Posted on 27 October 2005 by Gary H
When most people think about selling magazines on eBay they talk about old vintage magazines published prior to the 1930s or 1940s. There is a definite market for this type of magazine but they aren’t something you will frequently find at garage/yard sales or at small local flea markets.
The boxes or piles of magazine most frequently seen at garage sales are usually recent issues published in the last 10 to 20 years. Many of these have little or no real value, but if you know what to look for you can make a lot of money buying these recent magazines at garage sales and flea markets and selling them on eBay.
The ones that deserve your attention are those published in the last 20 to 30 years for small, targeted groups of readers.
Here’s a list to get you started:
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Posted on 26 October 2005 by Gary H
Two weeks ago in Why Most People Will Never Be Successful On eBay I talked about the bad advice that’s so prevalent on many eBay related, and other, discussion forums.
Below is a sampling of advice concerning how to become successful on eBay:
“Aim for a 10% profit on everything you sell…..”
“…but if you can double your money on your items that do sell you’ll do just fine.”
“If you make $10 on each auction that ends successfully then you will be on your way to success.”
“List all your auctions with a $.99 starting bid and add $2 to the shipping costs as a handling fee.”
I can guarantee you that someone taking any of that kind of advice won’t be selling on eBay a year from now. Most won’t be around six months from now. I’ll also guarantee you that if the people giving the advice were making any money on eBay it amounted to peanuts.
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Posted on 24 October 2005 by Gary H
Nineteen of the twenty-six items I had listed on eBay ended successfully earlier this evening for a sell through rate of 73%.
The only surprise in the auction was the ANZA Brand coffee tin which didn’t get an opening bid. I’d been confident that this would have brought somewhere in the $30 range. I’ll re-list it in two or three weeks and see what happens then.
I was a little disappointed withe the two Marlboro cookbooks that sold for $9.95 each. Normally I get between $15 and $25 for these when I find them.
Final prices on everything else that sold were pretty much in the range I’d expected them to end up in.
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Posted on 22 October 2005 by Gary H
When I walked out the door this morning everything was white and there were huge snowflakes drifting down. Actually it was pretty, but not ideal weather for garage sales.
There were two sales that began today. One of these advertised “antiques, collectibles, vintage clothing, UND pottery…..” The two pieces of UND pottery each had some of the prettiest cracks and chips I’ve seen in a long time.
Apparently the antiques and collectibles were the largest number of brass pieces made in India I’ve seen in a long time. There had to have been at least 100 of them.
Neither sale produced anything worth buying so the only bright spot of the day was that it warmed up enough by early afternoon to melt all the snow.
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Posted on 21 October 2005 by Gary H
The AAUW book sale this morning was a huge disappointment. As long as I’ve been attending these sales their pricing structure for books has always been $1 for hardcovers, $.50 for paperbacks and $.25 for children’s books.
This year they totally changed their pricing and today it was:
- Hardcover copyrighted prior to 1984 - $1.50
- Hardcover copyrighted 1985-1990 - $2.00
- Hardcover copyrighted 1991-1995 - $3.00
- Hardcover copyrighted 1996-2002 - $5.00
- Hardcover copyrighted 2003-2005 - $7.00
- Large soft cover (whatever that is) - $2.00
- Small soft cover - $3.00
- Children’s books - $.50
Their new pricing structure really limits the number of books someone can buy for resale and there were quite a few people there with smoke coming out of their ears.
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Posted on 20 October 2005 by Gary H
There were only two garage sales in today’s paper, but one of them was an estate sale that sounded as if it would have a lot of interesting stuff.
As is often the case, the sale didn’t come close to living up to it’s advertising and there wasn’t anything really good being sold except for a beautiful oak secretary priced at $250. A great price, but since they are a little difficult to ship, I passed.
The extent of my purchases were:
- 63 pieces of Bootonware pink and blue melmac dinnerware for $5
- A wonderful old book commemorating the engagement of Queen Elizabeth and her “Consort” Philip for $.50 that it seems no one else has been able to get a $.99 opening bid on eBay for
- 6 books about various aspects of North Dakota history
- 15 of the 24 books in Dana Fuller Ross’s “Wagon’s West” series for $3.75
- An early Captain Midnight Adventure book titled “Joyce of the Secret Squadron” for $.50.
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Posted on 19 October 2005 by Gary H
One of the local thrift shops stocks new books every Wednesday morning and if I’m in town I always stop by at 10:00 when they open.
This morning’s visit netted a copy of “Custer’s Indian Battles” for $.50; “Echoes From The Beat” for $1; “The Student’s Dictionary Of Anglo-Saxon” for $1; “This History Of The 31st Infantry Division” for $1; and two Marlboro cookbooks for $1 each.
When I left the thrift shop I decided to stop at the one antique mall in Grand Forks. There hadn’t been any garage sales advertised in this morning’s paper, but on the way to the antique mall I spotted a small sign pointing down an alley that said “Garage Sale” so I followed it.
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Posted on 18 October 2005 by Gary H
Yesterday morning Arlene and I left Grand Forks at 8:30 AM for Friends Of The Library (FOL) book sale in the small town of Fosston, Mn. About a week ago I’d stumbled across an ad for it while looking for information about an AAUW in another area of Minnesota.
I was a little leery about a 150 mile round trip to a FOL sale in a town of less than 1500 people, but it was a nice sunny fall day so Arlene decided that we were going to make the trip. We were there when the doors opened and it turned out to be a pleasant surprise.
I was surprised to find 21 8 foot banquet tables filled with books with more books in boxes underneath along with two card tables billed with video tapes and audio books. Even more surprising was that everything was donated - not a single ex-library book in sight.
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Posted on 17 October 2005 by Gary H
The auctions for all the items I bought at estate and garage sales a week ago Saturday ended yesterday with some surprises and some disappointments.
They got off to a bad start due a mistake I made when listing the items. I messed up when scheduling when the auction management service I use should launch these auctions. I’d intended them to launch at 9:45 PM on Tuesday but wasn’t paying attention and scheduled them for 9:45 AM. I didn’t catch the error until the launch notices began showing up in my mail box.
How much this affected the outcome I’ll never know, but I’m confident that 7:45 AM on a Sunday morning isn’t the optimal time for ending an auction on the west coast.
Overall though, my investment of $65 in inventory didn’t fare too badly.
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Posted on 10 October 2005 by Gary H
When I checked the local paper’s web site Friday night before going to bed I found 13 garage sales scheduled to start on Saturday in Grand Forks. Along with these, there were 3 estate garage sales advertised in small towns around Grand Forks.
Since all three estate sales were in small towns between 45 and 55 miles from Grand Forks I decided there might be less competition and better pickings if I opted for them rather than local garage sales.
I left home at 6:45 Saturday morning for the 55 mile drive to the first sale that began at 8:00. That sale produced a 1927 James Way catalog for $1, an early Boy Scout composition book for $1, a cardboard Halloween candy bag for $3, and a Northwestern Hytest aspirin tin (probably one of the three best acquisitions of the day) and a Watkins aspirin tin without price tag that they told me I could have for nothing.
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