This isn’t a recent policy change.

I - as a buyer - received emails some years ago concerning Managed Payments, and it wasn’t too much later that notifications went out clarifying that holds would be applied when a seller wasn’t selling regularly or sufficiently – that, in effect, such intermittent sellers would be regarded as “new sellers” until their selling was at the necessary level.

Did you perhaps disregard those emails and eBay messages, thinking they were just blah blah blah?

To avoid those holds, perhaps there are things you can sell on a more regular basis…? Otherwise, you may want to sell on Facebook Marketplace, or in Facebook Buy/Sell groups. There are risks involved as well as time wasters, but if you can’t sell regularly it may be the best option.