Is it possible to earn a living off Ebay or is it just for a hobby?

[gigiandcohomewares]

It seems to me with the exorbitant fees that Ebay is taking for the final value fee when an item sells,that it just keeps sellers struggling.
For example,if you bought a dress wholesale for $10.00 and then sold it on Ebay for $20.00 with $5 postage,according to Ebays fee calculator Ebay would take $4.07!
If you sold it for $25 with "free shipping" because we all know there's such a thing as free shipping (sarcasm) ,then Ebay would take $3.98.

So after Paypal fees basically you've just made around $5 (if your lucky).
You would have to sell approx 20 dresses a day to make $100 which is really unlikely when you look at how much people have sold in their feedback.

It seems to me that Ebay is no longer about the hardworking "little" sellers that it originally built it's hugely successful website on but that it's now mainly become a platform for items/sellers from China and big businesses such as Target,City Beach etc so what's to become of the "average joe" seller?

[robinsonmarineparts]

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@jkor1 wrote:


It seems to me that Ebay is no longer about the hardworking "little" sellers that it originally built it's hugely successful website on but that it's now mainly become a platform for items/sellers from China and big businesses such as Target,City Beach etc so what's to become of the "average joe" seller?

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We just sell what we can so that we can rack up our defect count.

[digital*ghost]

I will preface this post by saying that I do believe eBay's fees are bit over the top, and also I resent the FVF being charged on postage costs (particularly the way they implemented it here, meaning it's charged on whatever the buyer pays, unlike in the US where it's charged on the first domestic option even if the buyer chooses a more expensive service, like express or international). 

eBay shouldn't take more (or less) based on whether postage is free or not, though, if the total is the same, and for a $25 sale, eBay's fees should be about $2.48 (at the highest rate of 9.9%).

But, yes, it is possible to make a living here, albeit a fluctuating, volatile way to do so (in that nothing is guaranteed, from sales per week to whether someone can even continue to list items let alone sell them). I started out with clothing, and did alright for a while, but eventually gave it up as it was just too much work for too little return. I do ok now, in a similarly competitive market (jewellery and craft supplies - two things large retailers and Chinese sellers have excessive amounts of), but managed to carve out a niche. For now. Still a lot of hard work, and more than a couple of years of it, at that. 

[gigiandcohomewares]

What's a defect count please ?

[bitsnpiecesofstuff]

Also remember if you’re selling 20 dresses a day you will probably be registered for gst so that another 10% off the top of your sale. It is possible to make a living (though sometimes I think there has to be  a easier way ), I know $5 might not sound like much but keep in mind most big ebay sellers run on some razor thin margins once you take into account fees, returns, losses, gst etc etc and rely on turnover so if your case you would want to be selling maybe 50 or more dresses a day to make it work.

Cheers Chris

[saarzi]

No one is going to let you know their profit margins and how much they source items for, but, Youre right - youll never make a living off that example youve given - unless you have an extremly high item turnover. 

If that type of margin is what youre actually working with, and youre trying to build and actual business to make a living off, then with all due respect, you need to do a heap more research....

[chameleon54]

I am still making the bulk of my income from ebay but it is getting harder all of the time. The biggest problem is what many people believe is a secret policy by ebay to place hidden selling limits on accounts. ( called throtling ) . If this is true it makes it impossible to substantially increase sales and grow a business here.

You would be better finding products which give a much higher mark up than the example you used. It is very difficult to make a living if you are selling a generic product which competes directly with Chinese sellers who are willing to work for a few dollars a day.

 The short answer is yes you can still make a living off of ebay, but it is very hard to plan a future on ebay. 

[extra-keen]

And to add to what has already been said.

Once-upon-a-time many sellers made a complete living from ebay sales, today in Au I suspect it is far less common to make an income from ebay alone.

To be successful you need not only a presence on ebay, but your own website for starters, and other sales avenues such as markets, other on-line venues etc.

Good luck!

[helenm777]

I have found that I hardly make any money compared to the time spent taking photos uploading measurments item description..also with the new Defect Ratings ..

I make sure I put in as much info as possible including checking online and dfinding similar items to add to description.

For the time I spend the profit margin is not good.

I did try Market selling and did this for 1 1/2 years.  Again some days you sold a couple of hundred dollars.. but as it is Markets they also expect to haggle re price

Also the weather  especially in outside venues and plays a large role..been caught in the rain with all my stock and even a mini cyclone with all stock and tables crashing to the ground!!!!

The local Markets I Used to do was at North Rocks in Sydney packing and upacking the car each week was agonising ... Up at 5 am and out the door in by 6am to set up.. One hour to set up lifting heavy tables etc.. at first it was $35.00 per day then raised to $45.00 per day from 7 - 1pm.

An Ebay store at $50 a month for 500 listings was a major saving for me both in cash terms and for my painful body at the end of the day.  As some days only sold $100 worth less the $45.00 stallholder fee ...averaged out to so $11.00 per hour. That is less than minimum wage.

It is different of course if it is a household cleanout but many of the other :"one off" stall holders left with as much studff as they carted there.. and once again people did not want to pay a reasonable price even for Brand New Items

Things have changed over the years with Markets ( which I myself love to attend) but i am after antique stuff which I find is the only place you can purchase at a reasonable price.

I don't know about the Ebay rumours re blocking some sellers items due to the lack of space on the server but I do find my sales seem to come in blocks.  I have also tried to find some of my own items to check this and they were nowhere to be found!!!!

I started with 40 items per month , then went to the $20 Store and Because I have so much stock then the $50 Store.  Also i have found ( as I do use other User Id's that the Store stock moves much quicker as it would appear I think buyers will trust Stores more than smaller seller items..even if it the same items at a lower price !!

Anyway sorry to be so long winded but I still could not make a living out of Ebay unfortunately... Wish I could thought that was my plan in the beginning and I feel $50 per month for 500 items is a bargain if you compare to Market fees.

Hope this helps

[clarry100]

A defect rating is a new feature introduced by ebay in recent times to monitor performance of sellers.

You can gather defects for all kinds of reasons from your transaction with a buyer. eg

• NEG or NEUT feedback given by a buyer will earn you a defect
• Low star ratings left by buyers of 3 or lower will earn you a defect
• Cases opened for Item Not Received (INR) or Item Not as Described (INAD) will earn you a defect

If you gather more than 5% in defects they will restrict your selling privileges or even can close down your account.

It seems it is a way of getting rid of the small sellers in preference to the larger sellers on here. Defect them off the planet. 

Also it seems the larger sellers or Chinese sellers are given special selling privileges that the rest of us mere mortals cannot have.

There is now also the ebay money back guarantee (MBG). Whereby if a buyer is not happy with the transaction for any reason they will give them their money back at the expense of the seller. Forced refunds very often without the need for the buyer to return the item to the seller. How good is this for scammers?

For new sellers paypal will also hold your funds for 21-days. Means you don't get the money a buyer has paid you until then. So you then have to do battle with paypal to get your money released. There is an entire thread on here about that topic.

Having said all that tho... we are still managing to make a meagre living from it.

But we are also exploring other avenues of selling. eg our own web site.