Ebay is my side hustle. If you had asked me a couple of years ago, I would have easily said my side hustle was blogging, but time and personal decisions have changed that. I still love blogging and sometimes do still accept paid blogging jobs, but I’ve also become more selective over blogging assignments that I accept. I greatly missed the extra income from blogging, and when I was home for three months recovering from heart surgery, it dawned on me that we had so much extra stuff in our home that needed to be sold or donated, so I decided to try my hand at selling consistently on Ebay.
I’ve been a member of Ebay since 1999, so this year marks 19 years. I’ve bought a ton of things there, especially hard to find items. I have also casually sold things here and there over those 19 years, but never listed things for sale consistently. I finally decided that I would put a few things up for sale and see how they did.
I did OK selling for a little while, but things eventually slowed down when I had to return to work full time. I had to get used to getting back into my routine and getting used to my new normal after surgery. This took some time, and it would be almost another year before I started my Ebay side hustle again. This year when summer rolled around, I became even more dedicated to selling on Ebay to help bring in some extra money for paying those medical bills that never seem to go away now.
I began listing in May and by the time school started back in August, I had $800 in sales on Ebay. This may sound like quite a bit of money, and it is, but then you have to factor in taxes, Ebay selling fees, and shipping supplies. Even still, making those sales and bringing in a little extra cash was a great feeling! It gave me an added purpose, just like my blogging does, and it just lit a fire inside me to keep going.
I have over 100 items listed on Ebay now. I’m adding more to it daily and this has also increased my sales, which makes sense. Is it easy? Hardly. Finding items to sell, photographing items, and listing them takes quite a lot of time. It has definitely required lots of patience. It can get so easy to become discouraged when sales are slow. However, I’m discovering that everything eventually sells, even if it takes a few months.
I’m so excited about my new side hustle and I’ll be documenting my progress with Ebay here on my blog as time goes on. Do you sell on Ebay? If so, I’d love to hear about your experiences in the comments.
Pictures: HeatherPaque & TheDigitalWay
eBay is such a great opportunity as far as supplementing income.
I am a full-time reseller, so a lot of the love is lost. It is refreshing to read this point of view again, because I remember the joy I had before putting too many eggs in my eBay basket.
I am very jealous of your blog. Your hard work shows.
Good luck with everything
Thank you! You are too kind! I had a LOT of help with my blog design. I’m definitely not technical. I greatly admire YOU for taking a huge leap of faith to go full-time reselling. I’d love to do that, but I’m definitely not ready yet sales-wise and I’m also just really scared! I’ll be following along with your progress. I know things will pick up soon. If I’ve learned anything about Ebay…it just ebbs and flows.