Is it possible to make a living off eBay?

[Pandaren]

I know a guy who claims to pay his rent by buying computer parts and equipment cheap and selling it on eBay. He puts a lot of hours into it and seems quite serious.

I'm wondering if anyone here has done this before.

 

[MrScott81]

nope, nobody has ever made a living off ebay

Just look at those people with like 50k feedback...

 

[compudog]

My wife and I made enough money off of eBay to take a weekend vacation a few years back. We sold off all of our kids outgrown baby clothes and made about 2 grand.

 

[RabidMongoose]

Definitely. I did that in college when I was an undergrad.

In fact, I made a hell of a lot more than just my rent...usually somewhere around 1-3k a month. But I didn't spend lots of hours on it like your friend apparently does. I maybe spent about 30 minutes every 2 days.

I also met a friend of a friend that had about $100k from eBay profits in college.

 

[MikeMike]

talk to rossman. and some others on here, but they dont come forward as much as rossman will.

MIKE

 

[Corporate Thug]

i dont think so but you can make a nice wad of spending cash

 

[Ness]

Just like any business making serious money off of ebay requires initial investment. Usually to make enough to pay the bills requires that you get on some sweet deal and sell everything you buy at a profit.

Not only that, but you gotta find something that no one else is selling in mass, or else your auctions won't go as high.

 

[RossMAN]

Originally posted by: nourdmrolNMT1
talk to rossman. and some others on here, but they dont come forward as much as rossman will.

MIKE

Most hardcore eBay-for-profitters remain low key ... the uber elite would be Azurik of FW forums.

He's a college student that makes $50,000 per month off eBay sales and $25,000 per month for "consultations" to corporations.

Can you imagine earning $75,000 per month?

Other AT'ers who have turned this into an artform are LukFilm and NFS4.

 

[Trygve]

Yeah, it's possible. If I work at it, I can do about $4,000 per month, but it's not something I enjoy and it's not something I'm especially good at. I'm sure you could do a whole lot better if you really got into it.

 

[StageLeft]

Originally posted by: Trygve
Yeah, it's possible. If I work at it, I can do about $4,000 per month, but it's not something I enjoy and it's not something I'm especially good at. I'm sure you could do a whole lot better if you really got into it.

What do you do exactly to make that?

 

[tec699]

My dads buddy makes on average about $4,000 per month on Ebay. He hits the garage sales around town.

 

[CrazyDe1]

Yes. I made like 800 a month on ebay in college and I'll make about 45-60k depending on how aggressive I get this year.

 

[CrazyDe1]

Originally posted by: RossMAN

Originally posted by: nourdmrolNMT1
talk to rossman. and some others on here, but they dont come forward as much as rossman will.

MIKE

Most hardcore eBay-for-profitters remain low key ... the uber elite would be Azurik of FW forums.

He's a college student that makes $50,000 per month off eBay sales and $25,000 per month for "consultations" to corporations.

Can you imagine earning $75,000 per month?

Other AT'ers who have turned this into an artform are LukFilm and NFS4.

Azurik's sales are 50k a month. Profits are more like 7.5k a month or 85k a year.

 

[StageLeft]

Originally posted by: CrazyDe1

Originally posted by: RossMAN

Originally posted by: nourdmrolNMT1
talk to rossman. and some others on here, but they dont come forward as much as rossman will.

MIKE

Most hardcore eBay-for-profitters remain low key ... the uber elite would be Azurik of FW forums.

He's a college student that makes $50,000 per month off eBay sales and $25,000 per month for "consultations" to corporations.

Can you imagine earning $75,000 per month?

Other AT'ers who have turned this into an artform are LukFilm and NFS4.

Azurik's sales are 50k a month. Profits are more like 7.5k a month or 85k a year.

Compared to your 45-60 in actual profits? What is it that you do?

 

[CrazyDe1]

Originally posted by: Skoorb

Originally posted by: CrazyDe1

Originally posted by: RossMAN

Originally posted by: nourdmrolNMT1
talk to rossman. and some others on here, but they dont come forward as much as rossman will.

MIKE

Most hardcore eBay-for-profitters remain low key ... the uber elite would be Azurik of FW forums.

He's a college student that makes $50,000 per month off eBay sales and $25,000 per month for "consultations" to corporations.

Can you imagine earning $75,000 per month?

Other AT'ers who have turned this into an artform are LukFilm and NFS4.

Azurik's sales are 50k a month. Profits are more like 7.5k a month or 85k a year.

Compared to your 45-60 in actual profits? What is it that you do?

I present myself in a fashion where manufacturers will sell me enough quantities of items to undercut their channels or distribution networks. Then I turn around and move it all on ebay. Looking at getting into importing merchandise now though as I could easily turn this into 200-300k in profits if I did it right.

 

[Trygve]

Originally posted by: Skoorb

Originally posted by: Trygve
Yeah, it's possible. If I work at it, I can do about $4,000 per month, but it's not something I enjoy and it's not something I'm especially good at. I'm sure you could do a whole lot better if you really got into it.

What do you do exactly to make that?

I buy pallets/roomfulls of equipment from businesses and departments that are being shut down or are just clearing out their old and/or nonworking equipment. The higher-end stuff I test, hack past passwords and clear the configurations, and repair as needed, and that's mostly what I sell. The bulk of what I actually get in is lower-end x86 machines which are not worth trying to sell, so I work with several volunteers who clean off the hard drives and give those out to various nonprofits and low-income individuals.

It's a fair amount of work and I keep filling my garage with stuff that really isn't saleable, but a enough of what I get in will fetch a decent price per box and provide a reasonable return. If you don't have a lot of garage space, you could skip the part where you buy the pallet and limit yourself to just the boxes that are worth selling. The trick is recognizing which nondescript box will fetch $5,000 amidst all the similar-looking boxes that people wouldn't even pay the shipping for.

 

[StageLeft]

You guys are crafty. I wish I had something to sell on Ebay

 

[CrazyDe1]

Originally posted by: Trygve

Originally posted by: Skoorb

Originally posted by: Trygve
Yeah, it's possible. If I work at it, I can do about $4,000 per month, but it's not something I enjoy and it's not something I'm especially good at. I'm sure you could do a whole lot better if you really got into it.

What do you do exactly to make that?

I buy pallets/roomfulls of equipment from businesses and departments that are being shut down or are just clearing out their old and/or nonworking equipment. The higher-end stuff I test, hack past passwords and clear the configurations, and repair as needed, and that's mostly what I sell. The bulk of what I actually get in is lower-end x86 machines which are not worth trying to sell, so I work with several volunteers who clean off the hard drives and give those out to various nonprofits and low-income individuals.

It's a fair amount of work and I keep filling my garage with stuff that really isn't saleable, but a enough of what I get in will fetch a decent price per box and provide a reasonable return. If you don't have a lot of garage space, you could skip the part where you buy the pallet and limit yourself to just the boxes that are worth selling. The trick is recognizing which nondescript box will fetch $5,000 amidst all the similar-looking boxes that people wouldn't even pay the shipping for.

I looked into buying pallets full of used stuff but it wasn't worth it. Like you said, too much work. Not only do you have to test everything which is labor intensive but you have to deal with returns, broken merchandise, descreibing condition of each individual item, taking pictures of each of them. It's much easier to sell brand new stuff..

 

[Trygve]

Originally posted by: CrazyDe1

I looked into buying pallets full of used stuff but it wasn't worth it. Like you said, too much work. Not only do you have to test everything which is labor intensive but you have to deal with returns, broken merchandise, descreibing condition of each individual item, taking pictures of each of them. It's much easier to sell brand new stuff..

Yep, it's a lot easier. Part of my problem is that I have a hard time turning down bargains, even if they're for things I really don't need. And, to be honest, I do enjoy the bargain-hunting part and, for that matter, repairing network equipment can be fun, too.

But the side effect is that I have to get rid of the stuff somehow, even if that's not nearly as much fun.

 

[MacBaine]

Originally posted by: Skoorb

Originally posted by: CrazyDe1

Originally posted by: RossMAN

Originally posted by: nourdmrolNMT1
talk to rossman. and some others on here, but they dont come forward as much as rossman will.

MIKE

Most hardcore eBay-for-profitters remain low key ... the uber elite would be Azurik of FW forums.

He's a college student that makes $50,000 per month off eBay sales and $25,000 per month for "consultations" to corporations.

Can you imagine earning $75,000 per month?

Other AT'ers who have turned this into an artform are LukFilm and NFS4.

Azurik's sales are 50k a month. Profits are more like 7.5k a month or 85k a year.

Compared to your 45-60 in actual profits? What is it that you do?

He sells bullsh!t.

 

[stev0]

I had a ton of boxes of stuff from when i move houses a few years back. I've been going through that stuff now for about 2 months and have made bout $1000 now

 

[Evadman]

Originally posted by: RossMAN

Originally posted by: nourdmrolNMT1
talk to rossman. and some others on here, but they dont come forward as much as rossman will.

MIKE

Most hardcore eBay-for-profitters remain low key ... the uber elite would be Azurik of FW forums.

He's a college student that makes $50,000 per month off eBay sales and $25,000 per month for "consultations" to corporations.

Can you imagine earning $75,000 per month?

Other AT'ers who have turned this into an artform are LukFilm and NFS4.

There is at least one more here on AT, who does 40-50k a year. He is the one who introduced me to AT. If you know me, you know him. For soem reason he doesn't like any personal info online at all, and linking him to me would give you too much info for his taste, so for this moment he will be unnamed. Not that 40k a year is anything compaired to 75k a month. Geez.

 

[AmbitV]

it's good to be Ebay. Do some server ugprades/maintenance here and there, but otherwise kick back and let the money roll as the middle man.

One way to hedge the Ebay cost is to invest in Ebay stock at the same time you're selling on Ebay...but then again their stock could be overvalued.

 

[badmouse]

Yes, but you have to treat it like a business. You gotta find a reliable source of profitable goods to sell, you gotta get a system for doing all the boring stuff - listing, contacting/money, shipping, recordkeeping - and you gotta keep looking out for new opportunities.

Ebay is a great marketplace. But there are lots of other ways to make a living, too.

 

[goblue420]

wow, i really want to look into this, i am a college student as well and am interested in starting something like this, how does one get in contact with the companies themselves and get bulk parts? ohh and where can u find compaines that are clearing out pallets of stuff?