I get cabin fever this time of year. I look online and in the newspaper for promising estate and yard sales. I am looking and trying to find possibilities of where to find antiques and collectibles. Winter is difficult. Garages are too cold. People know that buyers won’t want to wait outside in the cold for a sale to start. (unless you are looking for antiques and estate sales in LA! or Florida). This is actually the best time to sell the stuff online, when you’re not out buying. Ebay and Amazon, and other great venues are good outlets in the winter months for you. It also means that they are good places to FIND good stuff. Yes, it’s possible to spend your days looking for good finds, and buying stuff on Ebay, and turning around and selling it back on Ebay for a good profit! It’s done all the time! Many times, you find the seller did not know what they had, and the title was wrong, or the category was wrong, or the spelling was wrong, or even the photo was bad. Once in a while you’ll see a listing for “A Lot of Old Transistor Radios” and no model numbers, and a crummy photo. Then you look closer, it’s a rare Regency TR1 radio in the mix, or an early SONY, or another classic. You buy the lot for $15, get it, and sell the rare one for hundreds of dollars. I’ve done this, and know people that do it all the time. It’s called “value added”. You are adding value, by knowing more, presenting or describing better, cleaning it up, or just selling better.
So, while it’s snowing outside, and you are getting stir crazy, look for some good buys on the world’s biggest yard sale. It’s always good to have a good long list of Ebay “favorite searches” running. If you are not familiar with this tool, learn how to use it! You can search by a string of misspelled words, for example. If someone messes up, and lists one of the words in your search, you will get an email notification.
I love getting good deals. The problem is that getting good deals becomes an addiction. Once you’ve had a lot of good deals you can never go back. It’s like I feel physical pain when I buy things at full price now, there are so many deals to be had. eBay and Amazon are a “good deal” addict’s first stop on the path to finding a discounted item.
hahaha. This is so true on eBay. I once boghut a tv stand from a store and sold it the next year for more than I paid for it and I clearly told them it was SECOND HAND!