I would like to share a few tips and tricks I have picked up on over the last few years with others out there in Vintage Land who buy and sell vintage collectibles like I do. It never hurts to share what you have learned. Naturally you want to get it cheap and sell it for a bunch right? Here are a few things I have learned through trial an error that have helped me plenty.

First the tips:

Tip #1. When you go to auction, wait around till it is over. There will usually be some people going through the lots they bought and getting the stuff they want out of it. 99% of the time they will offer to sell you everything left for next to nothing...i mean like 5 or 10 bucks. Or they will just tell you you can have whatever is left and some people just leave it and say nothing.
Whoever is running the auction will tell you that you can have it and most times gripe about them leaving it behind...lol. Most of the time they will leave tons of sellable items behind...they dont want to have to haul it away so your doing them a favor as well by taking it.

I do this at every auction I attend. I will usually buy maybe 2 lots myself of good sellable items but by the time I get home the trunk and back seat are stacked...sometimes I even have to make two trips...Im not kidding. I take out the ebay sellable items and the rest either goes into a yardsale pile or in the trash. Whatever I dont sell on ebay goes in the yardsale pile as well. The last yardsale I had I made over 200 bucks...and this was mostly on these items that I paid maybe a total of 30 bucks for..and this is not counting what I sold on ebay out of them. Whatever doesnt sell at the yardsale give it away free or throw it in the trash...if you dont, your house will start to look like sanford and sons.

Tip #2. When you go yardsailing, dont be shy. You see something you think might be sellable but you arent sure and you think to yourself, what if it isnt sellable, maybe I should pass. It probably has a sticker on it for 10, 25 or 50 cents...buy it!. Its 50 cents, its not going to break you if it does not sell. The very worst thing thats gonna happen is its going to end up in your yardsale pile or youll give it to a friend or the salvation army or something. If you bought 20 of these 50 cent unsure about items you will have only spent 10 bucks. There's a good chance that a couple of them will bring you much more than 10 bucks on ebay.

I once almost passed up a model of the titanic for this very reason..I wasnt sure it would sell and they wanted 2 dollars for it...I passed on it, but right at the last moment I said to myself ..what the hell and went ahead and bought it....I posted it on ebay the following sunday and sold it for 42 bucks. Needless to say, I never pass on items I can get for cheap anymore. Sell or no sell.

Tip #3. Wait ! wait! wait!, If your at a dealers stand and you find something you want, Dont just buy it unless its a steal. If it has a price on it, say for instance 10 bucks, ask the dealer if this is the lowest they will take for it. Many times they will say, I will knock off a couple of bucks. This means he actually wanted 8 for it in the first place. Now you say, hmmm will you take 6 for it? If they dont take your offer, just set it back down and wait around a few minutes. Many times when your getting ready to walk away, they will agree to your price. If not and you think 8 is fair enough go to another booth or something for a bit and look around. Then come back. Again he may agree to your price, he doesnt wanna lose you twice in one day...if he never offers to sell for your price then he must have near that much invested in it and he isnt going to budge so go ahead and pay the 8.

If it doesnt have a price on it theres usually a reason why. Ask them what they want for it..they will normally hit you with way to high a price first. After they tell you the price, just say oh! and quickly put the item back down on the table. Then, look at other stuff and wait. If you have a friend or relative with you, make sure the dealer can hear you, and tell your partner something like Man, I really wanted that, but not for that much. They will usually wait until you are fixing to walk away from their booth to hit you with a new lower price or they will ask you what your willing to give them for it. Be as fair as you can be and still keep it cheap. I mean you have to make a profit or its pointless right?. Many times they will agree to your price..they would rather sell it and make a minimal profit than to have it sit there and collect dust for another week.

Now for the tricks!

Trick #1. If you have a cell phone, and someone willing to lend you a hand. Have them sit by the computer while you go out yardsailing or out to auction or dealers market. When you run across marked items ( Items with makers mark or dates) or items with a little higher price tag. Use your cell phone to call your helper and give them the info on the item so they can research it right then and there and find out its actual value or if its a sellable item. Me and my better half do this almost every weekend and it saves me money and time.

Trick #2. Set yourself up a free ecommerce store where you can list your items for the price you want for them and park them until they become hot on ebay. Alot of items you will find will be sellable, but for the time being there are too many people selling the same item and driving the value down. You can hold onto these type items and wait till they start selling well and throw them on ebay when they get hot and at the same time still have a chance for a sale on the item through your store. Plus you can put links to your present auctions right on the front page of your ecommerce store and get a few more lookers for your items. I get alot of auction winners that tell me they saw my ebay advertisement on my store for the item they purchased. Also run free classified ads for your ebay items but give your store address as the location of the item. There are literally thousands of free classified ad sites. When they visit your store they will see your ad for ebay and that will bring even more prospects to your items and store.

Trick #3. Watch and wait. Watch the items you have in your posession on ebay....when a seller has the same item you have and it has multiple bids on it..wait till their auction is closing to an end, say 4 hrs before it ends, and throw yours up there with a buy it now price of just a little under what they are going for. You can look at completed auctions to find out what they are getting. The losers of the auction that just ended are going to be searching for another one just like the one they just got outbid on. And your going to sell yours immediately for almost whats its going for anyway. Plus they will see yours is just a little lower in price then what they were willing to pay.

I have done this little trick too many times to count. Just recently I did this on a used handheld scrabble game. The new games were fetching around 45 dollars and the used ones were getting around 25 to 30 dollars and of course all the sellers were trying to get the max on their used ones with bidding wars. I threw my used one up there for 40 bucks, buy it now, and it sold in less than 10 minutes. The guy that bought it even emailed me that it was just what he was looking for because he didnt want to have to bid on it. I have done this little trick many many times, usually with great success. If you dont get any buyers in the first 10 to 12 hrs...then change it to an auction style listing and get your money back for the buy it now listing.

I will post more tips and tricks throughout this blog. I think these 6 will do for now. Happy hunting!