This post is about 1 way I use to supplement my income from my 9-5 job. Don't get me wrong I have no intention of quitting my job. I'm one of those very few people who like what they do. However I could always use the extra money.
The way I am explaining today is using Craigslist and eBay. These are no new topics and they have been gone over a million times. Still I would like to express my view on how I use them. You never know it may spark an idea or two.
I have used eBay and Craigslist for personal use before selling or buying cars and random items so I knew the basics of them both. Every now and then when the wife and kid are busy and I'm stuck home alone and bored I will scour Craigslist for something that might peak my interest. After browsing around the site for awhile I started to notice that in certain categories in certain areas the prices for some items were generally lower than what you could get out of them on eBay. I have never price matched the two sites before this was just from what I have learned over the years.
One day I saw a motor for a 1999 Yamaha r6 **Motorcycle for those who did not know** for 150 dollars. The ad said it was in good shape so I gave the guy a call about it and set up a time and date to meet with him. My original intentions were to buy this motor for a go kart project, however when thinking about it further I decided to see exactly how much they were going for on eBay. Lo and Behold I was shocked to see this same motor going for 600$ +. Well I met up at the appointment time and looked at the motor and it was indeed in decent shape With every accesary still attached. Told the guy I would take it and he said I could also have a box of random parts off of his old bike. Well I handed him the 150 dollars loaded up the truck and headed home.
I spent about 2 hours Saturday cleaning and organizing everything. Most of the random items in the box were junk, but I got a triple tree, a fuel pump, and a horn that were all in decent shape. Well Sunday rolled around I spent about 1 1/2 hours taking pictures of everything and writing up articles so I could list the items on eBay later that evening. I was willing to ship everything but the motor because I figured it would be to much of a hassle. However I still listed in the auction for pick-up preffered or contact me for a quote for shipping. I listed the motor at 200$ with a buy it now of 600$. I figured I should at least be able to get my money back out of the auction had I made sometype of fatal mistake. Well to my surprise within 3 hours of listing the auction I had to get quotes for 8 different people for shipping.
I was dreading the next day having to sit on the phone with different carriers trying to get quotes. Then luckily someone bought it straight out for the buy it now price of 600$ and wanted to meet me the next morning on my way to work to pick it up. Well I met him he checked it out and handed me 600 bucks. There is a strange feeling you get when someone hands you 600 bucks so I felt I had to help him load the motor into his truck. So as of now I had 150 into the motor and parts and roughly 50 dollars into ebay and paypal fees also roughly 10 in gas. so 210 investment netted me 600 bucks gross and 490 profit off of just the motor and still had everything else to sell.
So I decided to keep a closer eye out on Craigslist to see if any other deals pop up. Well about a week later another lot popped up under motorcycles so I sent the guy an email to get a rough list of what he had. He emailed me back a VERY detailed list of everything in the lot. It was a lot of Harley Davidson parts for 400 dollars. I checked through the prices and realised that the lot was worth about 1500 dollars broken up. So I emailed the guy back and set up a time and place to look at the items. Met him at the time scheduled and checked out the lot and was very pleased with it. So I handed him the money and went about my merry way. Me and my wife **who was none to thrilled about it** spent a good chuck of saturday morning organizing and taking pictures. Most of the items went on eBay and a few went back into craigslist. Within the first week that I started listing I sold almost 1000 dollars worth of the items. Once again with about 80 bucks in ebay and paypal fees and about 15 in gas I netted 505 dollars and still had some items to sell that were slowly going over the next month.
Well that is my experience starting out with Craigslist and Ebay. Although I do not do it as much anymore because I get bored easily and like to try new things I still keep an eye out for the decent deals.
Thanks for reading about my experience with ebay and craigslist.
A few pointers...
Deals dont come along everyday you have to be patient and check frequently.
You will also notice I did not say how much I have made doing this besides in the 2 examples. This is because everyone is different. It depends on so many factors like. Being at the right place at the right time. How often you buy and sell. And also what kind of deals you can find.
Some have suggested buying on eBay and selling on Craigslist. I personally have never seen where this would make sense around my area, but it may be different in yours so it is worth checking out.
As with any type of business ALWAYS CHECK YOUR NUMBERS. Just because you think something is worth a certain price does not mean that it is. The value of the item is what people are willing to pay for it no more. Also if you have any doubts what so ever that you will not make a profit on a certain item just don't do it. There is no reason to be impatient If you tie your money up in something that MAY net you 10 dollars you wont have the extra capitol to invest should the right deal arise.
Also if you wish to keep in ventures like this you should have a plan for the money that you do make. I personally split mine 50-50. 50% goes back into the next project and 50% goes towards my personal life. Wether it be saving for vacation, the next toy, or what have you.
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