Is anyone making a 'real' profit on eBay?

Hello there...
my assistant and I are spending countless hours researching all the wholesale suppliers listed here. Well, our findings tell us that the small guys trying to resell on Ebay are 'NOT MAKING' a 'REAL' profit using these suppliers. It looks as if only those with large capital investments, buying in serious bulk are turning a profit! We would like to hear others opinions here. Let's be honest ok? No jokers wasting there time and money need to reply! Thanks for your time, GC & MC

no kidding buddy. i don't see any real investment future for the lil guys on ebay.they getting beat by these giant powersellers.can anyone help me find a cheap dropshipper out there.

What products are you looking for?

Yup I feel the same way.

I too am getting frustrated. I keep psoting items that I think are unique and I am getting nowhere fast. I spend hours and hours searching and searching for a good dropshipper and a good product and I can't seem to find 'it' any suggestions out there for someone that needs some assistance that has no money to invest but has the determination to make this work? I had good luck with cobalt blue glass but the product I found everyone is using now :( and I haven't found any other supplier.

Congrats fellas. Your true ebayers. You and 3 million other people have the same problem. Now you didnt really think it would be that simple to find items that you can make money on in a place like ebay did you? It took me 2 years to find a good starting point. And it wasnt just Ebay that got me started.

This isnt all fun and games. The serious powersellers your refering to started the exact same way you did. With little to no capital and no idea what to sell. I have seen hundreds just like you ask the same things here. Several of those people have given up and gone back to thier normal lives, And several of those people are now making some fairly decent money after relaxing and spending time researching items. Its not something that you can do in a few hours or a few days. Many sellers take months to find a niche or productline and a supplier to get them started.

Now have you considered that maybe you dont want to start on ebay. Ebay is a wholesalers marketplace. Its going to be much harder to find items to sell when your small and looking at wholesalers to supply your items.

Have you thought about using your local classifieds? Or even Craigslist? Or Yahoo? . If you really want to succeed you need to consider all aspects of selling. You can find many suppiers where you can get items at wholesale and resell them for very nice profits on places like craigslist and you pay nothing in fees.

I used to buy Xboxes on ebay and sell them through the paper for $50.00 profit on each one. I also used to buy broken Xboxes through the classifieds and sell them on ebay as broken units for $50.00 to $80.00 in profits by selling them to people willing to fix them.

You can make it big on ebay if you have the capitol, But if you want to build capitol from wholesale sources then using other methods to grow your ebay business may not need to come from ebay.

:D

Jimmy's points about the local market are very much worth paying attention to (I have made them myself in the past here.) Find stuff on eBay to sell into your local market, and vice versa. One of the key ways to bootstrap an eBay enterprise, yet it seems to not stick no matter how many times it's said.


Frank

Hey, Link hidden: Login to view ... cool!


Frank

I'm just wondering about all this. It seems everyone is talking 'eBay...eBay'. Well, what about other auction sites such as bitz.com, etc? Or how about opening your own ecommerce store on the web? If I'm wrong, please correct me on this.

One problem is that eBay isn't get rich at all. You basically have to set it up like a regular business.

You need CAPITAL.

And what you save in operating expenses will be eaten up by the competition.

So save about 2000 bucks find a product that is hot and see if you can buy in bulk and make a profit.

The other option is to by liquidated. But you still need 2000.

So save your coins and then jump in.

I don't agree, 6 months ago I stumbled onto this site salehoo, after much searching I thought great finally a site to get some deals, and deals I did not get because most wholesalers listed here are like a $1.00 less than online shops, but then it wasn't all bad I found some information here that really educated me about making profit online. I took up the advice of really forget looking for anything dog cheap..it just doesn't exist..but saving up and buying bulk was the way to go, and rather than trying to make big profits on one product make $5.00 from 2000 products!! Yes thanks Jimmy I read your blog, tried it and I spent 1000.00 on some products and made 85% profit, may not be much but what i sell needs lots & lots of spare parts..and yes ebay, I am in the process of opening my shop online. I don't even come here to look for suppliers, but to get the latest tips that can improve my knowledge. By the way it is never an overnight thing...takes time and time I have!!

Or you can discover the magic secret, and sell anything.............most of the time.....Once you have the traffic & experience to get you there.

i found the 'magic product' and im able to get up to 200 dollars per sale IN NET PROFIT do the math if i sell only 10 of these 10x200=2000 it costs 95$ to buy the item 2000/95=21 21x295 =6195 keep multiplying and get up to 1 million and put all that into a bank cd and get 50,000 a year. i have calculated it out to take about 9 months. i just started not even a month ago and im well on my way. but first you need to be ready to deal with ebay. they were taking my listings off because of copyright violations. by the way it isnt. but anyways all you need to IS ASK A FRIEND if they are looking for anything to buy. if they are looking for something to buy then so are alot of others out there and then BOOM you find yourself a huge niche like me. sure it doesnt always happen but it worked great for me.

P.S. HINT IS TO LOOK AROUND YOUR HOUSE THE THINGS YOU ARE BUYING IS THINGS OTHER PEOPLE ARE BUYING.

Found an old musty smelling Harley riding suit. Let it sit on my back porch for a month. The smell went away and I sold it for 175.00 on a .99 cent auction.

Sold a lot of KNEX pieces for 85.00

Picked up 2 phone systems from a company and sold them for about 100 each.

Got an email from a computer company offering a great deal on a laptop. Sold it in one day and made 100.00.

Sold a baccarat vase for 85.00

Bought a cricket bat for 8$ at a thrift shop and sold it on eBay fro 25$

Did you know the old watches, I forget what they are called, but the first digital ones are selling for 200 to 300 hundred dollars on eBay!

I bought an overstock DVR for $700 and sold it on ebay for $2400

I bought an overstock Espresso Machine for $1800 and sold it on ebay for $3300 and both of these items sold less than two weeks.

I became a powerseller on ebay last December and became a silver powerseller on january then just this month I became a gold powerseller and now I am currently making about $1500-$$2500 per month net profit consistently. It doesn't just happened overnight. It takes time and risk but like everybody says, without taking a risk, you will go nowhere. I took alot of risk and testing that failed costing me thousands of dollars but I am happy to say that I'm really doing well now =) Don't just quit when you fail but rather take that as a lesson and stand up and try again.

I bought a laptop from arons rental for $300 It had a broken keyboard. Replaced the keyboard for $20.00 Sold the unit for $1,500 in our local newspaper.

Bought a lot of 12 computers for $100 from a local office. Stripped them down and sold the parts for over $700.00

Bought a Car from a guy for $1200 , Shampooed the carpets changed the oil replaced some hoses and an air filter for less then $200 and waxed the car. Sold it for $6,000 on craigslist.

Bought a ton of girls, teen jewelry and a case of fake sunglasses for $400. Also bought a lot of 500 thongs and Camy Tops from lingeriemart for $380
Sold most of the product for $6,720 in 8 days at the illinois state fair.

Bought 3 broken DSLR cameras for 400 bucks , Took them to a camera repair shop paid $680 for him to repair them. Sold them locally through the paper for $3,200

We bought a boat for $500 Spent $3,000 reconditioning the boat fixing the damaged fiberglass and repainting the boat in my fathers garage. We then sold that same boat for $8,500 through a local free car magazine

Were currently in the process of restoring a 1964 Ford Thundrebird we paid $2,000 for a rusted heap. Were about $5,000 in on it. When its done we will probably sell it for $30,000+ But its a big project and Im currently running my business full time so it may be a few years down the line before its done. So it may be worth much more by then.

Ive used most of the money I have made on the side to take my family on annual vacations to Walt Disney World and Other destinations. Imagine taking 2 weeks in orlando and having everything paid for and $5,000 in play money for your wife to blow at the flea markets. Or eating at the most expensive resturants in disney world 2 times a day and not worrying about the cost. Im not a wealthy person. I live in a small house and I make payments on many things. Just like any other average guy. I prefer family time over wealth. I use my hobbies to make me money so I can take my kids and my wife to places they have neer been.

Most of this money is made just from part time work I do in my spare time. But these deals did not fall into my lap. I did not buy a list to find these deals. I used my own knowledge and I did not sell this stuff on ebay.

This was done with my own time and carefull research. Anyone can do this. Even a creative teenager can do this.

Seriously folks Any one of you can do the exact same things I do. Its not as hard as you think. But this will not fall into your lap. You need to spend your time researching. Goto ebay and look at some of the items that sell very low. If you can buy them and sell them higher somewhere else then do it.

Read your local newspaper every single day. I personally skip the paper and go straight to the classifieds and search for items people are selling dirt cheap.
Many people have problems and they will sell expensive items for way below thier value because they are desperate for money. Help them out and help yourself in the process.

As I said before I am not wealthy. I live a meager life. Im very cheap. I hate spending money. But 2 to 4 weeks out of each year I live like a king on vacation with my family. Isnt that all that matters???

A good tip for Ebay is to ignore 'branded' products...

I make at least $4,000 profit from ebay every month. But it's becoming harder especially with the new rule that Paypal will keep ebay payments for 21 days for high risk items, before the seller has access to withdraw the cash!

This will make it impossible for the newby to start an online business.

The only way to avoid that new paypal policy is to switch to a real merchant account.

Yes , I cant stress that enough. Putting the welfare of your business in the hands of a greedy corperation that has no legal obligation to federal banking laws is like using a mafia bookie to launder money for you.

grboutique, great testimony.. great motivation for the beginner..
best of luck to you in your continued endevours

Thank you! =) Just don't give up! I was just like everyone else before. A beginner who doesn't know where to begin with. I tried several products mainly nike shoes and I have been scammed alot of times costing me so much money but that didn't stop me from finding a supplier and products that I can sell for a profits. At first, I thought nike shoes, mainly jordans is the right one for me to sell because I love shoes specially nikes so I looked for suppliers endlessly and I found some that claimed they sell authentic nikes but as I received products from those so called suppliers, they were fakes and some just didn't send the product and I could file a chargeback nor file a claim through paypal because the suppliers gave me the run around and it went up for about six months until I gave up and just took that lost and move on from there. I took every failure as a lesson and didn't give up and now here I am making some decent profits on ebay and craigslist to cope up with those loses. So far, I made $7000+ in just three months. Just don't give up and look here in the forum for advices. Buying bulk from liquidators are the way to go if you want to compete from other sellers on ebay. This worked great for me =)

That's it guys, when you're knocked dowm, get up, dust yourself off and start agian. You will find sometihng you LIKE selling, I've sold alsorts of crap I hated selling. Then I found a niche and it was a pleasure to work with the buyers. :)

Selling ebooks, i've consistantly made $4K per month from December to now, even though Jan and Feb are known as slow months! :roll:


As for the original question 'whos making a profit on ebay?' I think we all know eBay is! 8)