# Ebay and Reverb becoming a non factor..



## Adrian R

Imo...far too expensive. Both have increased their selling fees forcing sellers to have to ask more then fair market value. Then, to make matters worst, forced to charge sales tax! I never understood that...two individuals, private, wout tax ID #s..in a person to person private sale!

Either way, it's just not a feasible option anymore...


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## lespaul339

I agree. It sucks because reverb used too be really awesome. Now there's really no incentive for sellers to sell on reverb anymore.


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## Im247frogs

Hey man eBay is barely getting by as it is!
I agree totally on the tax thing. A single transaction between 2 individuals shouldn't be taxed. I actually reversed a sale on a strat I bought because of it. I wanted it for what I won it for, not what I won it for plus tax.
Guys like my buddy who have over 10K sale transactions, they should be taxed. Just easier for states to decide to tax everyone. Weak.


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## paul-e-mann

Adrian R said:


> Imo...far too expensive. Both have increased their selling fees forcing sellers to have to ask more then fair market value. Then, to make matters worst, forced to charge sales tax! I never understood that...two individuals, private, wout tax ID #s..in a person to person private sale!
> 
> Either way, it's just not a feasible option anymore...


Whats our option without reverb and ebay?


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## Matthews Guitars

Ebay's been just flat out taking a shit on itself ever since Meg Whitman left. 

There's an organization that only gets paid by the sellers and when it comes to a dispute, even if you can PROVE that the buyer ripped you clean off, sending back a brick
instead of what you sold him, claiming it was defective, then they'll almost always take the buyer's side of the dispute. 

Ebay has been worth a six figure sum to me over the 20 years I've been using it. But they seem to be doing literally everything they can to screw the sellers until they all decide to go somewhere else. 

And I'm a top rated power seller, no less. I'm a good customer but I can see that the end of my association with ebay is an eventuality.


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## Gutch220

Whenever I look on Reverb/ebay, I first look at local ads. If I can find something local, I'll drive there and pay cash. 
I find that I can get MUCH better deals if I tell a seller I will 'come tomorrow with cash'. No fees, no tax, no shipping, no hassle, it works. I've bought smaller things on Reverb where the taxes don't really factor in. The more expensive the item, the farther I'm willing to drive. If you have to pay $150 on gas/tolls on a big ticket item, and sleep in your car overnight, to me that's worth it. 

Do people really send back bricks for a refund? That should be considered mail fraud, and prosecuted.


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## South Park

It is all part of the three branch’s of government fraud waste and abuse


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## Adrian R

pedecamp said:


> Whats our option without reverb and ebay?



Clist, Facebook market place, GC (pay tax there)..and as someone in this thread has pointed out... If you cannot find it locally through more traditional methods... find it on reverb or ebay...as close to you as possible and drive there to get the item. Gas in cheap these days...and it's worth it, not to mention you can actually experience the product before you buy it.
For small tickets items it's still worth it..ebay that is...strings, picks, tubes..etc... but for large ticket items...no..too expensive.


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## Bloodrock

Greed knows no bounds in a so called capitalist nation. It’s only a time until another site comes along with less fees and they lose business. Reverb was an answer to ebay, now they’ve gotten just as greedy, yet provide a niche service. Just raise your prices or sell elsewhere. There’s no other option at the moment if you want your stuff to get the best exposure to customers. I always sell my stuff at a fair price but the fees are definitely killing my profits lately.


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## dragonvalve

Let's blame the Event 201 and Scenarios for the Future of Technology and International Development written in 2010 for the lockdown/plannedemic.

Pizza Hut closed hundreds of stores even if pizza is the number one food business surviving.

Complaining about Ebay when the name of the game is to turn everyone's incomes upside down and should be seen as such, can't be done in a vacuum. The economic times are being dismantled and everyone unless you're in a billionaire situation like Bezos, you're going to feel the pinch.

Gone are the days of the horn of plenty.

Guys looking for cheap music gear or a cheaper way to get expensive gear will have to know what is going on and why.


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## Matthews Guitars

Pizza Hut deserves to close their stores. Their pizzas are just BAD. I had one recently and the cardboard box no doubt had a stronger, better flavor to it.

I mean that. It LOOKED like a good pizza. But the flavors were VERY weak. Like I was eating it while I had a severe head cold. 

Before Pepsico bought Pizza Hut, that was a great place to go for a great pizza. Pepsico quickly put an end to THAT nonsense! Quality was eliminated with extreme prejudice.

Then Yum Foods came along....and it got even worse.


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## dragonvalve

Well whatever the reason, this economic down turn has been brewing since the 1950's. The globalists planned as long ago to make China the new economy. It didn't happen overnight. So if Pizza Hut lost its magic it didn't happen over night either and the economy got so bad the quality of the pies got worse. Dominoes on the other hand are hiring delivery people.

4,000 hotels are going to close down because of C-19 the ruse that it is.

As G Edward Griffin has been saying, if we don't form a coalition and take back our lives, we're going to be gone. Literally, for 2020 was the line in the sand the globalists drew to start their new depopulation program. What's coming next is not going to be pretty and eBay will be the least of our problems.


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## Shawn Kawvey

..


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## Shawn Kawvey

..


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## dragonvalve

Buying and selling is on the skids to change. They want to get rid of cash and go digital. That will cramp the personal deals and underground economy. They want to know where all the money goes.


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## Drinkingdeath01

Both of them have become obsolete to me. The prices are so high and let's face it, buying used online is a gamble. Not worth it to me and from the sounds of it, you too. CL or GC is the only ones I do anymore.


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## Lance Chambers

ETSY killed Reverb........hell, they donated to the "B"owel "L"iquity "M"ovement. Are you surprised!


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## Sapient

Lance Chambers said:


> ETSY killed Reverb........hell, they donated to the "B"owel "L"iquity "M"ovement. Are you surprised!



Yea, I saw that. I put on my shop that in spite of Reverb's support for this, THIS SHOP does not support this racist hate group. Wasn't gonna sit under that umbrella for a second.


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## Sapient

dragonvalve said:


> Well whatever the reason, this economic down turn has been brewing since the 1950's. The globalists planned as long ago to make China the new economy. It didn't happen overnight. So if Pizza Hut lost its magic it didn't happen over night either and the economy got so bad the quality of the pies got worse. Dominoes on the other hand are hiring delivery people.
> 
> 4,000 hotels are going to close down because of C-19 the ruse that it is.
> 
> As G Edward Griffin has been saying, if we don't form a coalition and take back our lives, we're going to be gone. Literally, for 2020 was the line in the sand the globalists drew to start their new depopulation program. What's coming next is not going to be pretty and eBay will be the least of our problems.



It's quite clear who is responsible too.

"To learn who rules over you, simply find out who you are not allowed to criticize"

There. At least it all went through our heads anyway.


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## Shawn Kawvey

..


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## Adieu

dragonvalve said:


> Well whatever the reason, this economic down turn has been brewing since the 1950's. The globalists planned as long ago to make China the new economy. It didn't happen overnight. So if Pizza Hut lost its magic it didn't happen over night either and the economy got so bad the quality of the pies got worse. Dominoes on the other hand are hiring delivery people.
> 
> 4,000 hotels are going to close down because of C-19 the ruse that it is.
> 
> As G Edward Griffin has been saying, if we don't form a coalition and take back our lives, we're going to be gone. Literally, for 2020 was the line in the sand the globalists drew to start their new depopulation program. What's coming next is not going to be pretty and eBay will be the least of our problems.




Globalists?

You sure it doesn't have anything to do with Americans not making jack and just exchanging services and flipping financial instruments based on inflated house/land prices and companies valued for their dated or uncompetitive intellectual properties??? Think bloated old crap like Motorola, HP, Dell, GE etc...well ok GE has SOME value in its aviation division, but the rest of em don't have a unique product between the lot of em, and don't even make their own stuff anymore anyways

Apple's headed that way too, strong brand identity but little substance past that.... remember the utter crushing dominance of the Motorola Razr? Same thing gonna happen here. Microsoft will take a longer time to fall off because of their pseudo-monopoly, but with the dilution of desktops' share in computing and gadgetry and their failure to diversify much (except for Xbox and the hopefully-not-for-long partnership with Ford, who could do a lot better, on infotainment hardware) --- the decline is all but guaranteed.


That economic house of cards tumbles easy and never gonna get rebuilt without real work. America's true problem is that most of its "value" is in the images of ageing brands that are propped up by force of habit more than anything else. Yeah there's some software/internet startups, but that stuff gets copied fast and eventually improved on past the original. Intellectual property just doesn't hold long term value well.


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## jtees4

I agree except for the use of the word "forced". No one is being forced to do anything. There are always options.


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## rmlevasseur

Im247frogs said:


> Hey man eBay is barely getting by as it is!
> I agree totally on the tax thing. A single transaction between 2 individuals shouldn't be taxed. I actually reversed a sale on a strat I bought because of it. I wanted it for what I won it for, not what I won it for plus tax.
> Guys like my buddy who have over 10K sale transactions, they should be taxed. Just easier for states to decide to tax everyone. Weak.




Actually, its actions like this that caused me stop using ebay many years ago. It's not a secret there would be tax, yet you reversed a transaction because of it. Meanwhile the poor guy selling it thinks he has a deal. Ebay always lets the buyer squeek out, and it just became to risky to sell.


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## MarshallDog

Im247frogs said:


> Hey man eBay is barely getting by as it is!
> I agree totally on the tax thing. A single transaction between 2 individuals shouldn't be taxed. I actually reversed a sale on a strat I bought because of it. I wanted it for what I won it for, not what I won it for plus tax.
> Guys like my buddy who have over 10K sale transactions, they should be taxed. Just easier for states to decide to tax everyone. Weak.



eBay did not want to charge tax, the dam greedy states are making them charge the tax!


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## StingRay85

Would for sure be nice to have an alternative. Crazy what kind of commission they're asking for no other added value than being a sales platform. If the seller bumps an article, you already know it's overpriced. This BS for raising to 5% is nonsense, reality is that they want to increase their own profits


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## thetragichero

I'm perfectly happy buying and selling on reverb, for the service they provide (besides worldwide advertising, reduced shipping, somebody handling the payments besides me, even shipping resolution) 5% is a bargain. they're much easier to deal with from a seller's standpoint than ebay. the majority of my income comes from selling on reverb
I'll still troll the local resources for good deals


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## What?

Reverb is almost always too high from a buyer perspective. And 'accepts offers' usually isn't even worth the effort. I prefer Ebay, but prices there aren't great either. If I can find it locally, it's almost always a better deal, and I can try it first. And it's good to meet other local musicians that I might not have otherwise. So I always look locally first.


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## jtees4

What? said:


> Reverb is almost always too high from a buyer perspective. And 'accepts offers' usually isn't even worth the effort. I prefer Ebay, but prices there aren't great either. If I can find it locally, it's almost always a better deal, and I can try it first. And it's good to meet other local musicians that I might not have otherwise. So I always look locally first.



Totally opposite my experience...I have bought and sold lots on reverb after giving up EBay, and almost all of my buys and sells were with ""make an offer", and I've done pretty well on both. Different strokes I guess.


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## tallcoolone

Other than purchasing a pedal or three on Reverb, Craigslist has been my go-to for over a decade. Spend about $5-10k every year on CL MI transactions. 

Of course, I have zero issue dealing with and meeting people. I get that not everyone is that way. But the good deals are mostly on CL.


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## Matthews Guitars

I've recently sold amps via reverb but for everything else I use ebay. I've been an ebayer for over 20 years and I'm a top rated seller,
as long as my sales volume stays high enough. They've always made it progressively harder to sell on ebay while never doing us sellers any favors,
but it's still worthwhile to sell on ebay. Depending on what you're selling and depending on what your product profitability is.


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## Trelwheen

dragonvalve said:


> Well whatever the reason, this economic down turn has been brewing since the 1950's. The globalists planned as long ago to make China the new economy. It didn't happen overnight. So if Pizza Hut lost its magic it didn't happen over night either and the economy got so bad the quality of the pies got worse. Dominoes on the other hand are hiring delivery people.
> 
> 4,000 hotels are going to close down because of C-19 the ruse that it is.
> 
> As G Edward Griffin has been saying, if we don't form a coalition and take back our lives, we're going to be gone. Literally, for 2020 was the line in the sand the globalists drew to start their new depopulation program. What's coming next is not going to be pretty and eBay will be the least of our problems.





Thank you. How refreshing.

At least somebody has a grasp of what's happening.

Everyone- 
No matter who you are or where you stand, you're in grave danger. Not a political statement.....purely humanitarian. Knowledge is power.


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## Sapient

People get lost in details of the effect(s) while being completely oblivious to the cause or who ...is the cause. Sadly, in typical form, these same people probably don't even know what I just said either.


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## junk notes

How does charging tax on vintage pedal, that there are an abundance of, that fluctuate in used prices get taxed?
The other guy is paying less for the same used item due to final sale price. Ridiculous and unfair business practice with these companies taking advantage of the law telling you it is the law.....
edit: We should all help to phase these companies out. In the same manner that reverb took over eBay with its inception, others will come along with new formats and business manipulation.


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## MarshallDog

Adrian R said:


> Imo...far too expensive. Both have increased their selling fees forcing sellers to have to ask more then fair market value. Then, to make matters worst, forced to charge sales tax! I never understood that...two individuals, private, wout tax ID #s..in a person to person private sale!
> 
> Either way, it's just not a feasible option anymore...



Yup, I dont see how anyone can make money using these Places unless its a product they build/mfg themselves and the fees are not an issue.

Wait til the States figure out a way to try to collect sales tax from Craigs List...you know they are working on it, its just a matter of when!


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## Matthews Guitars

The notion that ebay and reverb are becoming a non factory just doesn't fly with me. They are making it tougher on sellers both due to corporate greed and government regulations that can't rightfully be pinned on the website operators, but it's still a very viable avenue for me to sell my products and assorted random stuff I pick up cheap that has a profitability potential. 

The only complication for me is that I sell a lot of things on consignment. Should I ever receive a tax form from ebay, it may report total sales but I would have to itemize every transaction and calculate my actual profit and may have to submit supporting documentation. That could cause a real hassle for me. I might even have to actually sit down and do some actual WORK for an hour or two! And after I'm done with my figuring, it's likely to turn out that my actual income after taking all deductions is low enough that I won't have to pay anything. I've bought enough stuff that I took a loss on that this is a very realistic possibility and that is WITHOUT playing games with any numbers. If I'm asked to report my earnings, I'll do it honestly and accurately. I always remember that Al Capone, notorious gangster, died in federal prison not for all the people he had killed, not for all the illegal activites he was involved in, but for TAX EVASION. So it's fair to say that the IRS is probably worthy of at least much respect as any gun-toting law enforcement agency.


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## What?

Matthews Guitars said:


> but it's still a very viable avenue for me to sell my products and assorted random stuff I pick up cheap that has a profitability potential.



That is one aspect that sucks about Ebay and Reverb. Too many hawks are always watching for local gear to flip online, where it used to be that finding decent deals on local gear *to make music with* was more common. And part of it isn't just the gear, but is about meeting locals you might not have ran into before, talking about gear and music in the process of trade, which gets eliminated by gear flippers. There is no community aspect to it. It's only about $.

Just the other day, I went to check out an old Epiphone acoustic, because you really have to play them to find the goods ones. That guitar was a dud, but I met an interesting older local who used to gig this whole area, and we talked about old Super Reverbs (he had one, as do I) and local music for an hour or so. And I found out some things about my amp's history that I never would have known (he knew the deceased previous owner) as well as some info about some other older local players and bands. That to me is as valuable as finding a decent deal on a piece of gear that I will actually use for making music.


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## Matthews Guitars

Almost none of my ebay activity involves musical gear, just FYI... I've sold a few amps on Reverb, though. And bought a few there, too.


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## What?

Matthews Guitars said:


> Almost none of my ebay activity involves musical gear, just FYI... I've sold a few amps on Reverb, though. And bought a few there, too.



Sorry. That wasn't pointed at you. I was making a general comment.


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## Geeze

Matthews Guitars said:


> I always remember that Al Capone, notorious gangster, died in federal prison not for all the people he had killed, not for all the illegal activites he was involved in, but for TAX EVASION. So it's fair to say that the IRS is probably worthy of at least much respect as any gun-toting law enforcement agency.



I fear my government - with Capone they couldn't catch him and make it stick so they wrote some new regs that allowed them to nail his fanny - lazy. Between that and the lazy ass RICO statues where if a member of your group does a naughty they can charge the whole group for the naughty - if that don't pucker the one way check valve nothing will.

The state's taxing internet revenue is a can of worms - each state can determine the 'volume' of business your org conducts in their state and set the threshold value at which you 'need' to start paying them tax on your sales to their citizens. I suspect the more the state is in the $$$ hole the lower the threshold. 

I stopped selling online because of the 6 month window for disputes and whining with PP. I sold an amp with a spare set of tubes to a guy in HI who was a pain in the ass about it getting there - I pack bomb proof packaging - and when it got there he went full 4 year old retard about how I lied to him about the condition that it arrived in. I looked up his complaint - preamp tube related - politely told him to change V1 and never heard another word. I sweated the 6 months and swore never ever never again. Local or I burn it.

Russ


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## Peter McAteer

I had a set of Gretsch Blacktop Broad'Tron pickups that languished on Kijiji for a month. Sold on Reverb in under three hours. It's still useful, but the margins for the seller aren't as good.


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## Peter McAteer

I had a set of Gretsch Blacktop Broad'Tron pickups that languished on Kijiji for a month. Sold on Reverb in under three hours. It's still useful, but the margins for the seller aren't as good.


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## FutureProf88

Adrian R said:


> Imo...far too expensive. Both have increased their selling fees forcing sellers to have to ask more then fair market value. Then, to make matters worst, forced to charge sales tax! I never understood that...two individuals, private, wout tax ID #s..in a person to person private sale!
> 
> Either way, it's just not a feasible option anymore...



Yeah. Reverb sent me a survey asking about what I thought of their website and I basically told them not to jack their seller's fees up to stupid amounts like eBay did. And they jacked their service fees up. The one nice thing about Reverb is that the guys who get in touch with you on there are usually serious about buying something. FB marketplace is great because it's free but there's a ton of spam.


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## StingRay85

So the reverb fee is now higher than ebay fee?


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## Brek

Ebays a PITA for sure. In the U.K. eBay treat private sales effectively like a business sale, I.e. if buyer decides for what ever reason real or imagined they want to return a no returns listing. They just lie and open a not as described case. Happened to me 3 times in 6 months, 1 Martin acoustic, 1 les Paul R8, and a gfx card. As far as sales go we get a lot of sell for £1 offers, but with a catcha, if it goes over 30 days you pay 10%, so you go to keep on top of those listings. I have sold around 100 items in past year totalling about £12000, so I suppose 3 returns may not sound a lot, but cost me £100 in wasted postage charges, and the les Paul came back damaged. Oh, and for for those thinking there’s no smoke without fire, 3 items were relisted and new buyers well happy with items. Only tried reverb once, was supposed to be a free listing, but when I cancelled it they said please pay £400, to which I said GTF. Never been back. Maybe we go back to the old ways, local ads, face to face eh?


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## dragonvalve

I got burned on eBay for a pedal and the seller after he got the money tried to change the stories. Par for the course when dealing with used stuff online. He never sent the pedal nor the money back.

Takes your chances, takes your hits. Learned better for the next.

I as a buyer have a perfect eBay score. But lately with the world being what it is, buying on COD from online sales is a lot easier.

Things are coming unglued...


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## Sapient

I still do eBay and have never had much of a problem with them. Reverb? Done. Never again.


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## Matthews Guitars

I've been an ebay user since 1999. The worst thing that ever happened to me as a seller was one person who returned an item claiming it was damaged but while it WAS damaged, it was damaged when the buyer dropped it. The box I shipped it in was still perfect, undamaged. It was an Icom M710 marine radio, one of a couple hundred I sold, and as part of the checkout process after completing a full suite of tests and certifying the radio to be good, I always stuck a red caplug on the microphone connector, and as part of the tests I had to plug a microphone into it to check the transmitter functions. No way that could possibly be missed. 

The radio came back with no red caplug on it and the mic connector was smashed in a way that could only come from dropping the radio right on the connector. Again...not a trace of box damage. I had a standard way of packing all those radios involving a lot of bubble wrap done in a certain way. It was two inches from box to radio thanks to all the bubble wrap. 

The bastard simply dropped the radio by being a drunken idiot and got his money back. I did, at least, get the radio back, and the repair wasn't difficult or expensive (I had spare parts radios to use for that) but the sheer dishonesty and failure of the buyer to be a man and admit to dropping it really got under my skin. 

I'm lucky that that's the worst it ever got for me as an ebay seller. REALLY lucky, apparently.


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## StingRay85

You had his address didn't you? Revenge is best served cold. Send him a turd now 

Or alternatively a big dildo. I can think of a few other funny things


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## Brek

eBay, lol, been on and off that platform since 2001, only real drama was in 2007 when a 2k Nikon d700 was bought by a dodgy account farming stolen credits cards to buy electronics with. PayPal covered my ass that time. Which was good, as the alternative didn’t bear thinking about. Last year was a bit eventful had a simply gorgeous killer les Paul reissue returned by buyer as ‘its counterfeit’ ffs and a simply mint condition 2017 d18, with a sublime sound, and canon like volume, as ‘it needs a neck rest’ I took it to the man I trust which such things, nigels guitar workshop in Richmond N Yorks, he took one look at it and laughed, ‘no it doesn’t.’, those two events left me out of pocket to the tune of £100 in postage costs. So with eBay sacking off PayPal, I’m sacking of eBay. No way are those fuckers getting a line into my bank account lol.


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## dragonvalve

Man these days it's going to be catch as catch can.


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## StingRay85

Yesterday made my first sale on ebay, a guy from Hong Kong that wants me to give up a false value for customs... This kind of BS I cannot deal with.


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## dragonvalve

StingRay85 said:


> Yesterday made my first sale on ebay, a guy from Hong Kong that wants me to give up a false value for customs... This kind of BS I cannot deal with.



And if it's made of wood (guitar) don't you have to make a CITES customs declaration to even ship it out or the guy in HK as well for the wood species involved?


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## wakjob

It was all down hill when they started imposing taxes on outta state sales.
I search local first. Might as well support a local...and pay Cesar his due in my own state.


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## dragonvalve

Taxes are put there to strain the economy and tie people down. 

Treasury is being raped. 

Doesn't mean the taxes are proper either.


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