Can you flip silver on eBay for a quick profit?

in steemsilvergold •  7 years ago 

Flipping coins on eBay is possible, but not easy and as quick as you might expect.

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I currently have the cheapest listed 2018 Britannias (well I am tied at least) and I have sold 1 in the last week.

They dont fly off the shelves that is for sure. And after fees and postage etc I end up making about £2 per coin at these prices.

So, you can make money - but it is not easy.

There is also risk involved. To achieve these prices you have to send the coin via regular unsigned for post. After signed for delivery, on one coin at £22 I would make about 75p. I evaluate the risk when posting a coin as best as possible (researching the buyer etc.) Not had an issue to date but I have had a number of parcels take a few weeks to arrive. Precious metals are not covered by royal mail so if one coin goes missing/lost or you get an unscrupulous buyer you wipe out all profits.

Talking of unscrupulous buyers - someone claiming you sent a fake coin is a pretty easy scam to do. They lodge a claim with eBay, send the coin back, which they swap out for an actual fake, and eBay will always side with the buyer. You lose out again.

I haven't even got onto the topic of the amount of work involved in organisation, packaging etc.

Just my two cents - I am happy to take the risks that I take - but I don't know that many people who would do the same for a very small margin.

Do you flip coins? If you do it would be great to hear your thoughts, if you liked this post please remember to upvote, comment and share!

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Ebay fees are high is a challenge.

First off i love your poured bars. Watch you on YouTube often. Wish postage was so dam expensive from the UK to the US. I’d love to have one from you.

On flipping coins on eBay, I’ve had ups and downs. I’ve made out well on hot coins and made good money on most of them. But regular government issued Bullion i haven’t had much luck. I have a 100% rating with over 800 positive feedback and still find it tough to sell coins. I’ve had better luck with bars then coins.
All the best. Keep up the great pours.

Postage is not that bad you know 😉 also, I offer free postage for orders over about $140 just let me know if you wanted something and I am sure we could work out a deal 😉 thanks for the upvote and comment!

Will do, thanks. I love quality poured silver. I’ve been experimenting myself. I really loved the bars you did for the Silver Forum, they were awesome. No problem , im following you as well, keep up the good work. Best regards

hello @backyardbullion I never buy off ebay! once you add on the high commission of ebay, then add paypal and it is stupidly expensive. I have seen sellers sell on ebay way higher than their own sites. So I go to their sites and save a substantial amount of cash.

My wife has an account with a website similar to ebay. She listed 100 items last week and sold 2. Lol... it's just a hobby for her. The amount of time she put into it I believe she's working for cents per hour.

I have bought a couple of coins on eBay but the prices were too high. I called the physical store location for additional specific coins and I got a better deal.
I wanted to try flipping/selling silver coins but the margin would be too low and the postage was high for proper insurance, tracking, etc. Finally, the risk with unscrupulous buyers eliminated my interest.

I have only bought bullion from the big houses on ebay when it's a deal. Everytime I ran the numbers on a flip the fees have been so high, and the risk of fraud from buyers ( or unknown sellers), I can't do it. I had the best luck selling on Facebook groups, unfortunately now that is a target for removal by Facebook.

Had a little more luck with soucing on eBay for numismatics.

If you use electronic postage stamps, for example, a 1 oz coin can be placed into bubble wrapped sleeve for less than 2 oz. That would be a 68 cent stamp if printed through a service like Stamps.com or Endicia.

Then you USE A TRACKING LABEL 400 (which is completely FREE) and you put the tracking label 400 sticker above the delivery address.

This is the way to avoid the First Class Package shipping postage amount.