The eBay Experiment Begins

The First Week of the $500 eBay Experiment

August 7-13, 2008: The eBay experiment begins….

The $500 eBay Experiment has officially begun! It is August 7, 2008, and I have started to place ads around the internet looking for items that I can sell on eBay. I have also started to get materials together to be able to do this experiment right.

Items to Sell

I decided to start with two items I know well to sell on eBay: Homeschool Books and Mary Kay makeup.

It is very important when you are looking to purchase items like this that you are totally familiar with them.

If you have not sold on eBay before, do some research on potential items to sell before you begin buying.

I decided to go with these two items because I know them.

For instance, the homeschool books I regularly buy and sell on eBay since I homeschool my own children.

I don’t know what it is, but I love pouring over curriculum and I have purchased hundreds of books over the years that I just didn’t end up using for one reason or another on my own children.

So I have resold them on eBay for most of what I’ve paid.

Not every homeschool book is worth money, but I can easily do some research on eBay to see if they are.

Mary Kay makeup. Ironically, I have never been a Mary Kay distributor, but I have found MK makeup at many garage sales and even through friends of a friend online.

I have had about 7 lots (boxes and boxes) of Mary Kay makeup to sell on eBay in the last 7 years. I love it! Its so much fun to see what distributors have bought and have left over. I know now about what items are worth, so I can make good decisions on how much I can spend.

What I’ve Done this Week: eBay experiment begins….

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August 7, 2008:

eBay experiment begins….

Opened a Free Checking Account

I opened a free checking account at my local bank to keep everything separate for the experiment. Since opening the account, I also got it verified through paypal to make it easy to use when the time comes. I left $100 in the account and have the other $400 in cash.

Placed Ads

I placed ads on one message board, one yahoo group, and my local craigslist looking for homeschool books and Mary Kay distributor lots. Here is an example of the craigslist ad I used for the MK:

Wanted: Ex-Mary Kay Consultant Items (or other direct sales) (Tri-County) Hello I am looking to purchase items from those who have decided to stop selling Mary Kay. No, I am NOT a MK distributor myself. I want everything you have: unopened product, samples, and all business materials. I buy entire lots. I am looking to purchase these at a substantial discount, well below wholesale. If you are sick of looking at the boxes collecting dust and need a little cash for back to school time, now is the time to sell it all to me. I'm a stay at home mom, not some company or something. Feel free to mention this to your friends who sell MK. I am looking specifically for MK items, but if you are involved in a direct sales company other than MK and want to clear out lots of supplies, feel free to contact me. EMAIL THE FOLLOWING: List of items available; Total price wanted for entire lot Can pick up in the Miami-Dade/Broward/Palm Beach area. Thanks! :)

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Replies: eBay experiment begins….

I got several replies to my various ads the first day.

One was from an online friend who wanted to know how much I would pay for Mary Kay, because she knew someone who wanted to sell her stock. I told her it would depend on what the friend had, but generally 10-15% of retail.

Another email from the MK ad I placed on a yahoo group I belong to for work at home moms wanted to sell me her MK starter kit, minus the items she wanted out of it, for $80. She had paid $100 for it. I passed.

From the craigslist ads, I got several people who told me they had school text books they could sell me. These books are old ones from public schools that are generally given to the public for free, or at prices such as $1 per book. They are virtually useless on eBay. One woman wanted $200 a box for them.

I revised my ad to say that I was not interested in school text books, but homeschool specific materials only. I got a reply from someone who had been enrolled in an online private school. The poor guy spent a fortune on the books (and was asking a fortune) that could only be used at that specific school. To top it off, the books were included in the tuition price and could not be purchased elsewhere. Pass.

My message board post elicited other posts saying that they had MK items and would email me a list, but to date they have not. One person did email me a list of homeschool books and asked me to make her an offer. I hate that. I want to know how much they want so that I don’t insult them, and I have a starting point for negotiations. I offered her $20 for the lot. She hasn’t replied yet.

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August 12, 2008

eBay experiment begins….The First Purchase!

By Monday, however, my Craigslist posts started to really pay off.

I had a woman who had an entire 5th grade homeschool curriculum from Bob Jones University Press.

She wanted $100 for the lot.

I looked up the prices on eBay, and felt that I could make $120-150 on the lot based on auctions for similar items in the last month.

This is always a risk as they could end up much lower than that, or much higher.

I offered her $50 for the lot instead, and she came back with $75.

At this point she also mentioned that she had an entire 7th grade curriculum from the same publisher, and would be willing to do $75 on this as well.

Tuesday, August 12, I went to her home and saw the books. They were in like new condition, and had several extras with them. I offered her $125 for all the books, but she stayed firm on $150. I felt it was worth it (though not worth more to me) and made my first purchase.

I also had someone contact me about the MK items. She said she had approximately $1000 worth of MK that she would be willing to sell for $200. She said she was at work, and promised an itemized list by 10pm. She did not email me that night.

A Word on Negotiations: I have been negotiating prices with sellers since I was 6 years old. My grandparents used to give me $3 and take me to garage sales once a month when I was a kid. I had to make that $3 go a long way! I learned early on that most people understand that prices are flexible. Some even have great fun with negotiating! Generally, I ask what someone wants for their items. I will ALWAYS try to negotiate a better price. After they have given me their price, if possible, I will research the item on eBay to find out how much it, or a similar item, has sold for in the last 30 days. I then take that price and multiply it by 0.75. This gives me the price I can expect for it (hopefully) after paypal , ebay, and shipping supply fees. I then divide it by two. This final price is the most I would be willing to spend. So, for example, if the item sells for $100 on eBay: $100 x 0.75= $75 / 2 = $37.50 I will then offer to pay lower than my "most I would spend" amount to the seller. I usually do this based on what the seller wants. For instance, if the seller wants $50 for the item, I might offer $25 and negotiate up to $37.50 if necessary from there. If he won’t budge from $40, then I walk away. If the seller wants $15 for his item, however, I would offer him $10. He’d probably take it. If the seller wanted only $5-10, I’d probably just pay it without negotiating. If the seller won’t give me a price, and asks me to make an offer, I’ll make a lowball offer and see what happens. I’d offer $10-15 for the item and hopefully not insult him!

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August 13, 2008

eBay experiment begins….Another Deal!

I had a woman contact me off my craigslist post with a list of MK items and a price of $250.

I took the list and looked up one by one how much those items sold for on eBay in the last 30 days.

Since most of the items sold, multiple times, I took a low-mid average for the final price of the items, to be conservative.

While I was doing this, I started to make a master Mary Kay list so that I didn’t have to research every item every time.

Now I can just consult a simple document to figure out what something is worth.

I then added up the price of each item and found that I would be able to conservatively estimate that I could make $487 off this particular lot. I knew she wanted $250, and by my calculations, the most I could pay her was about $180. So, I offered her $150 for the lot. I would like to have offered less, but I felt that too far off the $250 mark would have made her just outright refuse to do business with me.

I should have offered less, however. She emailed me back SOLD! with directions to her home. I probably could have gotten away with $125. Ah well, live and learn. So now I need to make arrangements to come and pick up the MK items this week. My money is going fast! I better hurry up and list this stuff!!

I also spoke to a friend on the phone about my experiment. She is the moderator for our local Freecycle group and mentioned that not too long ago she was given a bunch of Mary Kay samples. She offered them to me for free. She also told me she’d call her sister, an ex-MK distributor, and have her call me if she wants to sell off her stock.

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Plans for Next Week: eBay experiment begins….

I plan on picking up this MK lot by this weekend, and hopefully getting another lot or two lined up. I’m also going to do some Spring Cleaning in the house to find stuff to sell here, and will be getting ready to list Monday and Tuesday.

I’m hoping to go to a couple garage sales this Saturday, but I might not have time. I also need to start collecting packaging materials to ship these items, as my initial $500 will make it difficult to buy any supplies. Oh, and I should probably order some free priority mail boxes from the post office!

Check back next week!





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