Make Money Selling Stamps

No you didn't make $351.72. Did you get the stamps that you sold for free? Look, I am not trying to discourage any one from selling on ebay or the like. Especially if it is as a hobby. But if you are trying to do it as a way to make money, then I think there are better ways to earn bucks.

Duncan, click on Wensy.com there are no fees to buy or sell...i would say its mainly collectors selling stamps..a fellow I know on the Wensy board called me Friday..he says he pays his property taxes with what he makes..he sells low value stamps at approx. 25 percent of catalog..but he has collectors that will buy 50 or 100 of his stamps at one shipping..for him it works...i don't think I have the ambition !! phil

I can't think of a better way to make a buck then to earn some by doing something you love to do. Maybe I missed it but I'm not sure if Duncan has stated whether this is for strictly business and profit,or to supplement income or Stamp hobby. If it's strictly business and profit then I think it will be tough, not impossible, just tough. Stamps are a supply and demand thing and right now there is more demand than supply, hence the fact that you can get a MNH Stamp that's 80 years old for 2¢.
Also if it's strictly business then the first thing that has to be sold is the personnel collection as Dealing stamp and collecting them do not mix well, you can't get attached to your inventory.

I'd start running ads in your local classifieds telling all you are buying collections. Also I'd find the local source for estate sale listings and start making these a first place of business as without new inventory that is in demand, sales will come to a stop. If you think you are going to under bid the bidders now on ebay and try to auction it off later to the same group of bidders and make profit then I think it will die a quick death. The first order in business is to have a product that is in demand and you will need many sources for the fresh material.

Actualy, I think if you don't value your time, you CAN make money by buying large lots, breaking them down and reselling them, even on ebay. But the amount of time it takes means that you are lucky to make a few bucks an hour.

HOLD ON------STALLZER-------Your saying running ads and trying to get in front of some stamp dealers to buy estate or family collections . The problem with that is advertising cost and purchasing power .Its been more than a few times a ebay seller has come up against a willing seller . But trying to come up with $10,000 or even $20,000 cash on the spot DOES BECOME A PROBLEM . I received a call or two were a possible buyer has asked me to come into a transaction with cash and I told him ,for the percentage of investment I want a equal take in percentage of the collection and both times the deal fell thru because they couldn't come up with their share in cash .The results is the family called a major firm .So most ebay sellers don't have the cash handy to out lay for a major purchase on the spot .
The best place to buy supplies/inventory is to go to a major stamp auction and fight with other ebay buyers for a stock of material.
Sorry ,from what I read above few can play in the estate game and put in serious bids with a family attorney taken bids for a deceased philatelist .
Then there is always the family that has no clue to what its worth and will grap a hand full of dollars and a stamp dealers walks away with a gold mine of a collection and nobody knows about it ,THATS THE DREAM OF MANY STAMP BUYERS WHO RUN ADS .

Don't know as I don't sell much. I did not say the process was easy, I just said that in order to do it on a full time basis you need a few different sources for new inventory and local people selling collections whether it be on a classified website, local paper, Estate sale, whatever the avenue, you need to find inventory. I think we all know that you're not going to run 3 miles over in town to look at a collection, offer $100.00 for it and flip it on ebay for 20K but it's a possible means to an inventory especially when you can buy large or mid-sized collections at dealer price. Yes you are going to have to jump in line in front of the existing dealers in your area, but that's what it's going to take. You need to get there early and get your share before the greedy people do.

No one stated that you need to start buying collections at $10,000 a pop. I'm saying that there is a chance for more profit buying a collection from someone directly then being one of the ten bidding on it on-line. The benefit of buying local is LESS COMPETITION ! Buying online you can be bidding against Worldwide buyers, you do the math.
I have 2-3 people running an ad here that they buy Stamps and they do it on Craigslist which cost them ZERO! and all of about 3 minutes to post an ad. There are many ways to skin the Cat on this one but in the end it all comes down to 2 things, being able to buy low, and sell high.

OK ---understood .

I buy and sell all the time, Do I make money sometimes.
Here is my story I started collecting a little while ago and probably have spent $2000 on stamps. My pay pal account has a few hundred in it and what I try and do is only spend money from pay pal on stamps in other words I will not spend any money on stamps from my pocket. This was my New Year's resolution to only use the money I have on PP and what I can make selling surplus stamps. Its a little project I will be doing this year and it will be interesting to see how I do after a year. My plan is to acquire all the Canadian queen Vic jubilees mint including high values with out adding any money to my pay pal account.
I often purchase some high value stamps and a good price and have been lucky selling on ebay and making a profit but if I was to factor my time. I often spend 8 - 10 hours a day surfing the Internet looking at stamps and placing bid or listing stamps That's like 50 plus hours a week ( I am currently on disability from a very bad car crash so have plenty of time on my hands )
Some weeks I have made 200 -300 dollars others maybe 100 so on average say 200 dollars so I might be making 3 or 4 bucks a hour.

I have tried to do that too Irishjack and have had some success and it's allowed me to get some decent items. The problem I have now is that a lot of my sets are missing the high value pieces and I don't have a surplus of equal material or a surplus that large to fund some of the Big ticket items. I'm toying with the idea now of starting to sell off my covers except for a small group which might be enough to complete some sets.

And the other thing if you want to sell stamps by auction please don't start the bidding at 30% of CV . So you have a stamp with a CV of $100 and you purchased it for $5 I know everyone wants to make a profit so what do they do They start the bidding at $10 or have a buy now price of $50 or more. If I see a listing like that I move on. I have studied ebay and have noticed that the stamps with high catalog value that is listed with a starting bid of 99 cents are the ones that make money . I have listed high value stamps this way and had great success. At the moment I have a penny red cover on ebay with 4 imperf very similar to the one I have on auction here, At the moment there is one bid of 99 cents but I have 23 watchers and feel comfortable that on the day the stamp will reach the price I want. I know the old saying in business is buy low and sell high but I find with online auctions is you need to start low with your starting bid in order to sell high.
Another thing for repeat customers use a nice cover plaster that envelope with nice old stamps us collectors love receiving stamps that way. You can often buy old mint stamp lots for 70 % off face value use them.
Also keep you shipping cost down don't try to make money by shipping one of the first things people do AND I AM ONE is look at the shipping coast too high and they will move on.
On the auctions on this site I tack on a extra 40 cents or so this covers any pay pal fees ( most times the buyer from this site will pay the fees and even add a dollar to the finial selling costs )
Some times if you drop the shipping cost this will help in the sell.

Stamp collecting is a hobby and a past time any money I make is used for my hobby .

I have tried to do that too Irishjack and have had some success and it's allowed me to get some decent items. The problem I have now is that a lot of my sets are missing the high value pieces and I don't have a surplus of equal material or a surplus that large to fund some of the Big ticket items. I'm toying with the idea now of starting to sell off my covers except for a small group which might be enough to complete some sets.


I do buy stamps just to resale, I often look at the smaller stamp auctions and if I can get a deal I will pick them up and list on ebay.
Yesterday I spent about 125 on some old Irish seahorse overprints.
What I will do is add one sea horse to a stock page of older Irish stamps . For some reason if you place a seahorse on the page the bidding goes mad.
But again I am buying and selling to add to my collection I might make 50 bucks on my 125 investment, wouldn't pay the rent

Lets say I sell a total of $400 a year..here on ebay and whatever...i don't really want the tax man involved...we don't don't itemize as we have no big deductions as retirees..the standard deduction works for us !!

Somebody asked if this was my hobby. Well it used to be so I am working on selling my current inventory, stamps and fdc everywhere. I have recorded what came from where and how much it cost me. Now I am going to start letting go of everything and stop collecting. Just buying lots cheap and on on selling them. I have a source in Indonesia who can get me Indonesian FDC, mini-sheets & stamp sheets etc as they come out, inc limited edition ones. So that is one lot of stamps I can sell at low prices. I also grabbed some lots from other auction sites, not ebay at less than 50c a cover in bulk. I can't see why they would not sell for $2 each. I put a few more items in my store last night. Using ebay.com the fee was 10 cents a listing because I feel I want to include ebay.uk viewers, increase your market by making it visible worldwide. I now have since 2 nights ago three items being bid on and 19 watching items. 4 watching a Spanish mini-sheet for some reason. 2 bidders are fighting over a 19th century USA stamp on a cover that is an uncancelled stamp. I have not even slightly dented my own current inventory let alone other lots I have now acquired from various sources. My theory is buy it for $1 and list it for $2 and there are people world wide that will buy. You have to list hundreds to make 100 bucks, but all I need is a couple of hundred bucks every couple of days to get by. Of course I will try to make more than that. I want to have other lots worth $10, $20 etc to increase weekly takings. The important thing here seems to be is make a small profit on each listing, give the buyer a good price and have customers that are likely to return to your store. Also keep inventory of what sells and have sources where you can get it from. And lastly don't get to attached to stamps or you'll end up collecting again. Plus one more list in multiple sites and prefer sites that have no cost unless item sells. Be vary careful buying early stamps with so called high catalog values. Make sure the stamp has no flaws and is listed correctly. You can't say a stamp is worth $2000 when it has a perf problem or a tear or a thin margin etc. But sellers are doing this on ebay. Try to have stamp contacts and try to bargain with them on stamps before they list them. Stamp markets and auctions are a good place to get inventory. Plus estates. Ok that is what I am learning here. There is mixed reaction here on this subject. So I am going to say you have to be very positive and be able to spot something worth buying on line. Bottom line is I feel I can make some money doing this, not millions but I would not expect that. A couple of hundred a every couple of days and some larger sales every now and then would be a good start. All I can do is count down the days till retirement. I should get a pay out so I can invest some of that in more lots. Thanks everyone for your comments thus far, this is most interesting.

As a convict from the colonies I looked at the homeland at different times since 2008 to buy stamps doing google searches to find postal auctions and looked at uk.co .So I can understand negative attitudes from UK people and their general dislike like towards people that are having a go . It is a failing of mankind.
1st thing I found out is how expensive everything is compared to Aussie. Even with the pound being so low in value to the AUD.I am very upset that I can not take advantage of this situation but I see UK stamps as a no, no to buy or to sell and Aussie stamps as well a no, no to buy in the UK as well. The way things are in the UK it must make for some very unhappy people.

USA and Canada was surprisingly cheap compared to Aussie in most things and the stamps in Canada and USA are an extremely good buy at present. I wished I knew more about these 2 countries stamps. But I am happy to pick up better Aussie stamps in these 2 countries at the minute, at postal auctions as the AUD is so strong. After looking at the cost of running an ebay store on .com I can see how impossible it is in any other countries ebay to make ends meet. This includes the land of OZ. But not the same on some OZ postal auctions.

Folks I just put a question in the Main Stamp Collecting Forum on an old US cover. Now I may have it wrong but my catalog says that one is worth $1000 used. I think it maybe stamp number 64. Can anyone tell me if I am right? See my other posting. I am posting this here because I got this in a bulk lot of stuff that I am breaking up. This shows you can make money buying bulk from auction places online and breaking the inventory up. I listed a couple of old covers on my store real cheap and people bid on them straight away. I think I don't know the values. I have a couple of others like the one below. Can anyone tell me what year this stamp is, does it have any value?