Hey, frens. I was talking to a relative I hadn't seen in a very long time. She is now retired but having worked mostly in sales doesn't have a good retirement scheme. She wants to continue working, but needs to do so from home and asked if I knew of anything she could do. I really don't. Do any of you have any suggestions for something a nice, reliable lady could do? She didn't finish college so she doesn't have a degree, but she's sharp and gets things done. With so many employers needing dependable help, surely there must be something for her. Please post any ideas you have. Thanks!
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Wow! That's a long time. Is it easy to learn how to do it? There's probably a book somewhere she could get. I'm not sure she's even got an ebay account, lol. But she could learn. Do you sell new or used stuff?
I sell both new and used. Yes, it’s very easy. Lots of little old ladies sell on eBay. My aunt is in her 70’s and she started selling to make a little extra side money. There are How To tutorials on the website. It’s been a God-send for me. I was able to stay home with my kids and homeschool them even as a single parent.
Thank you so much for this info! I'm sure her first question would be, what would I sell? Then, how much can I make? If you're able to actually support your family with the income, it must be pretty good. So glad you found a solution that allows you to be with your kids and raise them as you see fit (home-school). That's fantastic. I have even thought of selling off a few things I no longer need, but to be honest, the thought of figuring out things like how much to charge for shipping and doing all the packing up and lugging down to the post-office has stopped me. (I don't have that much around the house to sell, lol)
You can use the search feature on eBay to see what similar items have sold for in the past and you can use their “Sell One Like This” link as a template to sell your own item. ALWAYS use your own pictures and descriptions though, never copy someone else’s listing.
These templates help with the learning curve on shipping charges and categories etc. It’s best to start off selling small items and non-fragile items until you get the hang of it. I’ll never forget my first sale, I was THRILLED and have been addicted ever since.
Lol, yeah, I can see where it would be fun and addictive IF you were actually selling stuff at a good profit and often enough to be making some decent money. Thanks for explaining about the templates and so forth. I could see the benefit of having a niche, but if you do well in your niche, it would probably be tempting to expand out as well.
If you sell used, where do you find stuff, if you don't mind me asking? Garage and estate sales? Do you sell anything and everything or do you have a niche? Does stuff stay around for a long time? I'm asking because when I used ebay as a buyer, I remember putting stuff on my watch list and coming back a year later and the stuff was still available!
I have sold literally everything except real estate on eBay. I’ve shipped items all over the world. Japanese folks LOVE anything American from Civil War era carpet bags, to jadeite dishes to old Levi’s. And they’ll pay almost anything for saphiret pieces.
I guess if I had to pick one niche Item that I sell the most of it would be sterling silver charms. You can buy sterling jewelry at pawn shops and thrift stores at the spot price for scrap silver. But the charms are highly collectible and are worth FAR MORE than sterling scrap. For instance I buy a charm bracelet at a pawn shop and then I take it all apart with needle nose pliers and sell each individual charm and the bracelet separately. Super easy to ship in a padded bubble envelope mailer. I did spend time learning which charms were the most valued.
Vintage costume jewelry in general is insanely collectible. There are many books on the subject.
That's interesting about the Japanese! Who woulda thunk it? Not me, lol. I had to look up saphiret. I am not familiar with that at all. Interesting.
Your idea about the charm bracelets makes a lot of sense! When you buy something like that at a pawn shop, do you pay the asking price or do you bargain with them? As an example, if you paid $50 for the entire bracelet, what would you expect to sell all the pieces for, total? $100, or double what you paid, or would you expect to sell it all for even more?
This is really interesting, lol. Thanks for answering and all your help. You're kind of making ME interested in selling a little on the side, and I'm supposed to be helping my relative, lol!