We all know that there is never enough money. I have spent years thinking about ways to generate some extra money in my spare time, with little effort, any day of the week. I have tried many different things, usually with the same end result, there is no easy way to make money.
Actually, there is one way that is fairly easy to generate extra money in your spare time. In many cases, you can even make money while your sleeping. I have written about using eBay, both for business, and personal finance situations. This Article will focus on my personal finances, and how I generate extra cash almost every day of the week, even while I’m sound asleep.
I started out on eBay one weekend day by setting up my account before I actually had anything in mind to try to sell. I spent a couple of hours browsing the site to see what kinds of things were selling, and for how much. I was amazed to see that you didn’t really need a special inventory of merchandise to start selling and making money.
The majority of stuff people are selling is common items from around almost any home. Surprisingly enough, I learned that not only was this common stuff from around the house selling, but it was selling for in many cases, more than I had paid for it originally.
I was anxious to get started, I had to find out if the people making money on eBay had some kind of special gift or some secret business knowledge allowing them to sell common items as fast as lightning, and for good profits.
As I mentioned, I was not really prepared to start selling because I had not really bought anything to resell for profit. I couldn’t wait to try it. It was about ten o’clock at night, too late to go out to the stores, so I started looking around the house for stuff I didn’t really need anymore, just to try it out.
I ended up listing a pair of Nike sneakers that I wore 2-3 times and didn’t like the way they fit, a watch that I never wore, and some computer disks that I no longer needed, as well as a few other things from around the house.
I watched my listings for hours waiting to see what would happen. I went to bed discouraged, as nothing had sold, not even a single bid was placed. When I woke up, I was surprised to see that someone had bid $20 on those old computer disks that I had no use for.
Over the next couple of days, I sold 6-7 more items for a total of $238, and couldn’t believe how easy it was. At that point I was hooked. I have listed stuff and made good money ever since. My personal online selling has actually grown almost to the level of my online business selling.
I owe this success to the fact that I was able to surf eBay, and see what people were bidding on and for exactly how much at that time. I would recommend any family to give it a try. I have to admit, it does take a few days to learn the full scope of the site, but once you do, the sky is the limit.
A couple simple things to consider that I learned the hard way are, try to sell small items, like jewelry, compact disks, video games, etc. Also, try to use flat rate shipping for these items to simplify the whole shipping process until you get more advanced.
You can get the flat rate shipping boxes free by mail, or pickup at your local post office. It is a good idea to keep one of each of the sizes handy to help you gauge what size box you will need for a specific item when you are listing it, and to charge the correct amount for the shipping of that particular item.
By doing this, you will simplify the shipping process as I mentioned, and avoid losing money due to a simple shipping rate mistake. Remember, this is a great way to clean up some of the things you no longer need around the house, as well as recycle these items back into cash for your family to use to go out for a fun night on the town.
This is one great way I have found to clean up, and leave the money in the bank, in the bank. As of now, I have made an average of 2-3 hundred dollars per weekend doing this. To some families, that’s another pay check.
Good luck to you and your sales on eBay, I’m sure to see you and your family there!
