posted on March 27, 2001 08:09:01 PM
A friend of ours owns a small used book store in a college town about 90 miles away. After being tied down by the store for many years, he has decided to close up shop. He plans to still continue to sell by catalog (which was always the bulk of his business anyway) and internet.
So, after moving out all the books he wanted to keep in his inventory to his new storage location, he had a buck a bag sale today.
I certainly don't fancy myself an expert book seller, but it was a lot of fun going through all the piles of books trying to figure out what might possibly be ebayable. Unfortunately, he had very few children's books, which I think I know a little bit about.
I ended up with about a 100 books for $4.00!
Anyone else ever have a great buying opportunity recently?
posted on March 28, 2001 03:34:20 AM
Mine is several years back, that's what got me started selling books. Salvation army received the leftovers from a library book sale, and they were taking up a whole corner of a room. They were selling them for $1.00 per box!!! (Any size) Needless to say, I bought 5 or 6 boxes worth.
Lots of the books sold for $3.00 or so, some old Harlequin Romances sold for $0.75 each. I still have a bunch of junk left over from this, but it sure was a cheap learning experience. Now I know what to look for, and what to leave behind. (Most of the time)
posted on March 28, 2001 03:40:46 AM
I love bag sales. Sometimes I find ebay-able stuff, but mostly I use that opportunity to book-scout for local used book stores and build up my credit. Unfortunately, the library sales in my area hold their bag sales on Sundays, and I now work that day, but I might try to get off for one such sale in April. It's just too lucrative to miss.
posted on March 28, 2001 05:00:28 AM
For great deals on books check out your local library. Often they have book sales to raise money.
My first book sale was in November of 2,000. The library had collected donations throughout the year
From people and sold all their hard cover books for .50 and all paperbacks for.25. I spent $30.00 and came home with several big boxes of books. I would have spent much more if I knew then what I know now. I was able to sell all my books right away on half.com.
Since then I have attended several large book sales in the area and have an inventory of over 3,000 books. My sales on half.com are brisk and I am enjoying learning about the values of books and what are hot selling authors and titles. I am still trying to figure out which books will sell for “good” money but I am having a ball doing it. So check your local libraries, watch for charity sales and auctions and don’t forget, about yard sales you can find some real gems at them for next to nothing.
posted on March 28, 2001 05:27:40 AM
I used to get bag deals at a salvation army back home. I'd sell them in yardsales for a quarter a piece and make some profit. Didn't know about the internet back then.
posted on March 28, 2001 06:35:55 AM
Just a few weeks ago a friend and I went to a combo auction. There were a couple small estates and a craft store's inventory. We ended up with TONS of craft stuff but the best was the craft books/booklets. 400 for $57. So far they're going great! Hard to lose money when you pay $.15 per book!
posted on March 28, 2001 06:58:59 AM
One of the library sales I was at earlier this year was better than most -- seems they had "pulled" a large number of really good non-fiction books printed by University Presses, which are often higher quality & lower print-runs. I ended up with 59 books at $1.00 each, still have about 12 left & so far they have earned back over $1,000 on eBay!
I think the topper though was 2 summers ago at a yard sale. There was a box of early paperbacks & I asked the lady how much, 25 cents each, so I bought the whole box for $12. The sale was jammed, so as I laid my money down I tapped her arm & told her to make sure she picked it up so no one else took it. She then asked me if I liked books, as she had "a house full of them", so of course I left my number.
Two weeks later she phones, invites me to take a look. Turns out someone else at the sale stole a small knife that was priced at $3.00, and she remembered my little act of honesty. Well, that paid off. She said, take whatever you want, I'm clearing them out, and she simply wouldn't take any money from me for them. Little did I know, but one of the 1950 paperbacks I picked was just extremely rare, and it alone sold on eBay for over $1,000!
It's always worthwhile at yard sales to keep a smile on your face & be nice to people, let those other dealers & jerks do the shoving & rushing -- nice things do happen to nice people!
posted on March 28, 2001 08:05:09 AM
IB - oh that WOULD be nice! are you still selling these craft things on Ebay? I need some rather hard to find (for me) patterns to knit and/or crochet...
I spend enough money at my craft stores to keep them in business, I think.. *laugh*
posted on March 28, 2001 09:13:59 AM
I go to an auction once a month. For some reason I can't remember my wife couldn't come (big mistake) and I was left unsupervised. My only purchase was 23 shelves and a dozen tubs of books and ephemera. Paid $500. Per piece probably a few cents each. It was the inventory of a retired ephemera dealer. It took two vans to bring it home.
Needless to say, she was not a happy camper when we started to haul the stuff in. It sat for a while until we began to sell a bit at shows. Did fairly well. Then we put a few things up on ebay.
Sold a railroad brochure for $65. Last week sold an airline brochure for $212.50. So far, have sold about 5% of the lot for over $1,200.
posted on March 28, 2001 10:17:04 AM
Cooltom--Way to go! My better thinks I am stark raving mad when I buy some of the stuff I buy but it is so nice when we can say "I told you so". Finds like yours are what makes it all worth while.
posted on March 28, 2001 10:54:27 AM
A couple of years ago, I bought a collection of books (52 volumes?) at a charity / fund raiser yard sale at a local volunteer fire dept. for $5.00. It turned out to be a very nice quality set of 1909 Harvard Classics.
I read a few of them over the years, then stored them in the garage. When we moved last year, I decided to look them up on ebay. Sold them the next week for $200.00 with a BIN in my auction.
posted on March 28, 2001 11:58:08 AM
Honaker -- 3900% profit. Profit was 40 times the cost minus the cost. Will take it anyday. My average profit on ebay is 1400%.
posted on March 28, 2001 06:56:44 PM
I just went to an estate auction last month. It was cold and snowy and no one showed up. I bought over 400 early romance novels for $1. I've listed about 30% of them and have made about $200. Very happy so far.
But the best part was the 2 boxes of old hardcovers - from the late 1800's to early 1900's - great books with embossed leather covers. I haven't had a chance to list many, but the 2 boxes cost me $9. I did list one that was in really poor shape - and it sold for $10. So the rest is just cream at this point! I'm waiting til the romances clear!
I'm not a romance reader, so these really surprised me....I may delve ito them a little more - I didn't realize that so many of the paperbacks would go in the $15 - $20 range.
posted on March 29, 2001 04:14:40 AM
Last summer, my son and me stopped at an impromptu garage sale. The man was cleaning his garage out and decided to sell a few things at the same time. I bought 2 clocks, a chiming one I wanted for myself, and 32 volumes of Louis Lamour with leatherette bindings still in the original boxes, unopened. I also got the collector's bookends for the books, all at the grand price of $20.00.
I had no idea what I had, so I didn't make what I could have, but I made 10 times my money on just the books.
posted on March 29, 2001 06:27:12 AM
My brother owns a HUGE home here in NH, and he saw an auction on eBay around thanksgiving last year by the Salvation Army (I believe that is who it was) for leftovers of a massive booksale they were having. He won, with a bid of $41.79. We rented a truck for $500.00 and drove down (an 18' Rider). When we arrived, we found out that the booksale went flat, and we needed a bigger truck. We got a 24' Rider, and it was jammed, front to back, floor to roof, boxes and boxes of books. They said that normally (they do this 2x a year) it is about 3000-4000 books. It took 3 days to unload the truck, and we have guesstimated the total haul to be about 10,000 books!!! About half are paperback, the rest hardcover. Some old, some new. We have only gone through about 1,100 of them, and we have sold over $2,000 worth of them, so I guess that this would be the mother lode of all for me!
In the begining, God created the heavens and the earth.
) Needless to say, I bought 5 or 6 boxes worth.
