Pooh!

I am having the worst eBay week ever. Rather than coming here to complain about it (something I try really hard to avoid), I am just off pouting in the corner.

I'm out of inventory, so I haven't been listing, which means I haven't been selling, which means I haven't had money to buy new inventory... on and on THAT cycle goes.

Good news! My last negative dropped off this morning! Oh wait. I blinked. Someone left me a negative this evening. Ugh. I had NO negatives for a whopping 8 hours. Sigh. I offered her a refund if she returned the item, but instead she chose to neg me. So I'm waiting to hear back from her to see if she will revise. Doubtful.

Had a Buyer Protection case opened against me this week. Long story short - I sent the shirt out in perfect condition. 16 days later, buyer contacted me complaining of significant holes under the arms. My return policy is 14 days, but I told her she could send it back anyway. Once I looked at it, it was very clear to me that she ripped it trying to put it on, so I only refunded her return shipping and sent her a not that it was ineligible for a full refund. She got mad and started harassing me, sending me message after message after message, demanding dated pictures and shipping timelines and blah blah blah. I didn't get to respond to any of those, when she wrote, "If you aren't going to refund me, then send the shirt back." I don't know about you, but if I truly received a torn shirt in the mail, I would NOT ask for it back. I would insist on a full refund. But she didn't, which was a red flag for me. I sent it back (because remember - she asked me to). Then she opened a case against me. I called eBay and they (clearly) sided with me. The rep escalated the case and put it on hold. He told me that as soon as I saw that it was re-delivered, to call them and they would close the case in my favor and release my funds. It was delivered today, so I called them this evening and they followed through. They closed the case (it won't count against me), they released my funds, AND they didn't refund her! Score 1 for eBay SELLER Protection!

Right smack in the middle of THAT incident, I discovered 2 fraudulent charges on my Paypal card, so I had to call and report those (got them credited back to my account immediately). They cancelled my card and have sent me a new one, but I have to wait 7-10 business days for it to get here. In the meantime, I am left with NO immediate access to my Paypal account, which means I have to plan days in advance to transfer money to my checking account in order to buy groceries or gas. Ugh. But at least the fraudulent charges have stopped, so I'll try not to complain about not being able to shop :)

I've also have 5 returns in the past couple weeks, which does not do good things to my Paypal balance.

***

Ok, so I came here and complained anyway. Just be glad you got the quick, abbreviated versions of all of those stories.

Let's end on a good note .... hmm ....

Check out these Converse! My favorite sale from the past couple weeks, hands down.

They sold to a buyer in Spain, who paid an additional $22 for shipping!

I priced these way high because I couldn't find this exact pair anywhere on eBay, currently or in completeds. I saw lots of black with black toes and red around the edges, but they all had black eyelets. Mine was the ONLY pair I could find with red eyelets, which apparently made them worth more to this particular buyer. Woot!

More From the Inbox

From Barbara:

I love hearing about your sales AND your purchases! Seeing a realistic view of an normal, everyday person like you (versus these professional ebayers who've made a gazillion bucks over the years) making a go of it is really motivating! It's people like you who keep me motivated to want to continue selling on ebay (because it can really be a drag sometimes)! 

 Thank you, Barbara! An overwhelming majority of the comments on my post asking for questions said that they enjoy seeing my sales. I'm so happy to hear that! That's always an easy kind of post at the end of a long, tiring day, when my brain just can't come up with anything else to write about, but I didn't want this blog to be all about me bragging about my sales. Haha.

I don't know if I would call myself "normal," but yes, I am an everyday person who does NOT have a gazillion bucks in her checking account. :-D


Over the summer, I bought a lot of 25 WWE action figures from a woman on my Facebook group. I paid $10 for them, knowing absolutely nothing about them. I researched each individual one and decided that individually, they were basically worthless, so I put them in a lot for $129.99 or best offer. I got several very low offers. I counter-offered on some, I declined others.

 Then a month or so later, I got another 43 of them at a yard sale for $18. I never even took them out of the book - didn't clean them, sort them, research them, look at them - nothing.

The other day, I got a $50 offer on the original 25. I decided I had had them long enough, and the buyer caught me in an exceptionally good mood that day, so I accepted his offer. Any other time, I'd have probably gotten annoyed at a $50 offer on a $130 item, but I needed the money. Before I accepted the offer, I checked out his user ID and discovered that he resells these things individually (for an average of about $10 with free shipping). It just wasn't worth my time to mess with trying to sell them singly, so I decided I was still happy with that price and messaged him:

Good morning! I am going to accept your $50 offer on my 25 piece WWE Action Figure Lot. I have 43 others that I haven't listed yet. If you are interested in them as well, I will sell them to you for the same price of $2 a piece, for a total of $136 + shipping. Please let me know what you think.

 He immediately wrote me back that he was definitely interested, but could he see a picture of the other lot first. I sent him a few pictures and he offered me $65 + shipping on the second set. I gladly took it! No eBay fees, no cleaning, no researching. So on my initial investment of $28, I ended up making $115 + shipping, and I didn't even have to bother listing the second lot!

Lesson: If a buyer is interested in something that you have more of that isn't listed yet, offer it to them! This is NOT against eBay rules. You aren't allowed to discuss completing an eBay sale off-eBay, but my second lot was NOT an eBay listing, so it was perfectly okay. You never know when you might be able to drum up an extra sale.

***

This post is getting long already, so I'll go to machine-gun-style for these other three items:

Yesterday, I sold the last Miche shell from the very first Miche lot that I bought back in the spring.

Here are the final results from that lot:

This next sale was a real surprise. I cannot remember if I had best offer on it or not. I probably did, but it sold for my full asking price Sunday morning:

• Acquired: 8/9/12 (road trip)
• Listed: 8/22/12
• Sold: 9/23/12
• Paid: $3.00
• Sold: $42.99 + shipping

And finally, I have a contact on my Facebook yard sale group who has nearly 30 pairs of Converse that she is gradually weeding out because they aren't supportive enough for her since she had back surgery. I've bought a few pairs from her, and they've all done well. These were my favorites - super-boring shoes, but exciting sale :)

• Acquired: 7/12/12 (Facebook yard sale group)
• Listed: 7/22/12
• Sold: 9/24/12
• Paid: $8.00
• Sold: $50.00 + shipping

****

My next post will be about packaging and shipping, which Ashley wanted to know more about. I might split it up into 2 posts - one about packaging and one about shipping. Logical division, don't you think? :)

Road Trip Goodies, Batch #3

I've had a super-busy week this week, and I am really tired, but I forced myself to get another box of goodies ready to list this week. Here's what we've got:

My Little Sandbox Play Set (Big Builder)

 When I bought this, I couldn't decide whether I wanted to sell it or keep it for my 4 year old. And then I pictured him playing with sand in his bedroom and decided to sell it. The sand and rocks are still sealed in the original bags. One of the rocks had a hole broken in it, so I'll have to sell it as New (Other) if that is an option in this category. Doesn't look like I'll get much for it, but I can hopefully double my investment. I paid $4.90 and will try for $14.99.

Beach Party Funshine Care Bear

 This was actually a Facebook purchase, not a road trip purchase. It looked bigger in the photo, but it's just one of the little 7-8" ones. The only other Beach Party Care Bear that is currently listed or in completeds is a Bedtime Bear.  It is also not showing up on Terapeak. I just googled it and found it on Amazon for $49.99! So I just quickly listed mine on Amazon, but I will also list it on eBay this week - probably higher than that with Best Offer.

Big Screen Poker

One of the stores I went to had several baskets full of handheld electronic games. I pulled a bunch that looked interesting and looked them all up. This one is a good seller! Hopefully it's also a fast seller. I'll probably be listing it for $69.99OBO.

Camping Journal

I'm not sure what I'm going to do with this. This was given to me as a gift. We enjoy camping, but we don't get to go nearly often enough to warrant an entire journal about it. I'll have to research it, but I'll probably aim for around $10.

Littlest Pet Shop Igloo

I wouldn't have bothered buying this, but it was half-off, and I remembered that Becky recently sold one for decent money. I only paid $2.25 for it. If it ends up not selling, my 5 year old likes LPS stuff, so I'll just give it to her. I don't think those are the animals that originally came with the set, but that doesn't really seem to matter. I'll try for $15-20.

Clairol Kindness 24 Hot Rollers

As you may know, I am a big fan of selling hot rollers. I have sold several different styles of Clairol Kindness rollers. These are old and in a cool case, so I got them. Actually, I recently sold this same set for my hairdresser. I combined it with another similar set and sold both as a lot, because she only had one power cord between the two of them. I'm hoping for $50ish, but that might be optimistic.

Little People Noah's Ark

I recently sold a LP Noah's Ark set that belonged to my kids. It only went for $9.99 + shipping, but I was okay with that because it was just laying around the house. It sold pretty quickly, so I suspect I could have gotten more for it. I wouldn't have bothered picking this one up, but I noticed that it had all different animals than the other one I sold. AND the animals have cool hair. So for $1.90, I took a chance. I'll be aiming higher on this one though. Will probably price it somewhere around $35-40.

Vintage Lincoln Logs

I'm never sure about these. I sold an incomplete set once before for $17.50 + shipping. They also went quickly. I guess I will price these a little higher - maybe $20.

Mauve Chuck Taylor Converse High-Tops - men's size 13

Okay. Seriously. It takes a very confident man to wear these. No idea how I'm going to price them. I think they are hideous, which COULD make them go pretty high. I'll have to sleep on this one...

Kids' size 12 Converse

I actually bought 2 pairs of these at a thrift store (donated by twins, I guess?). One pair has loose eyelets and mis-matched laces. I'll price them at just $15. The other pair I'll do $20.

Bloch jazz tap shoes

I haven't found any tap shoes for awhile. Now that summer is winding down, all these extra-curricular activities are probably starting to pick back up again. I'll put $25 on these for awhile and see how they do. They are size 8, which is a pretty common size, so they should sell fairly quickly.

Sunflower Sun Tea Jar

This wasn't a road trip find. This was in the back of my cupboard. We had a yard sale this weekend, so I pulled this out to sell for $3. But then I vaguely recalled some discussion on these on eBay Underground, so I looked it up. Geez Louise, I'm glad I did. I scraped my $3 price sticker off of it and put it in my eBay room. Have you looked these things up?? I fully intend to get $35 + shipping on this.