This is the five part of Oren’s series on reselling products for profit. You can view his site (where he highlights good deal and other useful information) here and you can check out the other parts of the series as well.
- Part 1 – Pros and Cons of Reselling
- Part 2 – Â Getting Price Down as low as Possible
- Part 3- Sourcing Deals
- Part 4 – Staples
After Staples, eBay is probably my next favorite site for sourcing deals.
Contents
Finding Good Deals on eBay
There are lots of ways to find deals on eBay.  You can check on eBay, including their Daily Deals, Trending Deals, Editor’s Picks or randomly searching for products (one reader does this a lot, very profitably).  Another method is to set an alert with Slickdeals for eBay deals to get an email into your inbox when a deal hits.
Great Pricing – Often without Sales Tax
eBay has tons of sellers and often there is very competitive pricing for desirable items like iPads and the like. Â The way eBay works is that depending on where the location of the seller is, often that determines whether you will be charged sales tax. Â If the seller is from your state you can expect to pay sales tax, if they are not from your state, you will likely not have sales tax. Â This is not always true but it is a good rule of thumb. Â An extra 5-10%, depending on your sales tax rate can have a big impact on your bottom line.
I’m not an accountant and I won’t pretend to speak with authority about the ramifications of not paying sales tax. Â Please talk to an accountant about that.
eBay Bucks
eBay has a very nice loyalty program called eBay Bucks. Â You earn 2% in eBay Bucks on almost every purchase (eBay Gift Cards is the major exclusion for most people). Â You can earn a maximum of $500 in every quarter and they can be used the following quarter. Â Merchandise resellers usually max out their eBay accounts well before the quarter ends, especially with electronics.
 Increased eBay Bucks
eBay has a relatively regular schedule of increasing the amount of eBay Bucks you will earn.  This increase lasts for 2 days.  The targeted increase usually comes once a week for 2 days except during the month when you can redeem eBay Bucks.  Check out this post for more details and for specific days of the month to expect an increase.
During the increased eBay Bucks times you can earn 2x, 3x, 4x or even 5x the regular amount. Â That’s 4%, 6%, 8% or 10% in eBay Bucks. Â If you earn an extra 10% in eBay Bucks, it gets much, much easier to find deals.
Shopping portals
Shopping portals for eBay purchases are typically not as lucrative as other merchants but they are still helpful.  It usually stays in the range of 1-2% or 1-3x miles (with temporary exceptions – see here and here).
You can always check the current rates from Cashback Monitor.
eBay Gift Cards – Target, Chase Ink, Fuel Points
eBay gift cards are one of the most important reasons that reselling on Amazon is super profitable.
You can regularly buy eBay gift cards for 5% off from Target with a Target RedCard. In addition you can also buy eBay gift cards from certain exchanges and earn 5x Ultimate Rewards points.
Keep in mind that there is a maximum use of $5,000 of eBay Gift Cards per rolling 180 days. Â Also, sometimes there is a maximum of 5, 7, 8 or 9 eBay Gift Cards that you can use in one transaction before the transaction times out. Â Try to stick with $100+ denominations.
You can check your current eBay Gift Card usage with this trick from Noah of Money Metagames.
Conclusion
eBay is a great place to source for reselling. Â Even if you find the same price on eBay as elsewhere, eBay can be far more lucrative when you combine all the ways to save.
Thanks again to Oren for this useful post, make sure you visit his site and follow him on Twitter as well.
