the brand, material, color, dimensions…whatever will help a buyer know what they're getting. There's buying the shipping materials.

You've gotta be motivated to keep doing this thing.