Children's clothing, equipment and toys are the most common items you'll find at garage sales. It's a huge market. People spend BILLIONS of dollars each year to clothe, entertain and care for their infants and small children. Kids outgrow these items FAST. Many of you who have children know that you don't end up using half the stuff you bought and the rest of it stays in pretty darn good shape considering the rate that young children outgrow things. Why not sell things that are easy to find? There are countless stay at home mom's out there (and women who would like to be a SAHM if they can afford it) who are looking to contribute to the family finance's. This is the perfect gig for them in my opinion. It's a profitable and versatile market. You could just stick to selling baby clothes and do great or you can branch out into vintage toys which are also easy to find at thrift stores and garage sales and can really be a lot of fun to sell. The demand for vintage toys is HUGE; millions of people search on eBay every day in the Toys & Hobbies category. eBayers are buying anything from classic board games to vintage Fisher Price dollhouses to plush Care Bears. I have to tell you that in doing my research I discovered that Plush Care Bears were selling for $9.99 to $19.99 on eBay right now! This kind of killed me since my wife and I donated two huge garbage bags of Care Bears several months ago when we cleaned out my daughter's room now that she's a "tween". We probably donated $300 worth of Care Bears. And since we donate to the local thrift store which supports a charity, some lucky eBayer very likely cashed in on my mistake. That's the beauty of this business though. If you know what to look for there can be goldmines around every corner. I interviewed my sister-in-law Deanna for this article as she is the ultimate guru in this department and has literally paid down her mortgage and paid off her car loans by reselling children's clothing and toys. Here's her advice to you: (Note: Even if you aren't interested in selling children's items, Deanna's advice here is really good for anyone looking to sell on eBay.) Deanna in California: It all started for me as I tirelessly researched alternative income options that would allow me to stay at home with my infant daughter. I was really lucky in that the company that I worked for at the time was being sold and I was retained to help with the transition for three months. Basically, we had nothing to do after the first few weeks and so I spent my time on eBay and message boards trying to learn as much as I could about selling children's items. I felt like it was my best bet to make enough money so that I would not have to find another job after the transition period ended. I'm not going to lie to you; it took a lot of trial and error to get where I am today, nearly 8 years later. But, it's my sincere hope that with all the information compiled within this book that you'll be able to bypass the learning curve that so many of us eBayers endured when we first started. So much of your success really depends on how quickly you can move merchandise. This means buying a lot of merchandise and selling a lot of merchandise. If you want to Net (this means money you made AFTER your expenses) $2,500 a month which I think is a reasonable goal, you need to average a PROFIT (what you made AFTER the cost of the actual item. EXAMPLE: You bought a Fisher Price dollhouse at a garage sale for $5, it sold on eBay for $37, you profited $32 and after fees, probably closer to $25 - $27) of $25 per item and sell 100 items a month. 100 SOLD Items a Month @$25 Profit = $2,500 Per Month in Extra Income! Not every item you list on eBay is going to sell the first time around. You should aim to list 125 - 150 items a month. This amounts to roughly 35 items a week to procure (i.e. FIND), take photographs, and list on eBay. To break it down even further, this amounts to listing 8-9 items per day. See how important it is to treat this like a business?! I recommend listing 4 days a week and taking the fifth day for shopping/procuring of new items to sell. I now do three times the volume I mentioned above and it's helped my family tremendously but I'm also extremely organized and efficient with my time and I get a lot of help from my family. I truly believe that anyone can do what I'm doing; they just have to put in the effort and realize it's not a get rich quick scheme but it is a very legitimate way of earning an income without working a traditional job. It's vital to strategize. I check Craigslist ads for garage sales I want to hit, I check community bulletin boards, websites and flyers for upcoming rummage sales and I know which days my local thrift stores put out new merchandise. I "route" my day based on these things and try not to backtrack in order to save on gas. Remember, it's important to check eBay Pulse regularly as well as Completed Listings to see what is hot. Deanna's list of HOT Items to look for when scouring garage sales and thrift stores is included in my latest EBook, Make Money Now, How Average Americans are Beating this Economy, Making Great Money Online and How You Can Too! Check it out at: http://www.ihavebeenserved.com/MakeMoneyNow.html Jay Johnson is a debtor advocate and recently launched WoodDuckEBooks. Check his NEW EBook, Make Money Now, How Average Americans are Making Great Money Online and How YOU Can Too! at http://www.ihavebeenserved.com/MakeMoneyNow.html Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/7055192
