A recent thread on failing to make money on eBay transactions piqued my interest, so I decided to do a little experiment. I paid a vist to my LCS, picked up three low grade SLQ's (and one had damage to the reverse, which I highlighted in my description) for $6.25 each. That's about a dollar over melt. I listed them as a single lot on eBay, with a $5 opening bid and free shipping. Here are the coins: My $18.75 investment sold for $39.00. After eBay and PayPal take their cut, plus the free shipping, I still have a nice little profit. I think there's money to be made, it's just how you go about doing it.
I agree. There's money to be made. One way to stack the deck in your favor; buy in bulk, sell as individual items. Lots of grunt work involved, but if I've done it, almost anyone can.
You should try the same experiment, except list them individually? No doubt about it there's money to be made as long as you can keep the expenses low.
Something interesting on making money from coins. Well, maybe not really making money but selling something for little more than I got for. Funny thing, the Chile current bimetallic 500 pesos is worth a aprox. 1 dollar. These type coins are not made in uncirculated sets or something. So, I always look out for the new coins in rolls in supermarket cash registers and others. I travel a lot for work and always take few with. I have sold them all in coin shops for 3 dollars. They are worth by catalog BU 6.5 dollars. Imagine that.
I think when selling low grade junk silver, it's always best to sell in small "lots" of three to six coins, start bidding low (which seems to generate bidding interest) and offer free shipping. If I listed these three coins seperately, I don't believe they would have sold for anywhere near that price... more than likely in the $8 to $10 range each, and after expenses I would have realized no profit, and more than likely a loss.
You're right about small lots. Postage is the killer. It only costs 20c more to ship 3 quarters than to ship just one (66c for a 2-ounce letter, 46c for a 1-ounce letter). If you distribute them right between light filler cards, the envelope will still be flexible, and you will not fall into the expensive non-machinable trap.
Impressive result for this one lot. But do you think you'll have the same impact if you sold 10-20 lots all ending within an hour?
The sad thing is that if the buyer came here to ask if he got a good deal, a bunch of people would likely jump on the bandwagon calling the seller a "thief", even though the coins were described honestly and sold in a fair auction-style listing. Regardless of if the price was reasonable or not, the buyer made a decision as to what they were willing to pay, so they only have themselves to blame if they later regret it. Good experiment and example, sir.
Even if you wanted to print the postage and put them in a bubble mailer $1.69 would cover the 3 coins with tracking. Also, Paypal charges 2.9% + .30 per transaction, so on smaller transactions with lower profit margins the additional .30c will start to make a difference.
I sold a lot of average silver coins recently because I was selling them for a friend. I would say your results were above average. I sold coins both singly and in lots. The price for lots tended to be about the same as the total of what the individual coins sold for, which surprised me because I thought people would want to save on shipping and pay more for the lots. For the most part people seemed to ignore shipping costs. One thing I can say is that they all sold for a good deal above spot. For example, common date walking liberty halves from the 1940s sold for anything from $13-$18, and the SLQs like you have sold for $7-$9 or so. Also, if you look at the enclosed pictures, the horrible looking 1932 quarter sold for $12, while the rare date 1932 D, which is in better shape besides, sold for the starting price, $50, which is a fraction of the book value. I don't get that.
