[Tia Maria]

I want some advice from all those who have sold on Trade-Me. I've bought a few things, but haven't attempted to sell yet.

So if I list a few items perhaps you could tell me the best way to market them. Do you use reserves? Is a photo essential? How do you work out P&P in advance? Any other tips to getting the best price....

1) Claw Foot Bath

2) Moses Basket

3) Pregnancy clothes

4) Large office style desk

Cheers

Tia

[jo-and-jeff]

Photos: I highly recommend including a photo. Studies done on eBay show that items with photos sell more often and for higher average prices than similar items without photos. As a frequent eBay buyer, I tend to be very hesitant and unlikely to buy if I can't see what I'm buying.

Title: Be sure that your title is fairly descriptive, i.e. "King Tie-down Electric Blanket (light blue)" instead of just "Electric Blanket". A non-descriptive title, when paired with no photo, makes the item an almost guaranteed non-seller.

Descriptions: Also, take some time with your descriptions, and do a good job of "selling" the item's desirable qualities. The more unique and individual -- or complex -- the item is, the more detailed your description should be. Include all of the following which are applicable: Quantity
Colour(s)
Size(s)
Brand(s)
Year bought or made, or number of years used
Condition of item(s), including any damage, wear, or flaws
Reason you are selling, if it's positive (my child outgrew it, my new house already has one, it won't fit in my new house, I got married and it's a duplicate, etc.); this will help reassure the buyer that you're not selling it because it's a dud.
Postage/Shipping: eBay makes it much easier than TradeMe to include the postage costs up front, so most TradeMe items don't include this in their description. Unless I am able to contact a seller ahead of time and get the postage cost, I won't buy an item, because after I've committed to buying it they can pretty much charge me whatever they wish. Some buyers will not make the effort to find out postage, they just won't buy the item. I highly recommend getting the items all packed up (but not sealed), taken to the Post Office to determine the shipping cost (or at least a guesstimate), then placed up for auction with the description including the shipping cost. Remember to include the cost of the box or other packing materials, if you don't just have them lying around the house and have to buy them. In the case of your tub and desk (items prohibitively large for shipping) you might offer delivery in the Auckland area for a set fee (taking your petrol costs into account), and/or just saying that these items are pick-up only and not charging shipping for them.

Reserves: In general, I don't like these, and I think items with Reserves often get lots of bids but don't sell because the bidders are hoping to pick it up cheap. Non-reserve items priced at the lowest amount the seller is willing to take get less bids, but the bidders are more serious about buying for the price you want to charge. I personally prefer not using Reserves.

I hope that this information is helpful to you!

Jo

[jubjub]

Post can be worked out here:- http://www.nzpost.co.nz/Cultures/en-NZ/Personal/SendingWithinNZ/, although personally I find it as clear as mud, and have undercharged a couple of people! To avoid undercharging you can buy prepaid bags from the post office, packaging and postage in one!

Photos, yes they are pretty much essential, I occasionally read the trade me message boards, and thats a big bugbear to buyers, bad or non existent photos.

There does seem to be a good market for baby/pregnancy stuff, with regards to clothes folks will probably ask questions on the auction and ask you to measure stuff, cos as we all know no two sizes are the same from shop to shop...

Good luck

Edited, Jo/Jeff posted at the same time and said it much better than me!

[Tia Maria]

Jo/Jeff - Thanks for all that info! I'll probably try to sell the bath first and see how that goes. It just needs a quick wash down and I'll wait for a sunny day to take the photo, as its currently sitting in our garden. I guess if I don't get any takers I can probably plant it up with tomatoes!

Jub Jub - I had a quick look at the link, but I think I'll check it out when I've got a few quiet moments ie when the baby isn't screaming the place down and my 3 year old doesn't have a jigsaw emergency!

Cheers

Tia

[sarahw]

Jo & Jeff's response is v. good.

Just a couple more pointers:

If you don't want to ship a particular item - especially for a large item such as the bath, put on there 'buyer to collect only' in both the text & on the shipment section - we've found that useful & if someone wants something enough they'll hire a van for it.

Generally, I don't bother to pack things before I sell them because people sometimes collect - even small items & you can save the packing materials.

The only other word of caution is really do use the website from NZ post since its accurate - I have had 3 occassions where I have taken an item (packed) and asked for a quote on postage to my local NZ Post office, when I've gone to post it a day or 2 later its been more expensive than the quote - no explanation & I've lost money on my sale!! Make sure if you're taking something to your NZ Post office that they know what they're doing before you get a quote!

It is quite addictive - my hubby says that one day he's going to come home & all we'll have is some cardboard boxes to sit on because I'll have sold everything from under him!!

[Tia Maria]

Just wanted to say thanks guys! I just sold my first item. I started off small and made a grand total of $5! I checked the auctions progress an embarrassing amount of times and all your tips must have helped as I got 6 bids.

I can now add a top tip of my own, which is to make good use of the 'expired listings' search, which you can find under 'more options'. You can look at what did and didn't sell, get an idea of a price and market your auction in a similar fashion to the items that achieved top price.

Sarah W wrote:

It is quite addictive - my hubby says that one day he's going to come home & all we'll have is some cardboard boxes to sit on because I'll have sold everything from under him!!

My OH is also in fear also, as I'm already running my second auction of baby stuff. I think he's hiding all his computer games after I noticed they fetched a pretty good price!

Cheers

Tia

[Tia Maria]

Jub Jub, I did try to give you reputation for your help, but apparently I need to spread it about a bit more!

So I'm sending you :cheers instead. And as I never use smilies this is possibly an even greater honour!

Cheers

Tia

PS I bet you would have rather had 10% of whatever I made!

[nippa&pippa]

Been looking at trade me, off and on for baby equipments/clothes etc. I am bit surprised on there are some items are poor quality they are trying to selling?????? :laugh How you know some of stuff are really good conditions? some photos are not good to see it properly :o

[jubjub]

Yeah, the quality thing is a bit of a risk, but you can ask to go see it first, by asking a question on the auction, if its a large item, most folks are happy for you to do that.

Tia, well done, hope you get more stuff sold soon! I have not done any for ages.....

[sarahw]

Well done!! Last thing I bought was a baby carrier (one of those you strap around you) - was in great condition & I only wanted it for the airport when we went on hols so I can re-sell at the same price & have used it for free (or even make a little profit!) Haven't sold anything in ages but I'm sure we're due another few auctions to make space in the house!

[Mexican in NZ]

My OH is selling everything as we are moving down to Welly to look for house in Carterton...yes Avalon i will b knocking ur door very soon, hahahaha :laugh no dont worry i am not like my stalker :p
So if u want to buy something from us just look for the user name of tuffa1987 yes my hubby loooves reggae !
Ok guys c u later alligator!
Adriana and Anton

[shakyle2906]

Has anyone rented a house through Trade Me ??

We are currently in Uk, moving over end of March.

I confess to being a manic Ebay seller, have sold no end of stuff over past year!

I have looked on Trade me and there seems to be loads of properties for rent, some with good offers of furniture, etc

This is a site i hope to look into further once we move over, as they seem a lot more 'in our price range' and offer certain furniture, in relation to residential lettings

Any advice ??

Sharon

[Trigirl]

you don't rent "through" trademe as such. its just an advertising tool for people (and companies) trying to rent out property - you ring the number given and then go to see it and arrange the paperwork entirely independently of the trademe site. in fact its normally the same properties that are in the estate agents windows and in the newspaper - you do get the odd one thats only advertised through trademe but its pretty rare. by the way its pretty normal for rentals over here to come with whiteware etc.

[Smiler]

Hi Sharon

Mandy is right, you don't rent through TM. I found all three of our rentals since we've been here on TM though. The first 2 through agents that didn't have shops, they just advertised on TM and the last one through a private landlord, again on TM.

I use it because it's convenient for me and when we first got here we didn't want to be touring lots of agencies, who always wanted your details before telling you of any properties. So we printed off the info from TM, did drive bys and then called if we liked the place.

We looked at fully furnished, part and empty properties to get an idea of rent prices etc too. In the end we went over our budget, it was a fab place and we enjoyed our time there.

Most rentals come with whiteware, fridge/freezer, cooker and usually a washing machine and dishwasher too.

[Moorf]

We BOUGHT this house on TradeMe!! It's brill!

[Tia Maria]

I've found this book really useful:

Trade Me Success Secrets - Michael Carney

Worth buying if you're going to a do a lot of selling, or get it from the library if you're only going to sell a few items.

Sam B - any bids yet? :)

Cheers

Tia

[Sam B]

Lots of watchers, but only a few bids. I only check about 80 times a day, so I may have missed something in the last 5 minutes!