1st time seller on ebay - advice?

worto03

Hia,

I've been using ebay for a couple of years & feedback of about 50 (all good) now I'm about to sell for the first time basically anything I can find round the house which I don't need any more & more importantly my GF's car.

My main question was when should I time my auction to end? I assume 4:00am for instance is a bad time, do you guys end auctions on evenings after work or weekends or doesn't it make much diference?

If you have any advice for the car advert it would be much appriciated too.

Thanks for any advice,
worto.

smartie1976

My advice would be to have a look at other car ads for the make and model.

Look at the descrip and see if you think you would buy that car based on what they tell you.

Put as much info in your advert as possible - full service history (if applicable)
All the good stuff in the car (elec windows, age, engine size etc).
Try to take pictures of any dints/scratches - things a potential customer would want to know about. (If you use AUCTIVA which is free to register for you can list up to 25 photos and not pay for them - useful as car ads should have lots of pics)
Offer all customers chance to come and see the car before auction end.
Do not show your REG on the advert. If people are serious and want to do an HPI check then they should ask you - welcome any questions, and publish them in the advert if they are pertinent.

soolin

i'll just state the obvious I think....DON'T take paypal for a car, cash on collection is probably best.

Soo

Hintza

Make sure folk can contact you about the car easily. If you don't want a phone number in the ad offer to send it if anyone asks. Personally I would try and get a few of your smaller bits and bobs listed and away first just to get the hang of listing etc..

Loads of photos for the car!!

Contains_Mild_Peril

With cars, I don't think it matters enormously what time or day you end the auction, since people will be likely to have a good idea of what they're looking for and relatively few items will fit their criteria, so they'll see it anyway. It may be best to end on a Friday to give your buyer the weekend to come and collect and pay for the car, since they may be travelling from a distance away.
For ordinary items which you plan to post, I think it's best to avoid about 4:30-6:45pm on weekdays, when a lot of potential customers are on their way home from work. I tend to have my listings end on weekday evenings, or Sunday afternoon-evening.

amazamum

Hi,congratulations on thinking about your first sale.
I buy and sell on Ebay,mainly things around the house and find that if I start a sale on a Thursday and let it run for 10 days you get 2 weekends of viewings(auction will end on a sunday).
I find the best time to list is about 8-9pm so that the listing ends the same time and people are normally at their computers after getting the kids to bed.
Go through the compleated listings for the items you are selling and see what price they have been selling for and what catagory they are listed in(top of the page),this will give you a better idea on what price to start them at and an average for postal prices.
Not sold any cars yet WISH I HAD ONE TO SELL,but good luck.
Ebay can be addictive though or so my OH says as I but nearly everything from them now lol.
Good luck::rolleyes:

worto03

oops I forgot I posted this!

thanks for all the advice, it will be very helpfull!

I need to go and work out what all the options on my digital camera do now!

If the winner of the auction comes & looks at the car then changes thier mind do I then just sell it to the next highest bidder?

It just seems like the right time to start selling as we have a baby on the way & thought it would be a good place to buy & sell baby clothes. Apparenty the little monkeys grow pretty quickly!

cheers,
worto.

kriss_boy

If your selling for the first time then it might be stating the obivous but dont leave your buyers feedback until they leave u it first. Otherwise they can threaten you with negative or pull or kinda of cons on you.

Paypal is risky because all a buyer has to do to freeze the money they paid you is click one button with absolutely no justification.
Paypal disputes are the luck of the draw too so i never accept paypal on expensive items.

worto03

oooh I know what I forgot to ask - I read on the 10p listing day that all items scheduled to go online on the day qualify.

does that mean that I can do my adverts at the weekend when I have loads of time but schedule it to go live on say Thursday so it will cover 2 weekends a 10 day auction as suggested above?

Cheers,
worto.

soolin

worto03 wrote:

oooh I know what I forgot to ask - I read on the 10p listing day that all items scheduled to go online on the day qualify.

does that mean that I can do my adverts at the weekend when I have loads of time but schedule it to go live on say Thursday so it will cover 2 weekends a 10 day auction as suggested above?

Cheers,
worto.

No, They have to go live on Monday. What that means is you can do your advert today and have it set to go live on Monday, but you can't do your ad on Monday for a future date.

Soo

worto03

cool, sorry I wasnt very clear I just wanted to know if you could schedule adverts at all not really for the 10p thing. Thats just where I read about go live dates.

What that means is you can do your advert today and have it set to go live on Monday

I think you've cleared it up for me anyway with that bit.

Apart from the car which is excluded anyway most of our stuff will only be cheap to list anyway.

Thanks
worto.