Buying and selling coins on ebay: Lessons learned

You can get deals from coins with bad pictures, many times at most, you get what you paid for. As far as selling is concerned, I tried overcharging, starting the bid a little higher than the coins value. Don't assume that there are as many bidiots out there, overcharged coins don't sell. Usually overpaying have to do with bidding wars where two or more people want the same coins and it gets out of hand.

 

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Interesting post. You bring up several points to which I'd like to respond, but since I'm too lazy to break up the post, my responses are in bold within the quote.

Welcome to the free market society! The board is full of stories about people buying items from eBay, then not understanding why they aren't getting dump truck loads of money delivered to their homes by attempting to flip that same item on the very same venue (and thus, the very same audience) they bought said item from in the first place. Supply and Demand. The prices are set by what the market will bear. So as a buyer, if the item is readily available and offered by numerous vendors, I would purchase from the cheapest guy in the fray. If it's a rarer item with more buyers than sellers, then I'm going to pay what I believe the item is worth to me (not necessarily what it's worth). This is why auctions sometimes seem like they're out of control. Again, especially in regards to the Franklin set, the people looking at that auction were thinking "If I get this at $X, I can sell for $Y and make $Z in the end", not "Gee, I'd like a nice set of Franklin Halves for my collection, let me pick up this one". And don't delude yourself, no one is thinking "Boy, I wouldn't want to screw that seller, that item is worth this amount, let me get that bid in".

 

^ Flipping coins/ebay junk etc actually worked quite well in early days till 2006 it was pretty viable strategy and i know people earned close to six figures on it. But too many people jumped on it (especially stay at home parents) and competition made it quite hard to find bargains and couple that with ebay raising its fees, stricter rules which favor the buyer (buyers who purposely break the item or ship back broken product and get $$$ back) and increase in counterfeits...

 

Buyers do have it made, no doubt about it. In short as a seller, you absolutely gotta take your time when selling because if you don't you are gonna feel screwed every single time. Ebay is definitely a way to make a profit but it's also a gamble. I have lost money selling just like everybody else who sells on ebay. Anybody who says that they never lose money on ebay is simply not playing with a full deck!! You can't win all the time but if you take your time and proceed wisely, then you will do fairly well. Lastly Vess, your story is so true especially to the experienced! :thumb:

 

This is a nice write up with lots of truisms. I'm in a similiar situation, more of a coin horder but I've sold coins on eBay and most of what you say rings very true.

One takeaway if you're in the coin game for a profit, let the collectors do the work assembling sets. Buy the entire set at a discount. Then break them up and sell the coins individually. It's a lot of work but it's probably one way to stack the deck in your favor financially.

The problem with this of course is for those of us who are collectors, a lot of fun is derived in putting the work into assembling the set.

 

Vess, there is no simple answer to why reserve auctions don't sell very well if at all, but as you know, it happens. You might as well ask why books with dark covers sell better than the same book with a light cover, or why items prices in odd numbers sell better than even numbers even if they're lower priced. Its human psychology.
Guy

 

So you're saying the only people buying on ebay are flippers? Lets be clear, I didn't do this to flip the set. I'm not looking to flip anything for a profit. I wanted to break even or at least not take too bad of a hit, selling to another collector. I don't believe everybody on ebay is just looking to buy something to flip.
I don't care if I did pay retail for every single Franklin half, it is totally unreasonable to expect 50 cents on the dollar in order to sell the set. Would you sell a mint state set and be left with melt value in cash and say "Oh well, that's the market." No way.

Somebody actually thought 15.80 a coin was fair, and oh yeah, take fees and shipping out of that too. Not realistic. Melt value is 12.40! 7 of them were more than $50. A few were 60-80. I could break the set up and do much better I'm sure. Not interested in doing that at this time.

 

Sorry, just not seeing your point yet.

 

Cheer up bunkie,

It ain't you, some people just have it...I knew a guy who could sell ice to Eskimos in the dead of winter, make a double profit and not even try. It use to blow me away because I am the guy on the longest, slowest check out line in the grocery. When I move into a fast lane on the freeway it automatically slows down.

 

Here's my view on Ebay, I've been buying and selling for years. Auctions tend to go at wholesale/grey sheet prices while BIN's are at retail. With BIN's it's about the quanity/quality of listings and having your pricing in the lower third of that particular market. You are targeting the impulse buyer who wakes up one day and decides to buy and is not patient/smart enough to wait for an auction. Selling in the auction format is no different than bringing your trade in to the dealership, the purchaser (in most cases) has an eye on the flip. As a buyer, be it a collector or flipper, you should always have an exit strategy which starts before you make the purchase. Just my .02.

 

There are two items which you mentioned that I believe(along w/others here) contributed to your bad experience.
Reserves say to me, "The person wants too much for it" or "whyis their item so special that they don't want to tell you what they want forit". Why not just set your price and let it go from there? Start it out onauction for what you would like to get for it and let it go from there or use a"buy it now or best offer". On the one listing you took it personalthat someone offered you a low price, which you cannot do. Set the "minimum price" on the best offer and you don't have to take the time to weed outthe lower offers. I buy and sell a lot of coins on eBay. Coins I buy are usually auctions or buyit now, I hardly ever bid on reserve auctions.
When I sell, if I need togenerate cash I will set the auction lower than I would like to get for it anddeal with what it goes for. Sometimes starting items low on auction, they gofor more money than I had them for sale as a buy it now. Otherwise, i just set them on buy it now with best offer higher than I would take and see what happens.

 

I totally agree that ebay has become a loser for many sellers. I ran a bunch of details graded nice type coins in NGC and PCGS holders and I lost over 50% of my initial investment. Yes, if you put a reserve price in you may not get buyers, but you will do better in the long run with reserves to protect your investment. If you are selling on ebay you are doing it for a reason to get reasonable offers, not as a charity. Numerically graded coins can do well but the images have to be good.

 

I hear ya foghorn, and I've read this thread with interest. I only recently started selling coins on the 'Bay, weeding out my low grade stuff. Most of my "junk" silver sells for 10%-30% above melt. I was so surprised when one auction sold for TOO much, I posted a thread about it:

http://www.cointalk.com/t214660/

 

The problem I have with eBay is people wanting way too much for certain coins. $6-$8 for an unc Roosevelt dime is ridiculous for common years. Yet they relist the heck out of them, never selling. It's been hard to put together a set because you basically have to wait for it to come along in an auction, as Buy it nows are way too high. Even then the auctions sometimes get carried away. There is one seller on there "mcvanderstien" or something, that lists his Un roosevelt dimes at 3.99 each. Good photos, but then another $3 for shipping, your paying $7 out the door. Way too much, and the semi key/keys he list always bring way beyond book value.

I've noticed that the better the picture, the better the price. So I've learned to bid on auctions with poor photos but yet just enough detail to spot any damage.

 

I liked your post - thanks for the insight. I just spent a bunch buying part of my father's collection (part he gave me, part was his retirement investment - that part), and buying other family member's old coin collections. My goal was to cherry-pick what worked with my collection, then sell the rest. I anticipated it would be unpleasant, and that I would take a hit, but it's good to get your perspective. I've never sold coins on eBay - other stuff, but not coins. I'm quite nervous.

 

I've hear a quote about our democratic form of government (paraphrasing here): it's the worst form of government - except for every other form of government.

eBay is the same I've heard - it's a poor option - except for every option.

 

I think the "no listing fee" policy on eBay is a terrible idea. It removes any disincentive for people to do what you describe. If it cost something, even a small amount, each time they relisted, they might think twice about doing it again and again without ever dropping the price.

Which raises the obvious question -- why don't I list a bunch of stuff at inflated prices, and just let it sit indefinitely (or until some misguided person meets my asking price)? Inertia, I guess.

 

This has been a great discussion here. 99% of the time, I'm the buyer on ebay so I have plenty of my own insight from that perspective. I agree that as a seller, I can't trust people to bid on stuff reasonably without having a reserve. I'm not going to give something away and then get hammered on fees just to say I sold something. The problem is, you could list the same item 5 different weeks and get 5 different final sale prices depending on who's watching. Maybe you list on bad week and lose out?
Sometimes I'll list at .99 just to generate interest. Everybody will check out something listed cheap even if there is a reserve. People say they're scared away by them but I'm not. I'm almost more interested and have no fear bidding on something with a reserve. I'll let the auction play out and if we don't meet it, and I want the item, I have contacted the seller to see what the reserve was. Sometimes work out a deal on it in the end.
Ebay charges to use reserves because they want items selling no matter what the price. If you list something for free, take up their server space for 7 days and then it doesn't sell, they don't make any money. So they try to steer people away from it by charging for it. This doesn't mean not using one is always in your best interest.
Probably the best bet is to just list something for the minimum you will accept and be done with it.

Personally, I like the best offer option too. Some people are very generous, others I don't know why they even use it. I like making offers.