Happy new year's! And a chart!

I figured things would be slow this weekend, and so far, I have not been disappointed.  That's just as well, though, since I have several things to ship out on Monday and I hate packing stuff up.  I do hold out hope that some drunk people will get online at like 3 in the morning and decide to buy some of my stuff...and pay immediately, of course.

Here's some stuff I've sold recently:

100% Cashmere sweater by J. Crew, men's large.  Picked up for $1.75 at Salvation Army sold in under 12 hours for $24.99.

 Men's red and white gingham Ralph Lauren Polo shirt, men's size 15 (smallish), Salvation Army for $1.75 sold overnight for $17.99.

Men's Ralph Lauren "big shirt", size XL, another Salvation Army find for $1.75, sold overnight for $19.99.

Do you see a pattern?  People think women are doing a lot of the shopping on eBay, and maybe they are, but it's not always for themselves.  I know some sellers shy away from clothes, but I've never understood why.  These have been some of the fastest selling items I've had up in a while.  I know this isn't common knowledge, but did you know men hate to shop in stores?  They hate to try stuff on?  They would rather push a button and be done with it already!  I've always thought I should do a tutorial on men's clothing, since it seems to be one of the few things I have a good handle on.  So I made a chart.

I'm not going to lie to you, I'm pretty proud of this. Please note, there is no "NO" leading from the "does it have a pony?" box because if it's Polo and doesn't have a pony, you might as well forget it.

I went to the flea market today.  I will post pics of that stuff tomorrow.  Here's to lots of money in 2012!

There is a disturbance in the Force.

Something is going on with my new eBay listings.  Usually, the minute I post, there is 1 view for every new item.  I always assumed it was some eBay droid checking to make sure I didn't break any laws or whatever.  Last night and tonight that hasn't happened.  Stuff that should get views gets no views.  Then, if I end the listing and do a "sell similar", that 1 view shows up immediately.  This is weird.  I swear, if I've fallen into the black hole I was in during the fall, I will be really upset.

I've got stuff to talk about, but I'm going to bed.  I'll talk about it tomorrow.  Good night!

Sick and tired

I'm sick. I don't know what it is, but I feel like crap. Also, baby has decided not to sleep in her crib. I guess it's from where she was sick and we let her sleep with us when she wouldn't go back to sleep last week. We don't have what it takes to let her cry it out, but it's easy to get frustrated. She slept with us for about three hours last night.

She has no problem sleeping in her crib during naps, so it's weird that she freaks out at night.

Anyway. I have several things to pack, but my ribs and back are so sore from coughing that just the thought of it makes me tired. The person who bought my Wii on Sunday finally paid.  So here's some other stuff I sold:

 I actually bought this cardigan for me for $1.00 at a rich people yard sale.  It was 100% shetland wool and I couldn't wear it for longer than 2 minutes without wanting to tear my skin off.  So I put it up $40.00 OBO and it sold within 12 hours for $30.00.  Not bad.

Good Lord, this is a dreadful picture.  I take better pictures than this now.  This is from August.  They finally sold for $29.99.  They're Allen Edmond's.

This is one of those sales that reminds me that I'm an idiot sometimes.  I really liked this coat and it fit me and so I kind of wanted to keep it.  It's Ralph Lauren and I paid $1.00 for it.  I figured people would really want this, so I did an auction at $.99 with the option to BIN for $29.99.  Well, it sold it for a lousy $2.00.  I should have just kept it.

Mom donated some Fenton cats to me yesterday, so I have those up for varying prices.  I'll talk about them later....getting weak...urgh...

Business magnets!

Lookit at what I ordered!  I am excited.  I only ordered 25.  It's a magnet!  I mean, I know I throw away business cards, but if I got a nice magnet, I would stick that junk on the fridge.  Maybe one day, someone will look at their fridge and think "oh, I really liked that whatever I bought from her.  I should see what else she has.  I wonder if the milk's still good."

I got them from www.vistaprint.com (they take paypal, which is important) after an hour of agonizing over the designs. 

Christmas Hangover, sales and a BOLO

Ugh.  Baby's still sick.  Having a child be sick on their first Christmas is the definition of mommy torture.  You've planned this day since last Christmas, imagining the way her eyes will light up with every present, how she'll play with the boxes, the way she'll squeal with delight when she realizes mommy and daddy don't have anywhere to put her new toys.  You don't picture her throwing up the night before or having to take a break during present-opening to take a nap or her trying to play but then just plopping down resignedly and yelling for her mama.  It's heart-breaking.

Our Christmas was good, though.  We seriously have approximately 20 toys too many and I must buy a cube storage thing at Target today.  I'm going with my mother-and-sister-in-law at 8:30 to fight people for leftover wrapping paper.  I also need to get some Tupperware containers for my eBay crap.  Between that stuff and her toys, we're totally drowning over here. 

You know, I had some auctions ending yesterday and I was nervous about them.  They were potentially high-dollar items and I wanted to get everything out of them that I could, and I think I did!  Here's what I sold:

 All of this stuff was stuff we already owned.  Tyler bought these P90X DVDs a couple years ago, and we used them, just not very much.  None of them are scratched and somehow I managed not to lose any of them.  I didn't think they'd go very high without the guidebooks, but they ended at $102 + free shipping and the buyer's already paid!  Also, if you just find one of the DVDs, some of them can go alone for a very good price.  Check out the Ab Ripper X disc by itself!

Ever since baby was born, we've not even turned the Wii on.  It's taking up space and the cords hang down off the mantel where the TV is and Addy just tries to play with them.  $118 + $51 shipping to Brazil.  Buyer hasn't paid yet, but it just ended last night around 9.

I really didn't think these would be so popular.  They've been opened, but we bought them while I was preggo and have only watched the first season.  Between Once Upon a Time and Dexter, we simply don't have time for this, even though Bryan Cranston is basically brilliant.  $26.00 + free shipping.

BoLo: So baby's currently sleeping and I was thinking of ways to make room for all her new stuff.  I realized our bookshelf upstairs has a ton of books on it that she'll probably never get into (mainly mine and Tyler's old books), so I started looking up highest selling single Golden Books.  While we do not have this one, it's definitely something you should keep an eye out for!  I was also looking up Sega Genesis games, which Tyler has a few of from back in the day and while we don't have this one, either...holy cow!  Keep your eyes peeled for Musha!

The Great Strawberry Shortcake mug screw-up

So, Tuesday baby wouldn't take a nap.  Now I know she was working on getting some heinous virus that put us in the ER last night when she woke up with a fever of 105.  She's much better now, although no one could really tell us what it was.  They thought maybe it was a urinary tract infection, but they didn't want to cath her (thank God), so they sent us home with instructions to alternate Tylenol and Motrin every 3 hours and start her on Amoxocillin if it didn't get better in 24 hours.  That was our Wednesday night.

But I digress.

On Tuesday I decided "you know what would be fun?  If I took her around some of the antique stores downtown.  Maybe I'll find some Christmas gifts and she can look at stuff."  She loves to look at stuff. 

We went into one that has a TON of cool stuff, old toys, McCoy mugs, old books...just full of stuff.  Most of it is priced at what I would sell it for, so it's not anything I could make much money off of.  But, lo!  One thing made me stop in my tracks.  A Fire King Strawberry Shortcake mug from 1983.  It was $8.50, but I've read so much about Fire King advertising mugs selling for a ton, so I scooped it up, thinking "oh, boy!  I'm going to make some money!"  Baby was getting fussy, so I paid and we came home.  While she was asleep, I checked completeds.  I was extremely dissapointed.

So now I'm drinking my coffee out of it exclusively, just to get my money's worth.  I didn't even LIKE Strawberry Shortcake growing up. 

Weird thing?  The coffee from it has a faint aftertaste of failure.

Moral: Get a smartphone.  I just got a new one today from Virgin.  It's an LG Optimus V and the first thing I put on there was the Droid eBay app.

Moral dillema and recents.

Do you know what is weird?  When you have something listed and it's had no interest at all, and then BOOM major interest.  I had this Thumper doll up for a couple of weeks, no watchers, nothing.  Then last night I got a message asking if I'd take $10.50 for it.  I didn't have it OBO, but I changed the price and was getting ready to message the buyer back when it sold before I was done writing to them and the buyer paid immediately.  I figured it was the people who had contacted me, so I didn't think anything of it.  THEN I get a message an hour later saying "did you accept our offer?"  and I was like "crap".  I told them I thought they had been the ones that bought it and apologized for the mix-up, thinking that was that.  THEN they messaged me back saying "oh could you tell the other buyer you lowered the price for us and send us the invoice?"

Um.

No?

I messaged them back and explained that the buyer had already paid and I didn't want to cancel the transaction.  I was expecting an angry message when I got up this morning, but there was nothing.  Whew.  I'm really bad at confrontation, even online.  I'm pretty sure I did the right thing.

Anywhooo...I sold my ugly Golf postage stamp shirt I talked about in yesterday's post and it went to Italy today for $24.99 + $28.00 shipping.  People be crazy.

I also shipped out Thumper and a pair of Michael Kors plus sized pants I thought were a "sure thing" that took up closet space for over a month.  Today's been uneventful.  I have some auctions up that are doing well, though.  I'll talk about them next week, once they end.  Because I'm a genius and have them ending on Christmas.

Today I had to go to the mall and buy my sister in law a birthday present.  There's a newer thrift shop across from the mall called "Lend A Paw", henceforth known as LAP that I've only been in once.  My mom was watching my feverish baby (sad face), so I went in and got this stuff:

This was one of those "interesting factor" items for me.  My instinct sucks, folks, as I will explain in tomorrow's post "The Great Strawberry Shortcake Mug Screw-up".  Sometimes, however, I am very good at picking out weird stuff (see Golf postage stamp sweater).  I actually bought three of these little boxes, but I haven't taken a pic of the third one.  They are what those who lead alternative lifestyles would refer to as "stash boxes", or what us on the straight-and-narrow would call "places to hide your pot".  They're about 3" long and 1/2" deep, ceramic, very vintage looking.  I'm doing them separately BIN for $9.99.  The guy sold them to me for $.75 each instead of the $1.00 marked on them.

This was in a torn plastic wrapper.  I flipped through the pages to see if they had been written in, because I thought it was like an exercise book and journal or something.  They were brand new, so I got them for $2.00.  I got home and looked through them again, and it's about living with cancer and it's got worksheets to write down your appointments and treatments and stuff.  It made me sad.  It also made me wonder how to write a title and description.  I thought "LIVESTRONG GUIDEBOOK AND JOURNAL, INFORMATION ON CANCER NEW!" would be a bit off-putting, so I didn't do my usual all-caps title and left all of the "awesomes" and "!!" out of my description.  BIN $13.99

Salvation Army Love and WTH is this, blogger?

So I made the huge mistake of clicking on the "new blogger interface" button and now it sucks more than normal.  Anyway.

So I had $20.00 burning a hole in my pocket yesterday and decided to visit the Salvation Army, which I haven't been to in a long time.  Ours is pretty much crammed full of stuff and it's really depressing, so I avoid it.  Also they only take cash or local checks and who carries cash and checks around anymore?  But, I'm glad I didn't avoid it yesterday!  Apparently the rich folk in our town take their unwanted stuff to the SA and not the GW.  No housewares or books to speak of, but I got lots of neat stuff.  Observe:

These were in "Santa's Workshop", a small closet outside of the store where they put stuff that was NIP or still had tags.  I paid $3.00 each and come home to find that they individually sell for about $5.00 a pop.  Lame.  I put them up together at auction starting at $10.00.  It was one of those things where, if I hadn't gotten them, I would've always been wondering (well, at least until I checked completeds).

 Boy's snow boots by Cabela's in a size 1.  They have a removable liner.  Also, shoes at my SA are only like $1.75 and they look great.  I put them as BIN for $14.99 I think.

Women's Laredo leather lace-up boots.  They're the dreaded size 6.5, which I can't unload for the life of me, but they look really nice, so I couldn't pass them up.

This is so ugly, I really couldn't NOT get it.  It's by Cotton Traders and it's an XLT.  I put it up for BIN $24.99

Polo Golf sweater size XXL.  It's actually in pretty good shape.  It's already got a bid for $12.99.

I also got an XXL Polo shirt for men.  It's weird, but I love buying XL and up men's clothes.  I especially love finding Polo "big shirts".  I got one of those, too, but it had some weird stain so I Oxycleaned it and I need to takes pics of it today.  I have women's plus size stuff that sits around forever, but I've had pretty good luck with my larger men's items.  Go figure.  I'll definitely be going back to my SA soon!

Christmas Spirit

So, apparently I've missed out on all of the things people actually want for Christmas. Unfortunately, you don't find many XBox Kinects and iPads at the GW. Oh well. Here's what I have sold:
While looking for this picture, I realized it was in a folder from AUGUST. That's like forever ago. I was an idiot and paid $15.00 for it. It's a set of Elvis cassettes and a stamp book. Accepted a best offer yesterday of $14.50 just to be rid of it.

I just got this fellow at the GW on Friday and he sold for my full asking price of $18.99 to Canada. He's a Disney store exclusive Lumpy the Heffalump. You know, some people swear by certain brands of shoes...some people swear by certain kinds of figurines...I swear by anything Pooh. If you see something and it's Pooh-related. Just buy it. I actually passed up a Pooh crib bumper set and crib skirt at the same GW and I'm kicking myself over it. Paid $1.85.

This was an 18" Garfield from 1981 I picked up at my friend's mom's yard sale a couple weeks ago. He's the only plush I bought there that's sold. He went to the UK for $18.99, paid $.50.

These also left my house this week after being here TOO LONG. I have a "mom" one and a "dad" one. I didn't put the "dad" pic up because I didn't feel like rotating it. I thought these would be speedy sellers, but I've had them since September. I was always suspicious they were Fire King but they had no mark. When I relisted them the last time I put "FIRE KING?" in the title and made sure to specify in the listing that I was not certain they were Fire King and they had no mark on the bottom. I had them listed separately and they finally sold to a buyer in Japan for $5.99 each.

I also sold a few books and a lot of Addy's 3 month clothes for $17.99. The clothes selling isn't really for the money. It's because I'm too lazy to do consignment and I need room for the RIDICULOUS amount of clothes she's getting for Christmas.

On average I am hitting my goal of $33.00 a day. I'm not super pumped about anything I have up right now, but hopefully someone will be. I did find some SAS shoes at GW last weekend and was excited, as eBay Underground says they are great sellers, but I haven't had many views on my two pairs, so we'll see what happens.

Finals and stuff.

This week's been OK and so far, I've managed to meet my goal of $33.00/day. This doesn't mean I've consistently sold that much every day, but it averages out to about that. This week I've unloaded:

*An Old Navy plus size jacket I've had FOREVER - paid $4.50, sold for $9.99. Bleh.

*A map of DC from 1957 that was in my parent's house when we moved in - paid 0, sold for $27.99

*Russ piggy bank we got at a shower - paid 0, sold for $17.99

*Denim jacket I've owned forever - paid ?, sold for $6.99

*Footprints by Birkenstock shoes - paid $4.50, sold for $30.79

*Large print Mere Christianity book - paid probably $1.00, sold for $10.99

*True Religion mini skirt - paid $3.00, I think, sold for $27.99

*Garfield plush from last week's yard sale - paid $.50, sold for $24.99

And some other stuff.

I currently have 103 things listed, none of which are very exciting. I've got a Stromberg Carlsson rotary phone that I'm surprised hasn't been snatched up yet and TWO Revere Ware tea kettles. One's been sitting around for a couple of months have the other's been up for three weeks. They sell well when I look at completeds, so I don't know why mine are gathering dust.

Tyler got me an excellent new camera since ours died due to an unfortunate pudding incident involving our offspring. It's a Panasonic Lumix and it's apparently "smart" which is good because I am totally dumb when it comes to taking pictures. The only bad thing? I have no new stock to take pictures of! We're going to Sears for family Christmas pics and I figure I'll sneak out to Goodwill afterwards or maybe we'll make it a family affair since one of our GW's is right next to the mall...it depends on how happy the baby is.

I've also got to do some shopping for another baby...not ours but there's a family of three kids, one of which goes to the middle school, who are being raised by their grandma and she doesn't have enough to give them a good Christmas. When I heard that she had a 3-month-old girl, I told our guidance counselor that I would just do all of the baby stuff. Addy's got piles of presents and the thought of a little baby having a bad first Christmas makes me want to punch a hole in the wall (unexpected reaction? yes, but justified). So I've got to get thee to a TJMaxx and get her some clothes and toys! This also gives me an excuse to buy those Huggies Santa diapers Tyler won't let me get for Addy (we subscribe to Amazon diaper delivery and don't need any but COME ON). Haha!

Realistic goals.

So I've gone through a lot of goals while doing this eBay thing, but I think I've stumbled upon a very realistic one. $33.00 a day. I've been doing this for a couple of weeks now (although that might just be the Christmas rush) and it brings in an amount that I'm very happy with. I mean, $33.00 x 7 = $231.00/week. It's no great shakes, but that's fine with me.

I sold my Coach shoes I talked about last week and a few other pairs. My lot of Build a Bear clothes is being bid on by several eager buyers and some stupid Disney mugs I bought forever ago that may or may not be Fire King also FINALLY have bids.

You know what's weird? When you list something and it has several watchers but doesn't sell, and so you list it again and hardly anyone even LOOKS at it. This has continued to perplex me time and again. I have a lot of baby clothes up for the second week and the first time, it had 3 watchers, but I had it ending on the middle of a week day. So I've relisted it and only about six people have even looked at it and it's due to end tomorrow. There really seems to be no rhyme or reason to shopper's habits. I know some people have this down to a science, but it continues to elude me.

Also, re: my stuffed animal haul from this weekend...nothing. That is all.

Blogger, I'm going to punch you in the face.

This is my 997th time trying to post this stupid thing. I would have given up but Tyler's watching the Hokies game and I'm not tired enough to go to bed yet. The pictures keep doing crazy things. Hopefully this works because I will not restart this post.

SO I went to the yard sale down the street today, run by a mom of some friends of ours (I also teach her second youngest...she's had a lot of kids). I knew there would be toys. I did not know they would be covered in frost from being left out overnight and I did not grasp how cold it was before I left the house. Here's what I bought before my hands went completely numb:

Thumper has some special Disney store badge sewn onto his leg, making me think he was special. One sold for $16.99 so that's what I listed mine for. Paid $.50. Please ignore the stupid time stamp. My camera broke last weekend so I've had to borrow one from my parents, who never bothered to set it and I'm too lazy. Hopefully people don't really think I took these pics four years ago.

Care Bears checkers. Completeds aren't too impressive, but I threw in a Cozy Heart penguin to sweeten the deal. Listed as BIN OBO for $19.99, paid $1.00 total.

This is Rudolph from the movie. When you wring his neck his nose lights up and he plays a nightmarish version of "Rudolph The Red Nosed Reindeer". BIN $19.99. Paid $.50

1981 18" Garfield plush. If he had on an "I hate Mondays" shirt, I'd be good, but he doesn't, so we'll have to see how he does at $24.99 and free shipping. Paid $.50.

My first Build A Bear clothes lot! I was pretty pumped about this. I put this as an auction starting at $9.99.

Also picked up a couple of nice blazers. Went to our other GW later and got some dreadful men's wool pants by Christian Dior and some more Allen Edmond's loafers. I will list the Christian Dior pretty cheap just to bring in customers who search for the high-end stuff. If you see something that's a big name brand in presentable condition, buy it simply for the traffic the name will generate. Hopefully, these high-rollers will look through your store for more stuff and buy some of your crap awesome stuff!

Weekly stuff and GW hunting.

Ok, back to the posting grind. This week was great. Most of my expensive stuff has sold and mom volunteered her American Girl Samantha doll, which I sold for $85.00 (should have asked way more) in about three minutes. Here's what else I sold:

Mary Englebreit Disney pin picture that I talked about here: paid $1, sold for $55.00

American Girl Doll: paid 0, sold for $85.00

Croc wedge shoes: paid $5.00, sold for $19.99

Merrell shoes: paid $4.50, sold for $24.99, I think...something like that.

Lot of 19 VC Andrews books mom picked up at a book sale, paid $3.00, sold for $25.99 FAST.

Fenton glass shoe someone gave me at a baby shower for some reason, paid 0, sold for $9.99

Set of Indiana Glass 12 days of Christmas glasses (FINALLY), paid $7.00, sold for $22.99

Lot of 4 Adrinana Trigniani books: paid 0, sold for $8.99

Martha Stewart craft book: Paid $1.00, sold for $8.99

And some other small things I can't remember. It's really a mixed bag. I always try to look at my stuff and see if there's any rhyme or reason to what people are buying from one week to the next and there's not.

I went to GW on Thursday night and found some pretty good stuff. Tyler's decided to start reading the "Wheel of Time" books by Robert Jordan and has been ordering used ones off Amazon for about $3.00 each paperback. They're always in rough shape, but guess what I saw in a cart of stuff ready to be put away? Five of the books! 4-8, all looking pretty good! I scooped them up. Then I got this for resale:

Coach shoes! I was very excited and the guy checking me out was like "whaaaat?". We were both equally nonplussed that people would just give up expensive shoes. I have them BIN for $27.99 because, to my dismay, Coach shoes really don't actually sell for much used and the insoles show show some wear.

Hartstrings crafty sweater. Ok, for one thing, it's pretty freakin cute (thimble buttons!) and I know it would appeal to a very limited number of buyers, but SOMEONE would def. want it and it's Hartstrings! BIN for $21.99, size 3T

These are just Nine West, but they're new and I thought they were super cute! They're a size 6, which usually does well resale wise. If they were my freakish size 11, I would totally keep them! BIN for $22.99.

There's a yard sale up the road today at a friend's mom's house. She's had about 80 kids, so I'm hoping to find some good toys finally! We'll see.

Oh Lordy.

It's been a month since I've posted, which is inexcusable! I don't know what I've been doing instead...nothing interesting. I'm eBaying it up. And by that, I mean, jumping at my computer any time my email dings to see if I've sold anything worthwhile. It's usually an email from The Children's Place (for real, they send 3 emails a day and I've unsubscribed but to no avail). Anyways.

Work's been hectic and baby's crawling which keeps us so busy! She's so fun to watch. She does some Army-crawl thing where she uses her right arm and left leg and all other appendages pretty much just get in the way. She's almost 10 months! It's nuts.

I honestly think eBay is messing with my head. When I check the traffic reports for my store, it says I'm getting a respectable amount of page views. But when I look at my actual views, I'm not seeing where those 100-200 views are going. Omniture is a dirty liar. Yet I check it obsessively. Go figure.

I have 104 things listed right now and actually bought some nice stuff at some yard sales this weekend (mainly clothes and shoes) and I've made some pretty good profit on a few things recently. When I'm feeling feisty (maybe tomorrow, feisty or not) I'll do a picture post. This was just an update to say hey! I hope everyone's holiday selling is going well!

Excuses.

All of them excellent.

So last weekend, the yard sale-ing was completely amazing, thanks to some great estate sales. My sales were totally awesome on Sunday (about $200!) and where was I? Puking my guts out. Tyler and I had some sort of Zombie flu that lasted a day. His parents took the baby while we laid on the couch watching Auction Hunters and waiting for death. My email kept dinging and I kept thinking of all the bloody work I'd have ahead of me once I recovered. I didn't get all the purchases out of the house until Wednesday. It's really hard to make up a lost day.

This week I didn't pay much attention to eBay. I had meetings, baby had doctor's appointments (just a check up with her dermatologist and pediatrician) and I was burnt out from all the shipping. When I checked my traffic yesterday, I'd had like NO visitors this week. I had a couple good auctions going but really zero storefront views and the other views were probably in the single digits. On eBay underground's proboards, they call this the black hole. I feel this is very accurate.

Tyler and I have a wager going. Our Christmas club account pays out on Tuesday, so we were going to go to Pigeon Forge and do some outlet shopping next weekend. I want to stay at the indoor waterpark Friday night (the baby's an Aquarius and seriously loves water) but Tyler's more for just making it a day trip and letting a set of grandparents watch Addy. If I make $150 by Tuesday, we can go. Now that I'm looking at my traffic, I'm not sure if it'll happen, but I have another 20% off sale going, so we'll see if that can generate some sales...it sure didn't yesterday!

Now here's some pictures of the cool stuff I got last weekend (it's so cool, no one's bought most of it yet! wheee)

I have this BIN for $29.99, I think, with another one that's pink with white design. Gooseberry is supposedly popular right now, but I'm not convinced.

Tyler's been wanting a set of these to resell for awhile now. It's Fire King lustre ware and I cannot find any completeds on a huge set like this. There's nine of them and they're gorgeous. Something my crappy photography skills cannot convey.

This had a bid on it the second I put it up. It's LPS teeniest tiniest stuff. Hopefully the bids keep coming!

These are sportsman insulated mugs by Flambeau. The only completeds are for one or two of the mugs, not a whole set like this. Two of them sell for about $20.00, so we'll see what happens at BIN OBO $59.99

Yeah, I was too lazy to link to completeds. So what? I also realized that most of my pics are on my other computer which is at school. If you want to see what else I have, look at my store!

Hollaaaa

Look at what I got on my eBay page today! This morning it was just the power seller, but later this afternoon I saw the Top-rated seller badge, too! I now live in fear of it being taken away. When you look at your status, They have the maximum count of "item not as described" stuff you can have and the max for me is 3. I've had 1 for awhile now. I think it's from one person who left positive feedback for an item but then messaged me and told me she wasn't happy with it. Now I have 2! What?? One person left feedback on some Merrell's I sold a few weeks ago and said "different than in the picture but great none the less". HOW?? How is something different than in the picture!? It's a picture of the actual item! I bet it's them. If I lose my Power Seller badge, I'll be pretty devastated.

I sold about $100 worth of stuff yesterday. Wednesday for some reason is one of my busiest days in the "store", so I always do a Wednesday price markdown of 10-20%. It seems to usually work out for me.

Also, someone's watching my Mary Englebreit pins! It doesn't necessarily mean they'll sell (I mean I've had 10 watchers before and nary an offer or bid or anything), but seeing that someone's watching it does some crazy psychological stuff that makes me feel hopeful.

WTF eBay.

Look at today! Look at today compared to other days! What is that? How does this happen? I have 91 things listed. Lots of different types, name brands, etc. TONS of watchers. I honestly think this is a huge conspiracy. I don't know what kind, but thinking it makes me feel better.

Yard Sale Tales: 10/15/2011 edition.

You know what really chaps my rear? When people advertise for a yard sale and make it sound AWESOME and then you get there and there's no yard sale! I got up this morning and went to an apparent yard sale in a super nice community on the other side of town and I was so pumped because this neighborhood is gorgeous and there was no yard sale. It's so disappointing. I wanted to go to their door and ring the bell and tell them they owed me money for the gas I used driving out there.

Then I got this stuff at other places:

The Stitch doll is from a community yard sale at some condos. Apparently "community" means two condos at opposite ends of the place, both with about two tables worth of stuff. I also got the framed Mary Englebreit (more about that in a sec) "picture" on the far right at the same place. Paid $1.50. Stitch does ok, depending on what you have.

The Josef Seibels and Bob the Builder sheet set were from the GW. We stopped at a yard sale where I got the Snoopy root beer mug and it was close to GW and the baby was asleep so I ran in really quick. Paid $8.00

The Snoopy root beer mug got me really excited, but the completeds have dashed my hopes for huge profits. Oh, well. At least I just paid $.50.

I did a happy dance when I found the Revere Ware tea kettle at an estate sale. It was one of those where they think everything they own is awesome and want exorbitant amounts for it, but somehow this beauty was just priced at $5.00, which leaves me lots of room for profit.

I got the books when I was still smarting from the pretend yard sale. It was freezing so I didn't pick through this lady's stuff like I should have, but she said that they're having a bigger moving sale in a couple of weeks, so it's ok. They're all in really great shape.

Ok, so the Mary Englebreit "picture" is actually a framed pin set. I really can't find much about this. I can find listings for the lithograph print of the pin in the middle, which is Ann Estelle serving tea to her Mickey and Minnie rag dolls, but I can't find anything for this item in particular. Since Disney pins tend to go for crazy prices, and this print has a certificate of authenticity on the back, I listed it for $112.75 (don't ask me why that number), OBO, just for giggles to see if anyone would bite. What a great profit that would be, eh?

Waiting for the ball to drop.

I'm having another sale in my store this weekend. Have already gotten rid of an 18" Alf for $27.99 and some furry baby boots (by Arizona) so far tonight. My inventory is decidedly down and I'm having a tough time finding more, but that's not stopping me from wanting to get rid of anything I can. I've done well the past two weeks (way better than at the end of September). So, selling's not my problem right now: it's finding stuff to sell.

Yard sales last weekend were mediocre. I did find a Cuddle U pillow, like a Boppy that was brand new for $5.00, sold it for $19.99 a few hours later. So if you see those, be sure to pick them up!

I'm having some luck with shoes. My closest GW has gotten very nice shoes lately, so I've been buying those up. They haven't gotten much else in, though!

Since I've been shipping so much out lately, I'm getting lots of feedback, which is good, because I hate sending stuff out that I know is awesome and not getting credit for it. I'm anxiously waiting for someone to hate what I've sent them, or for it to not get there, or for something else bad to happen. Every time I see I have new feedback or a new message, I get really nervous and am afraid it's something awful. It hasn't been yet, but if my statistics class I passed only because the professor felt sorry for me taught me anything, it's that the more stuff I send out, the greater the chance for an unhappy customer. Ah, well, I guess I'll just bide my time.

We're yard-saleing tomorrow. Well, I'm going out early while it's still cold and then I'll swing back by to get Tyler and baby once it warms up a bit. I've only got four on my list, but one's a huge estate sale, one's a community yard sale at some nicer condos and the other two are multi-family in nice neighborhoods. Hopefully I can find some good stuff!

Sale results so far

Wow. Who knew discounting stuff 20% could make such a big difference? I haven't sold tons, but I have made over $200 this week so far. Hopefully tomorrow brings more bargain hunters. I'm glad that things have picked up for the time being. I was getting very discouraged. Here's what's sold:

*Clark's mary janes - paid $4.50 sold for $23.99

*Merrell shoes - paid $4.50 sold for $13.00 (not a huge profit but they were in rough shape)

*Ralph Lauren hoodie - paid $10.00 at TJ Maxx in June, the auction didn't meet the reserve when I first listed it, so I just relisted and it sold for $25.00

*Some American Girl's dolls sewing stuff - paid $1.50 sold for a total of $20.00

*Single books - paid around $5.00 for all the ones that sold, sold them for a total of around $30.00

*Two of my four lots of romance books - paid $5.00 for all of them, sold for $30.00

*prAna vest I bought forever ago and never wore - Paid ? sold for $15.99

Other various things I can't remember right now. I'm happiest about the books. One of the romance lots has 39 books in it and getting those out of the house will make lots of room for all the VC Andrews books my mom bought at the book sale this week!

Being proactive! Sale! Buy things!

Today was a doozy as far as work was concerned. Sometimes I wonder why I get up in the morning and leave my precious baby just to get crapped on by 12 year olds. I mean, I know we can't live on Tyler's salary and my recently terrible eBay earnings by themselves, but on days like today I think maybe living with my parents wouldn't be too bad (and if you knew my mother, you'd be like "omg, she means business").

Don't get me wrong, a lot of my kids are precious and I would take them to raise, no problem. But it only takes one (or three or five) to make your day terrible. So, feeling the need to be successful at SOMETHING, I went through and did a markdown on all my Buy It Now items. So from now through Saturday, everything BIN in Pages Bookstore & More is 20% off. I had someone buy a vest I've been trying to unload for a while, but it had 3 watchers, so it might have sold today, anyway. I would be thrilled if a ton of stuff sold. My house is so packed right now, I really want to get rid of some stuff before I bring more stuff in.

One of our local libraries is having a book sale this weekend. It starts tomorrow but I have parent teacher conferences and can't go after work. My mom is going tomorrow and I've left her a list of books and the type of books I would like, but we'll see what she actually comes home with. I'll go Friday after school and probably hit it up Saturday in case they have any last day sales.

I'll let you know how the BIN sale goes. Fingers crossed!

Time

Before I start on my planned post, I want to address one of my least favorite things on eBay: when people leave you weird feedback. Like today, I got one on a Polo shirt I sold in excellent condition and I was even flexible with the person paying and their feedback? "Satisfied". That's it! Really? Or just the flat "thanks." or "satisfied with transaction." It makes me feel like they were somehow not happy with their purchase. I dunno. Maybe I'm too sensitive. But, "satisfied"? Boo.

So some people have asked me how I have the time to list like I do. My basic strategy is one of desperation and lack of space. Our dining room and office are currently packed to the gills and I want it gone. Sometimes, I think "I should just throw this crap out", but I list it instead.

I take pictures whenever I get a chance. Baby's naps, Tyler playing with baby, anytime I have a free minute, I lay down a blanket and try to take a decent picture or two. Then, I sit down and load all of the new pictures on my computer once baby's asleep. Bedtime is pretty regularly 6:30-7:00, so I list then. Let's say I have 5 things to list. I usually sit down at 7:30, upload pics, edit if necessary, do my listings (if it's clothes, I'll take quick measurements when I take the photos and write them down) and I'm done by 8:00.

I've tried Auctiva. I know this is the most basic of the listing sites, but the free month trial lured me in. I loved it at first, until after a couple weeks of using it, I realized my sales really hadn't changed and it was taking me 30 minutes to find a background I liked for each listing. To me, 30 minutes of time doing other things is more important than the few extra dollars it might have made me.

Luckily I have nothing to list tonight because my house is a total wreck. I'm watching Hoarders to inspire me to clean up.

Goal!

I actually reached a goal! 100 listings tonight, thanks to a good trip to GW with Tyler this afternoon. We got a lot of shoes, which was pretty much all the good stuff they had:

Clarks shoes, size 10; Born sandals size 10; Merrell shoes size 9.5 (rough shape, but hey, they're Merrells); A&F cords in size 0. We also found some Doc Martens! They're really scuffed, so I'm going to try to clean them up before I list them. I got a few hypnobirthing books, which is strange to me, but I figured someone might be crazy enough to consider it. And a J.Crew skirt for me. Spent $33.00.

So, 100 listings, and $16.00 in sales for the weekend. Hm.

Etsy?

As I was scrolling through my items for the 1,000th time today I realized a lot of my stuff is vintage house decor and kitchen ware. This is not necessarily what I set out to find, but lately it's been all I can find. So this made me think of Etsy. I am wondering if anyone out there sells on it. Not crafts, but vintage stuff. Do you think it's superior to eBay when it comes to selling these things? Please advise.

Positive Thinking.

Well, the pipe's fixed. There is a hole in my kitchen ceiling from where they had to cut it out to get to the toilet drain, but I can live with that until we fix it next week. Addy's still yucky, but she hasn't thrown up since this morning and she's managed to keep down two bottles. Tyler took the day off and took her to the doctor and he thinks it's just a virus and should be good in day or two. The good news is her ears are better and her nose looks good, so that's something.

I've had about $40.00 worth of sales today, some romance books (BIN), Hello Kitty slippers and a Starbucks mug, both auction. That takes me to $170-ish for this week. I'm at 91 listings, most of those are from going back through July and August and relisting some stuff I'd given up on. We'll see how that goes. I'm trying SO HARD to be positive about this stuff and just remember that it's not personal and I just have to hope that every day will be more successful than the last! I don't think I'm yard sale-ing tomorrow, considering the baby being sick, but I'm sure I'll get out to a thrift store or two.

If you're going to yard sales tomorrow, good luck! And dress warm!

Yuck.

So this whole leaky pipe thing is starting to kill me. Our persnickety landlord was here all day with two plumbers who were apparently trying to swindle him by wanting to do the job properly. After they left, we were dealing with a puking baby and went to clean her off and, lo! No water. They forgot to turn it back on. Tyler called the plumber over an hour ago and they're apparently sending someone out, but they haven't shown yet. We tried to turn it back on ourselves, but the sinks still won't run.

Addy has thrown up twice tonight. Not just spit-up, but full on puke. I had a minor breakdown, but the doctor finally called us back and said to keep an eye on her and give her Pedialyte for the next 12 hours. She's not mad about it, and she's not running a fever, but it's pretty disconcerting. She's asleep right now, thank goodness.

And not that I've really had time to mess with eBay, but I know nothing has sold today. These have been the worst two weeks ever resale-wise for me, so I'm pretty discouraged. Also all this stuff makes me feel a little crazy inside.

Good times.

Goal update

85 listings.

We've had a setback. While hunting for some espresso cups Tyler bought at the GW a couple weeks ago, we realized our upstairs bathroom drain pipe that runs through our dining room closet (why?) has a giant crack in it. No inventory got wet, but most of Tyler's tools did and some of our winter coats. So now our dining room is in more disarray than usual, and our landlord (who is decidedly NOT a plumber) is probably going to come to town to stick Mighty Putty in it so he doesn't have to pay someone to fix it properly.

We didn't find the cups.

New Goals

Ok, rethinking this goal thing. Decided I do not want to be questioning my worth as a human being just because of low eBay sales. So I'm going to go with: get 100 things listed by the end of the week. I'm not really even sure if I have 30 more things to list, but I'll try. I guess my goal should actually be: list a crap ton of stuff by Friday. It'll be mostly books, but I do have some stuff that was up in July and August that I gave up on and has just been chilling in inconvenient places.

Total listed now: 74

Yard Sale Tales: 9/24/2011 edition.

Wow, I haven't written much this week. I wish I could say it's because I've been so busy making money. I wish I could say that I've been so swamped with items to ship, I just haven't had the time. Unfortunately, I can't say that. This week has been depressingly slow for me, especially considering the fact that I went into it with such high goals. I've just been busy licking my wounds.

I've kept an average of 70 items listed in my store in a wide range of categories. I also feel like this is the best quality stuff I've ever had listed. I've got good books, NWT clothes (in plus sizes, too!), nice vintage housewares and some great shoes. Where are my buyers?

Today I got an offer on some Allen Edmonds shoes Tyler picked up for $3.00 a few weeks ago at a yard sale. I had them at $62.99 OBO and accepted an offer of $46.00. I also sold a book today. Other than that, this week's sales total about $40.00. *sigh*.

I took yesterday off work to take Addy to the doctor for a breakout she has on her legs. After having him basically tell me "I don't know what this is." I figured out that it's the cleaner I use on her Bumbo seat. I felt like a genius. After the doctor's appointment, I took her to my parent's and went to Goodwill. Our two local GW's were basically cleaned out! I got a few things, but nothing big. Hopefully some rich people decide to donate some stuff soon.

We went to five yard sales this morning with baby. She did great! The first one we went to was kind of a bust. I got two Christmas Tervis mugs for $2.00 total. Haven't gotten them out of the car yet.

The next one was a neighborhood yard sale in an unofficial retirement community. Really nice duplexes out in the county. All the people were super nice and totally in love with the baby. I decided we need to move to a place like that. We basically behave like 80 year olds, anyway. Being surrounded by doting elderly people sounds kind of nice. Especially considering we currently live near crackheads. Not kidding. Real crackheads. We found a few things there:

There was one lady with a ton of quilting stuff. Fabric's been treating me well lately, so I grabbed three yards of this. I loved the pattern and figure someone can do some cool Christmas craft (alliteration, anyone?) with it.

I also got some McCall's American Girl doll sewing patterns for clothes and accessories.

Completeds show that these will sell. I have about five more. They all appear to be uncut except for the one I was really excited about, which was Disney princess costumes. It's cut to pieces. I'm putting a couple of them in lots and doing a couple more separately.

At the same house, there was a bunch of doll clothes accessories, like snaps, zippers and stuff like that. I grabbed some up (they were only .10) and I'll put them as a lot.

I also found Alf! I was so excited to find him! I found this 18" plush by Alien Productions and a smaller version that does not have a tag. I knew the big guy was a good find from eBay underground, but since he had a buddy, I couldn't pass up the smaller one, too. I'll do them separately.

The other yard sales weren't too fruitful, so that's about it. We got a few more things, but I haven't had time to take pictures of them yet. My only goal for next week is to overcome this terrible slump!

Linking up with Coupon Tipster!