ebay as a hobby

[keziak]

Anyone here sell on ebay as a hobby, not as a business? I am trying to come up with a model in which I keep my hand in due to having stuff I can't just list on Amazon instead (such as lots). I am not quite ready to wholesale throw the stuff into a ravine. If nothing else I still have a ton of manga to do something with. Also anime series and some miscellaneous other stuff.

What does selling as a hobby mean to you? Strictly limiting your number of listings and/or the time you spend on the site? 

I am thinking of cutting back to listing only one day a week and not Sunday so I can take more of my weekends off. Maybe just 10 auctions a week or whatever. No more listing single books and gradually removing the listings. Maybe sales will end up being so low I'll finally take the plunge and close up shop. I just don't want to run two full-bore businesses anymore.

[sin-n-dex]

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@keziak wrote:

good heavens, typically you work 40 hours a week at your FT job then an additional 4 hours a day on ebay? Is that every  day? That's a whole lot of work. Maintaining 2 online businesses (ebay and Amazon) has meant a whole lot of work for me and I"m sick a nd tired of [insert whininess everyone has heard before]. I've started working with a nutrition coach to deal with my eating patterns and the conversation got around to issues of overwork and I started tearing up just talking about Ebay. Enough is enough. 

Plus, organically I will be downsizing my auction business a lot due to selling off inventory a nd disposing of a lot of the rest of it. I no longer go out and bring home tons of stuff to list. It feels GREAT to see the house gradually emptying out. I still get lots of books to list on Amazon and if I cut ebay back hard I'll have more time and energy for that while hopefully also taking time off to rest and pursue hobbies like reading and gardening.

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I've got good and bad stuff to share... for one, I don't have to worry about the house needing to be emptying out because I don't keep stuff here (or I didn't... until I bought several postcard and stamp collections, now there's stuff here... but it's kept in closets).

Also what's bad is doing eBay at night on the computer isn't much different than doing work all day. I'm in document processing (legal docs) and lots of my eBay admin tasks don't seem much different than uploading and viewing a document, modifying it to rotate and resize pages... all kinda like editing eBay photos and putting up listings.

4 Hours a day isn't every day... last night I took a 2 hour nap because I needed to rest, it was a long day at work. Tonight it's 9pm almost and I've been sitting on my bed with the laptop since 4:30 (creating auctions in SixBit for my upcoming Sunday auctions, sending out offers, printing packing slips and creating shipping labels, and reading the forum).

Saturdays are my "days off" the computer... but I still process stuff. I do whatever I want. Last weekend I was taking my left over vacation money and packaging and labelling it for listing. then I took pictures of it. I also was packing up and organizing all the loot I got in South Africa (Royalty medallions that apply to the royal visit and events in South Africa). I consider all that to be fun stuff, and not really work at all.

Sundays are when I do my excel spreadsheets and log my sales for the coin shop to calculate their cheque (as the funds go into my personal bank account first), and Sunday afternoons auctions are ending, so orders are packed most of Sunday. I give myself Friday night and Saturdays off the packing orders part and get caught up on Sundays. Sundays feel like work though because I have to pack orders, and I consider that to be the only real chore in the whole process (the one thing I have to do whether I want to do it or not). But I tell myself getting orders out means customers get them quickly and come back to buy something else sooner.

I have a life partner who is running his own business and works 12 hours daily even on weekends, so we're a good fit for each other. He spends time in his home office on the computer (not much unlike what I do) and sometimes spending time together is being in the same room working on our businesses and taking breaks to socialize.

I get giant collections sometimes that take weeks and months to process, so as soon as I'm done with a collection a new one comes along... I got a stamp collection that took me 6 months to process, and when that was almost done I got a coin collection which will take 6 months to process and run auctions for. There are smaller projects that come along. I never have enough time for **that** part of the business... most of my spare time is spent shipping orders or doing bookkeeping. Tonight I made time to get the next week of auctions ready to go.

C.

[keziak]

Well, I think your work ethic is incredible. I do like the part about how your partner and you are in sync in many ways and take the breaks to socialize. My husband the lawyer works hard all week but also manages to spend time any evening he isn't lawyering at city council meetings reading, listening to apparently hilarious bits on the Internet, and playing music. His weekends are sacred, no hint of work unless something (very rarely) is a crisis or a major court case he needs to prepare for. 

I on the other hand are a commonplace drudge. Last year I started asking myself was I going to put off any semblance of real life until retirement. Who knows, I could get some dire condition or disease before then. Meanwhile I was nearly crippled with bad knees. I decided that by goodness I would make the time to exercise and it's turned my life upside down in the best way (though getting up at 4:15 to hit the pool at 5 is tough sometimes). 

In 2024 I want to get my eating house in order and actually tend my extensive gardens. I know  I can't do that and still work (scout, list on two sites, handle all the mail) so many hours a week. I am going to force myself to be OK with that (ie make less money, have more time). Might as well face it, I'm addicted to ebay. Especially auctions. Well anyway, said all this many times. I've sworn to my husband I mean it this time (cutting back) and maybe instead of shrugging he will hold me to it.

[dogofwar777]

When I sold here I considered it a hobby and a way to make a quick buck. I would only list maybe 2 or 3 items at a time because I didn't want to deal with managing multiple listing and didn't have time to run back and forth to the post office. I would list all the items at the same time and have them all end at the same time and it worked for me. I would sell them and ship then list a few more items. It was fun and I got to meet great people here, some of who I still talk to.

[mam98031]

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@keziak wrote:

Maybe "hobby" isn't the word I am looking for. Maybe just "very part-time".  I don't want to sell anything that did NOT make me at least some profit!  I am reminded of people I see locally who sell on Amazon FBA and pay cash for books, in such volume that they may be "making" a few dollars on some but not all of them, then comes all of the FBA fees which are astronomical. Not at all sure what they are doing but surely making any money isn't it. 

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IRS doesn't care if you are part time, occasional, full time, double time or whatever.  If you sell for a profit, you need to claim the sales on your tax reports.

As to the rest, I don't think that has anything to do with your sales, or does it.

[mam98031]

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@msmaggie060 wrote:

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@mam98031 wrote:

I am sure there are many sellers that personally consider themselves a Hobby Seller, but IRS would have a different opinion of that.

Per the IRS:

A hobby is any activity that a person pursues because they enjoy it and with no intention of making a profit.

https://www.irs.gov/newsroom/heres-how-to-tell-the-difference-between-a-hobby-and-a-business-for-tax....

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mam, because we are calling ourselves hobby sellers doesn’t mean that we don’t prepare and send in our taxes each year.

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Maybe you don't, but that is not true for many.  I've been on many threads with this subject and somehow some people are convinced that if they call themselves a Hobby seller they don't have to report the income.

The rules for IRS is simple.  They expect all of us to report all our gross income of $400 or more to the IRS.  That is BEFORE deductions for expenses.

[mam98031]

Having fun doing a job doesn't make it a hobby either.  I've had paying jobs that I have very much enjoyed over the years and they weren't hobbies.  Then I've had other jobs I've loved and never been paid a dime for.

"No one is going to tell me I can't enjoy my hobbies just because I sell the result of the stuff I make with the materials."  I have no idea where you got this idea.  The IRS says NOTHING about enjoying your hobbies.  Whether or not you enjoy making the stuff you make has absolutely no bearing on your taxes.  I simply don't know where you got this from.

[mam98031]

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@12345jamesstamps wrote:

So a kid selling lemonade at a stand because he is making a profit who is maybe 10 years old should declare that to the IRS? Curious...

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Well IDK and I think you are trying to discuss this using an example that is not even close to the spirit of the conversation that has been going on in this thread.

[keziak]

Of course I pay taxes no matter what I make.

[keziak]

for example everyone I know who sells on Facebook Marketplace tells me they do not pay taxes on w hat they make there and at least one of them makes a lot. I've recently started experimenting with selling there and keeping track of what I make for putting on my Schedule C for 2024. Same as for the year I made money selling to Decluttr. 

[dbfolks166mt]

for example everyone I know who sells on Facebook Marketplace tells me they do not pay taxes on w hat they make there and at least one of them makes a lot. I've recently started experimenting with selling there and keeping track of what I make for putting on my Schedule C for 2024. Same as for the year I made money selling to Decluttr. 

     People who sell on FB and CL may possibly be skirting their tax liabilities for the moment just as they do on eBay if they do not get a 1099. That may change for some sellers next year depending on how their buyers are paying and where the Fed or other states go with the 1099-K issuance thresholds.

     You are in VA, as am I, and I am sure you remember when VA, rather quietly, changed the 1099-K reporting threshold to $600 in 2020 even before the proposed Federal change that was part of the Biden American Rescue Plan Act of 2021. That law passed in July of 2020 and they made the total gross amount processed by financial processors retroactive back to January 1 of 2020. 

     Things remained pretty quiet until January/February of 2021 when people started receiving 1099-K's from PayPay, Venmo, GooglePay.......... I still purchase items off FB, CL, garage sales, estate sales and other local forums as well. Despite the shift towards electronic payment methods a lot of sellers on those venues will now only accept cash payment since it is literally impossible to track. 

[luckythewinner]

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@12345jamesstamps wrote:

So a kid selling lemonade at a stand because he is making a profit who is maybe 10 years old should declare that to the IRS? Curious...

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No. This is covered by IRS Publication 501. Generally, a minor who may be claimed as a dependent only needs to file a return if their income exceeds their standard deduction. 

Single dependents

You must file a return if any of the following apply.

• Your unearned income was more than $1,250.
• Your earned income was more than $13,850.
• Your gross income was more than the larger of:
  • $1,250, or
  • Your earned income (up to $13,450) plus $400.

https://www.irs.gov/publications/p501#en_US_2023_publink1000220702

[luckythewinner]

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@mam98031 wrote:

I am sure there are many sellers that personally consider themselves a Hobby Seller, but IRS would have a different opinion of that.

Per the IRS:

A hobby is any activity that a person pursues because they enjoy it and with no intention of making a profit.

https://www.irs.gov/newsroom/heres-how-to-tell-the-difference-between-a-hobby-and-a-business-for-tax....

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This is a partial quote from the introductory paragraph of an IRS publication that goes on to list 11 determining factors that must be considered together. 

[pcobra93]

The IRS also says that a tax "refund" is income....and must be reported next year so they can steal it back.

[keziak]

I actually prefer electronic payments for MP.  I'm just getting started and books are a hard nut to crack there. I'm not sure, do PP and Venmo have threshholds for sending 1099s or do t hey do it for any amount?

[broto_64]

Regardless of why we sell here Ebay considers selling here as a business, whether low or high volume, 1 sale a year or 100 a day, makes no difference.