Nine Tips For Selling Your Valuable “Junk” Online

For most household items that you can no longer use but that have some useful life remaining, donating them to a charitable organization like a homeless shelter or thrift store can be a lot easier. Of your valuable goods, however, you may like to take the time and effort to sell them online.

Here are some tips to help you maximize the sales proceeds for the items you sell:

1.  Pricing: Before you sell it, look carefully for similar items for sale to see what the fair and reasonable price is.

2.  Big Items: If it is too big to ship, carry or move easily (like an old sofa or a bed) Craigslist.org works great. It is all just an online local classified advertising that is free for most listings. It is not difficult to use. (I generally price things low to get someone with a pickup truck to show up quickly with a friend to haul my old stuff away, saving me the trouble.)

3.  Shipping Efficient Items: If your item is compact and light enough to ship efficiently and especially if it is unlikely to break in transit, you can try eBay. Bay (it.Ly/FSAEQ) listings give you national and international reach for things that you can ship. What you can ship may surprise you.

4.  Cars: There is rather a market for cars on eBay. If your car could be considered rare or collectible, you should certainly consider selling your car on eBay. If your car has graduated to clunker status, just trading it may be the best bet. You can also list cars for sale on Craigslist.org (cheaper and easier than eBay).

5.  Free Stuff: If you’re like me, there are some things that are so big and ugly you’d give them to anyone who’d show up to haul it away. You can list such things as Craigslist.org or Freecycle.org.

6.  Ay: Because eBay tracks feedback and allows both buyers and sellers to rate one another, it is a good idea to buy a few things on-line before you try to sell something so that you can validate your good name. Purchase cheap things; pay promptly. Request feedback if none is provided automatically. Give the seller feedback. Then, sell your least valuable things first and find out to something like a car where feedback would be key.

7.  Racialist: Craigslist is not eBay. There is not any feedback mechanism. Do not agree to anything other than cold, hard cash as payment from anyone from Craigslist. Ever. Do not take things for Craigslist buyers; chances are very good you’d hold them forever. Tell everyone the same thing—the first one to prove up with the cash gets the goods.

8.  Good photos: Whether you are selling an item on Craigslist or eBay, you need good photos. You can get wonderful photos with a cheap camera if you have excellent light. Try taking photos with and without flash, inside and outside and then choose the photos with the truest colors and the sharpest focus.

9.  Don’t Lie: Don’t ever lie about your stuff. The cultural ethic on eBay will punish fibbers harshly. Provide complete and accurate descriptions of your stuff to prevent negative feedback. Remember, on Craigslist, someone who lives in your town will come to your home to provide you with cash; you’d hate to make a tall guy with a pickup truck and a lofty friend mad because you weren’t honest about your stuff.

You can quickly and easily sell your old stuff on-line, converting old junk into cash. You can’t retire on the proceeds, but selling old junk to cash sure beats renting a storage unit to it!