[OT] First time eBay seller needs advice

[Green Knight]

Well, I finally got an eBay seller's account, so I'm gonna be hocking most if not all of my old stuff. Including my entire Palladium books collection. Though I'm not sure how I should go about it.

Should I sell my books individually? Should I sell them in one set? Or should I split them up into groups? This is what I have, specifically:

Rifts RPG Collector's Edition
Rifts RPG
World Books #1-6, 9, 11-12, 14-16
Dimension Books #1-4
Conversion Books #1-2
Sourcebooks #1-3
Coalition Wars 1: Siege on Tolkeen
Rifts Mercenaries
Heroes Unlimited RPG
Palladium Fantasy RPG
Dragons & Gods
High Seas
Robotech RPG
Rifter #1-3

All of them are mint, some near mint, with only one damaged (Sourcebook 2: Mechanoids). So what're your opinions as to how I should sell them? And how should I price them? I'm thinking of starting at about 50%-60% of cover price for each book. Is that a good idea? Appreciate any and all feedback. (What a lame pun )

 

[KingThorvar]

Selling separately is probably better but will cost more to list. I always start at $1.00 if you think it will sell well (put a reserve if you don't want it to sell cheaply) because more people will look at it.

Keep an eye on other items like yours to see how they're selling. Sometimes it's just not worth it.

I always put Priority Shipping price in the ad because the post office will give you free boxes for priority use.. if not, you have to find some boxes for shipping stuff.. a huge pain.

 

[Holy Bovine]

I would do several searches on eBay first before posting anything to see how much your books are going for (RPG stuff in under the toys & collectables grouping). Seperate items will bring in more money for you in the long run but 50-60% of cover price is probably too high as a starting bid - I usually go for the $5-$9.99 range myself (why 9.99? B/C eBay charges you a higher listing cost for auctions starting at $10). $5 for things like softcover modules & 128 pg or less supplements, 9.99 for hardcovers or really rare/in demand stuff. I really don't like reserve bid auctions as I feel the opening bid should really be the lowest you are willing to part with the item for (and I have yet to have anything rare/in demand go for its opening bid).

That's about all I can think of for now - good luck!

 

[trancejeremy]

Well, how you sell them depends on how much free time you have. You tend to get the most money by selling them individually. OTOH, as a group you'd get one large sum (hopefully).

Though as something of a trick you can try to increase the price by selling a expensive book with 1 cheap book. Or several cheap books together.

Setting low prices can work, but you have to be careful if there is suddenly a flood of the same product. (You should also check that out before you put it up, that there aren't too many similar items. Though in some cases, if someone loses out on one auction, they can be likely to bid on someone elses auction, whereas if there isn't one, they will just forget about it).

 

[Green Knight]

Hmm. Thanks for the advice. I'm gonna go investigate how much eBay charges you to sell, now, and see if anyone else is selling Rifts stuff.

Fortunately I got the Rifts RPG Collector's Edition and the first 3 issues of the Rifter, so that's a plus. I also got the Robotech RPG book, which I think is out of print. God, I hope I sell my stuff at a high price!

 

[Heretic Apostate]

One thing about Reserves:

IF the reserve is met, you pay nothing.

IF the reserver is NOT met, you pay listing charges on the reserve price, in addition to the normal reserve price.

So consider carefully before doing Reserve auctions.

(Note that there are probably some things about Reserve auctions that I have failed to mention. I am not a seller, I'm a buyer. An experienced seller can probably fill in the many gaps I've left.)

 

[bondetamp]

While noone asked me, I've never seen that as a reason for not airing my pet peaves.

It is, I believe, generally a good idea to ship internationally. Just say that you'll need to be paid in advance and that the buyer pays for the shipping, and it shouldn't be a problem.

From my limited searching of e-bay, items that are sold to international customer often go for a much higher price than items that are restricted to the US.

 

[Green Knight]

I was gonna limit it to the US, but if that's true, then I'll include international shipping, too, so long as the buyer understands he's gotta pay shipping.

Anyway, this is what I'm thinking of selling in what groups and my starting asking prices. What do you all think? (Note: Approximate cover prices are in parenthesis after the books name)

Conversion/Sourcebook Set
$30 - Rifts Conversion Book ($21), Conversion Book 2: Pantheons of the Megaverse ($21), Sourcebook 1 ($12), Sourcebook 2: The Mechanoids * ($12), Sourcebook 3: Mindwerks ($12) * Note I disregarded Mechanoids when figuring out a price, as it's damaged. So I'm pretty much giving it away, free.

Dimension Book Set
$35 - Dimension Book 1: Wormwood ($17), Dimension Book 2: Phase World ($21), Dimension Book 3: Phase World Sourcebook ($13), Dimension Book 4: Skraypers ($17)

World Book Set 1
$40 - World Book 1: Vampire Kingdoms ($17), World Book 2: Atlantis ($17), World Book 3: England ($17), World Book 4: Africa ($17), World Book 5: Triax & the NGR ($21)

World Book Set 2
$35 - World Book 6: South America ($17), World Book 9: South America 2 ($21), World Book 11: Coalition War Campaign ($21), World Book 12: Psyscape ($17)

World Book Set 3
$35 - World Book 14: New West ($21), World Book 15: Sprit West ($21), World Book 16: Federation of Magic ($17), Coalition Wars 1: Siege on Tolkeen ($17)

Palladium Set
$49.99 - Heroes Unlimited RPG ($25), Robotech RPG ($13), Palladium Fantasy RPG ($25), High Seas ($21), Dragons & Gods ($21)

Rifter Set
$9.99 - Rifter #1 ($8), Rifter #2 ($8), Rifter #3 ($8)

Rifts RPG Set
$49.99 - Rifts RPG ($25), Rifts RPG Collector's Edition ($33) *

*It's a Collector's Edition, after all, and I didn't see it AT ALL on eBay. I figured it'd be a good idea to sell those 2 together, as whoever buys it will probably want to keep it in good condition and use another book for his games.

So how does that sound? It'll cost me $8 to list, unfortunately. But unless I want to sell every book individually I gotta sell them in bunches.

 

[Upper_Krust]

Hi Green Knight!

Do any of those books have a lot of information on the Splugorth?

Also, I was looking over your list - I didn't notice Palladium RPG Book II: Old Ones. Did you ever get a chance to read this - did it have stats for the Old Ones in it? (I was thinking of picking this up on ebay sometime).

Incidently for anyone who was disatisfied with the number of Pantheons represented in Deities & Demigods I strongly recommend PANTHEONS OF THE MEGAVERSE that Green Knight is selling here! Excellent book! Dragons & Gods isn't too bad either!

 

[Green Knight]

Hi Green Knight!

Do any of those books have a lot of information on the Splugorth?

Yep, several of them. World Book 2: Atlantis has stats for the Splugorth themselves, plus most of their servitor races and their equipment. Including rune magic and bio-wizardry.

Also, I was looking over your list - I didn't notice Palladium RPG Book II: Old Ones. Did you ever get a chance to read this - did it have stats for the Old Ones in it? (I was thinking of picking this up on ebay sometime).

Never got my hands on this book, sorry.

Incidently for anyone who was disatisfied with the number of Pantheons represented in Deities & Demigods I strongly recommend PANTHEONS OF THE MEGAVERSE that Green Knight is selling here! Excellent book! Dragons & Gods isn't too bad either!

Yeah, Pantheons of the Megaverse is one of my favorite books out of the whole bunch! Not only do you get information on a buttload of pantheons, but you also get VARIANT pantheons, so you can do something different. For instance, they have the standard Greek Pantheon, but they also have The Olympian Club, a group of mercenaries who have modelled themselves after the Greek gods. Pretty original some of the stuff they got. Off the top of my head, it's got the Aztec, Babylonian, Greek, Norse, Hindu, and Persian gods. As well as stuff like demigods, godlings, valkyries, scorpion people, etc. (They also have the Egyptian pantheon in the Africa book and Celtic pantheon in England)

Dragons & Gods is good, too. The only real world pantheon in that one is the Egyptian Pantheon, but the rest, though made up, are pretty interesting. They even got a vampire god among them, as well as demon and devil gods and a dragon pantheon, the gods of Dragonwright.