Martin---

I would guess in the $25-$45 range, depending on condition.  That may be a little low, though??

Prufrock wrote:I'm thinking of selling my 6th print OCE books (no box).  The books including reference sheets are in excellent condition with just a small amount of rust beginning to show on the outside.  

Give me your thoughts as to value on ebay?

Thanks
Martin

My first thought would be to sell them individually rather than as a set but post them one after another. Make sure to use the gallery feature. It costs an extra .35c per auction (almost doubling the basic cost). From my recent experience I'd say $20-40 apiece depending upon a few factors and you might want to sell the reference sheets seperately as well.

Make sure to list your auction between 9pm and Midnight EST. 10:30PM is probably the best as it is 7:30 on the west coast allowing people to be home from work and not too late on the East Coast for them to be in bed.

Make your sale is open to as many countries as you feel comfortable selling to, but be careful about places where you cannot track the package especially if you accept paypal or credit cards.

Accept paypal and money orders are okay, though only USPS money orders are completely safe. Don't accept personal checks. Make sure that paypal customers have confirmed addresses.

Personally I find selling during the week is better than selling on the weekends. Less competition so the listings are clogged with items.

I mention all this because I believe it affects the value of what you are selling. The more bidders you can get the more money you will get for your items.

Prufrock wrote:Jason,

Thanks for the advice.  Much needed as this will be my first auction.


Martin

I've only recently gotten back into selling on ebay, and now that my classes start this monday I'm slowing down to a crawl again.

Ebay offers lots of frills for auctions. The only one I find worth the money is the gallery and sometimes the extra photos.

I normally run a 7 day auction because it is the default setting. I don't think a longer auction will do much better.

I like to check to see if other people are selling what I am selling. This has saved me from posting items that have no or little chance of doing well.

I always ask a price I wouldn't mind getting. You may want to run a reserve price auction ( personally I don't care for those as a bidder) and I never run a .99c starting price auction (it saves you 20c) but sometimes the .99c is all you get. Make sure you check the fees before listing. An auction starting at 9.99 costs .40c an auction at $10 costs .60c or more. I normally start all my auctions at $9.99

Make sure to post here in the classifieds and if you belong to other sites that allow posts about ebay listings make sure to post there as well.

Make your listing as interesting as possible. Formcritic recently posted here about his Dragon Mag collection especially iussue #39. For me that history makes his collection much more valuable than a generic collection without character or history. This isn't true for some buyers but it couldn't hurt. (As long as you make a section of your description contain the basic clear information then in a seperate section add some history of your books if you feel like it). My own listings are pretty much bare bones.

Make sure you have your shipping costs defined. Get a shipping weight beforehand or guesstimate so bidders will know or can use the calculation program to work out the cost of shipping.

Communicate with your potential bidders. If they ask a question make sure to answer it. After the auction make sure to email them when you recieve their payment and when you send the package. Make sure to ship with tracking (.75c for delivery confirmation) offer insurance if the want it and will pay for it (but insurance is an absolute waste of money with the USPS while tracking is a neccessity for sellers since it proves you shipped the item and the customer can follow the progress.  (I also follow the progress and let customers know if the package has been "attempted to be delivered" and email the customer to contact their local post office, otherwise the package gets returned and trouble ensues).

Ship in a box or with cardboard (and make sure to include the weight of packaging when you estimate shipping cost). Make sure to write 'Please! Do Not Bend! on packages that are not boxed and 'Fragile' on boxes that aren't solid. Use the cheapest, lightest packing material. A wedge of cardboard from corner to corner is good (cut from a solid cradboard box) or scrunched up newpaper. Lightweight plastic or packing peanuts. Just make sure the weight is properly taken into account for shipping costs (becuase they have gotten pretty high).

Probably more info than you need but these auctions can be smooth or a big pain depending on how prepared you are to run them.