# Great deals on ebay!



## dakotajo (Aug 10, 2004)

I do ALOT of ebaying. A few days ago I bought a P4 laptop for $67. I wasnt even sure what I was going to get. The person claimed it didnt work and was very vague in his description on how stripped this unit was. I got it in the mail and it turned out to be a Dell Latitude that came with a 2.0ghz P4 cpu, 512mb ddr, 20gb hard drive(undersized), cdrw/dvd drive, 14.1" screen. Strangely this thing works runs like a champ. Its in perfect cosmetic condition. I just had to reinstall an os. Im using it to type this post.

Ebay is great. Anybody else get any really good deals?


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## Milan (May 29, 2005)

$67 :shock: Your one lucky bugger.....


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## Guest (Dec 22, 2005)

Uhm, let's just say that seller probably made a 67$ profit. :!:


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## Guest (Dec 31, 2005)

Right, I guess ebay stuff could be hot.

Has anyone sold on ebay? I'd like to try it.


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## enngirl5 (Aug 10, 2004)

I've had good and bad experiences with ebay. I've been setting up a new ebay account as we speak tonight to sell my old textbooks on there. I order a lot of good cheap books on their for like $1. My one bad experience was when I tried to order my mom some earrings. She wanted some really big blue topaz earrings. So I ordered some on ebay that were exactly what she wanted. Well when we got them, they were these tiny little things that looked like they came out of a gumball machine. It turns out that in the picture on ebay, they person had zoomed in real far to make it look like the earrings had a much bigger stone. Which is not really illegal because in small font he had written something along the lines of they may look different in person. I wrote him a sh1tty letter not that it did any good of course. I'm kind of iffy about ordering from big sellers. I would rather order from your average everyday ebay selling rather than someone that sells in huge quantities and has an ebay store and all. But that's just me. Basically I don't really trust ebay and can't bring myself to make big purchases on there. I doubt I would ever spend more than $100 on ebay and rarely more than 20.


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## Guest (Jan 1, 2006)

How much does it cost to sell on ebay?

They say it's a "nominal" fee.


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## dakotajo (Aug 10, 2004)

Hi,

I average about $30k in sales per year which is a nice supplement to my income. I sell older computer parts which I pay nothing for so everthing I take in is profit. Sadly Ive never taken the time to figure out what ebay exactly takes. I know the more "bells and whistles" you add to your listings the higher the fees. Also your starting price determines your listing fee. I start all my auctions out at $9.99 which is a 30 cent listing fee. I know ebay takes a small percentage of the final sale also. Paypal which is part of ebay also takes a percentage to handle the financial transaction.

Regardless of this I love having the ability to run a small business out of my home. The only time I have to leave the house for this part time business is to pick up more equipment and to run to the bank to get the money out with my paypal debit card.

Im convinced that If I did this full time I could make $100k per year or more. I know a guy that made $400k last year.


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## jc (Aug 10, 2004)

i sell quite a bit on ebay...the trick is to start your listing at a very low price (you can always end the listing early)

if you add a reserve price ebay take a cut (start your bidding at 99p 1$ eg)

the higher your starting price the more money ebay take

paypal will also take a cut so try and comuniucate privately with an interested party and if he or she is trusting they can pay the money directly into your bank account (avoiding paypal charges)

keep your eye on your listing during the last couple of hours and if no-one has met your price end the listing early


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## Guest (Jan 4, 2006)

dakotajo said:


> I sell older computer parts which I pay nothing for so everthing I take in is profit.


Where do you source these parts from?

Not accusing you of anything :lol: just wondering if I can do anything similar here. :twisted:


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## Guest (Jan 4, 2006)

jc said:


> i sell quite a bit on ebay...the trick is to start your listing at a very low price (you can always end the listing early)
> 
> if you add a reserve price ebay take a cut (start your bidding at 99p 1$ eg)
> 
> ...


But if you end the listing early, don't you have to pay ebay again for relisting the item? Do you still save money this way? Does ebay take a percentage of the listing amount, as soon as you list something? (ebay virgin here)


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## jc (Aug 10, 2004)

you have to pay to list but its upto you if you want to relist once bidding has ended....the reason i choose a low starting price is because ebay have become very greedy and the higher the starting price the higher the initial fee...also its better to sell privately via pm's then you can end the listing early as unsold and yet the other party has already paid you for the item..basically you pay for

listing the item
selling the item
payal transaction

these can be avoided saving you alot of money

for example i just sold half of my album collection and the total selling price was 450?, ebay would have taken about 60? and paypal would have taken about 20? in the end because i started the price at 99P and sold the item via email it cost me just 30P to list as i ended the item as unsold


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## jc (Aug 10, 2004)

dakotajo said:


> Hi,
> 
> I average about $30k in sales per year which is a nice supplement to my income. I sell older computer parts which I pay nothing for so everthing I take in is profit. Sadly Ive never taken the time to figure out what ebay exactly takes. I know the more "bells and whistles" you add to your listings the higher the fees. Also your starting price determines your listing fee. I start all my auctions out at $9.99 which is a 30 cent listing fee. I know ebay takes a small percentage of the final sale also. Paypal which is part of ebay also takes a percentage to handle the financial transaction.
> 
> ...


do you have to declare this to the taxman ?


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## Homeskooled (Aug 10, 2004)

Wow, Joe, I'm really fascinated by this. I was thinking of doing the same thing myself. I mean, technically, if you can get anything wholesaled and cheap, you can sell it on Ebay for more money. I was thinking of supplemementing MY income with it, as it just seems so darn easy. How do you get the computer parts you sell? Schools? Junkyards? People's curbs on garbage night? I'm really fascinated by this, and almost bought a book on it not long ago. Good for you man.

Peace
Homeskooled


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## dakotajo (Aug 10, 2004)

Homeskooled,

I get all my computers from schools/universities and large corporations. I make money 2 ways. All of the older obsolete computers I tear apart for the precious metal recovery. There are minute amounts of gold, silver, platinum, paladium in all of these printed circuit boards. Metals are high right now. Gold is currently over $500 per ounce.

The stuff thats usable I sell on ebay(motherboards, memory, hard drives etc.) Alot of the excess/obsolete equipment that these universites have they dont know what to do with. They realize most of this stuff is evironmentally sensitive(lead in the crts and solder on the pcbs) and I offer to take it for free to keep it out of the land fills. Normally they would have to pay just to dispose of this stuff. 75% of the stuff I scrap out is seperated and and sent to reputable recyclers. I make a nice supplement to my income and they get rid their excess without costing them anything or polluting the environment.

This is going to sound insane but I just recently I picked up 15 TONS of computers from one school alone. It was over 500 complete P3 desktop and laptop computers. I have another university that purchases about 2000 new systems a year so 2000 old systems have to be scrapped out.

Joe


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## dakotajo (Aug 10, 2004)

Hi Jc,

Yea, I have to report everything. They claim if you sell a few things around home it doesnt need to be reported but if you are intentionally buying or obtaining things to ebay than its a business and must be reported. Self employment tax is high. I just put up a building to I can get some deductions.


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