Selling on eBay

December 29th, 2005 3 Comments

If you’re looking for a way to make some spare change to pay down your debt from the holidays, selling on Ebay may just be what you’re looking for.

Ebay makes it possible for anyone to become a retailer of anything. If you have some old clothes you never wear, go ahead and list them in an auction, they may be just what someone in California is looking for. Maybe you’re tired of that old computer in your basement, put it in an auction, there might be a nerd looking for a spare part and he’d probably be willing to buy the whole computer if it has what he’s looking for.

Ebay opens up all kinds of possibilites to people. There are stories of stay at home moms becoming business tycoons by selling items on Ebay. People quit their jobs every year because they’re making 6-figures doing business on the auction site.

I’m not an Ebay expert, but a fellow 9ruler is and he launched the Ebay Sales Blog and it looks like it’s going to be full of great information. Check it out and if you know of any other great Ebay resources go ahead and mention them in the comments.

Selling on eBay

Dan Marques | December 30, 2005

In high school I made some good money by buying used cell phones that kids were no longer using for $10-$30 a phone and reselling them on Ebay for anywhere from $40-$200. The “supplier” market quickly dried up though.

Ben | December 30, 2005

Hmm…I never thought of selling used cell phones, I know lots of people with phones just laying around. Maybe I’ll give that a shot

Chris P. | December 30, 2005

I used to work in the cell phone biz, and I can tell ya that the demand is HUGE for the two most recent generations of cell phones. Unfortunately for the armchair Ebayer, large corporations have been built around the refurbished and secondhand cellular markets, and the competition grows more and more intense every day.

There’s clearly a demand here, but the problem is that the supply is not only good, but it’s also extremely diverse. As a result, the closing price of these phones continues to drop on Ebay, making this a less and less profitable business all the time.

As the margin drops, it becomes a numbers game, and I think obtaining huge quantities of used cell phones would prove to be a VERY difficult task at this juncture (unless you’re a large company with a LOT of money…oh, and connections).

Okay, so I’m a bubble-buster. Sorry.