how much ebay income do you make?

olias

OK, slightly lighthearted, don't take it too seriously thread (although I am interested in peoples ideas and perceptions). This is aimed at 1 man band business sellers who predominantly will be selling from home.

Basically, if you sell as a business on ebay, how much profit would you expect to make before you considered you were making a sole living out of it?

I obviously don't expect people to give their actual earnings (unless they want to that is!), rather an idea of what peoples general thoughts are.

£500pm? £1000pm? £1500pm? NMW (assuming a 40hr week)? More than this?

Just curious and I thought it would be interesting to get others thoughts.

Olias

soolin

I have a champage lifestyle (I wish) and would not consider anything full time unless I cleared a minimum of £1500 - £2000 per month. With tax etc that probably equates to around £2500+ per month. For a good living at least double or triple that.

I do not make a sole living off ebay though, I'm far too lazy.

the_lunatic_is_in_my_head

I agree with the above, 2K after tax would pay my bills and leave a small amount left over as a disposable income but it all depends on how much your bills are and how many other people contribute to the household income.

Unless you have a very good margin it's hard to get 24K pure profit without going over the VAT threshold so then you need to increase sales to cover the loss you are now making by paying VAT on your margin.

marie-20

Personally I would need to clear £1,300 per month but I have 3 children and a disabled husband so we get tax credits, DLA and Incap.

I am in a silly bracket of not wanting to make much this year, building up a client base and trying new products etc, as I now get Carers Allowance and Housing Benefit and after being made redundant last month (full time homeworking job for IBM) I'm already well over my tax free allowance. I'll be happy if I manage to clear just under £100 p/w until April '12 and then I want my business to take off and for me to no longer need to draw out any benefits . . . . . my children/family = my responsibility - not everyone elses.

toffe

anything less than £2000p/m after tax and expenses would not, in my opinion be a full time income, thats because i could earn more in they day job i'm qualified in.

but then you have to balance that with, if you could work from home, maybe shorter hours too, would you take a bit less for the lifestyle that working from home provides?

it will be different for everyone depending on how much they earn in their day job and how much they enjoy/hate their day job not to mention what they need per month to pay the bills and how important job security is for them.

i'm lucky in that i'm self employed in my day job too and i can pick and choose when to take work on and when not too, this allows me to run an online business (though no longer on ebay) and have the flexibility to not work the day job when i don't want or need to, or i'm too busy with my business but if business gets slow or i have the time and fancy the extra money i can take a few jobs on and fit them in around my business.

olias

Interesting.............

In my area (rural) I have struggled to find anything more than minimum wage work. I have recently started an ebay business, and if I could eventually make the equivalent of a NMW for an average 40 hour week then I would rather be doing that in the comfort of my own home working hours as and when I wanted to, than working restrictive hours in all weathers for an uncaring employer.

If I ended up being in the position of earning a few thousand a month, then I would be extremely happy with that.

Interesting comment about the VAT - that hadn't occurred to me. It's difficult for me to gauge my profit margin at this early stage of my business due to the nature of my stock purchasing, but at a guess it's looking at around 30-50% net, so I shouldn't need to worry about VAT with the above scenarios.

Olias

the_lunatic_is_in_my_head

If you're get around 30-50% you're doing very well but remember to add up all the small things like electric, heating in the winter, address labels, pens, tape, printer ink, petrol to the PO, etc and include these in your margins as they soon add up. Also if you're running a business from home any business waste shouldn't be disposed of with your household waste which is another cost most don't think of.

Also be prepared for someone coping what you are doing and margins being cut by pricing wars, if you're making good money there's always some sod who comes along jumps on the bandwagon!

QueenieB

I've closed my ebay shop because of maternity leave, but I was making about £4k a month, with about £2,500 of that profit. I was working an awful lot more than 40 hours a week though.

terra_ferma

QueenieB wrote: »

I've closed my ebay shop because of maternity leave, but I was making about £4k a month, with about £2,500 of that profit. I was working an awful lot more than 40 hours a week though.

That's excellent, you must have found a very good category of items, well done! :T

terra_ferma

olias wrote: »

I have recently started an ebay business, and if I could eventually make the equivalent of a NMW for an average 40 hour week then I would rather be doing that in the comfort of my own home working hours as and when I wanted to, than working restrictive hours in all weathers for an uncaring employer.
Olias

This is one of the reasons why making a decent profit on ebay is so hard nowadays, there are many people who are happy to work for very little money, and their target is earning NMW.
There are so many sellers whose profit margins are very low, maybe they are hobbyist, bored pensioners or stay-at-home mums, or unemployed/disabled people who want to supplement their benefits.
There are many people who are not used to valuing their time much, maybe not used to earning a good wage, so as long as they make a little money they are fine.

Unfortunately this mentality brings margins down for everyone, great for buyers, but not for sellers.
That's why I looked for a niche market where I don't have to compete with people selling at tiny margins.

olias

My margins don't seem to be too bad as I have said. My main problem is that my supply is a bit hit and miss at the moment (not good I know), hence the possibly limited income prospects unless I find more regular sources. Having said that, I understand where you are coming from.

Olias