Buying/Selling Best Practices

[Cwilliams1214]

I'm new to Rokslide and have some scopes that I would like to sell in the future. Does anyone have any words of wisdom for the best practices for selling or buying on forums? Is it essentially just an honor system? Is it typical to request payment prior to shipping, or vice-versa with a purchase agreement or something.

 

[JFK]

Offer to take a phone call or FaceTime so the buyer knows it’s not a scam.
Price things to move and you’ll deal with less people and less back and forth
Good communication. When selling something I make it a point to treat it as if someone bought from a store. Get it shipped ASAP, send them tracking. People are extending a fair bit of trust when they buy something from a stranger sight unseen and pay up front. Return the favor by showing them you are who you said you are and that the thing has shipped.

 

[Cwilliams1214]

Offer to take a phone call or FaceTime so the buyer knows it’s not a scam.
Price things to move and you’ll deal with less people and less back and forth
Good communication. When selling something I make it a point to treat it as if someone bought from a store. Get it shipped ASAP, send them tracking. People are extending a fair bit of trust when they buy something from a stranger sight unseen and pay up front. Return the favor by showing them you are who you said you are and that the thing has shipped.

I appreciate that insight. Thank you!

 

[Wheels]

Always get full payment before shipping.

 

[Axlrod]

First, establish a presence here. No one is sending a stack of money to a stranger that joined 3 days ago. Not being rude, but you wouldn't either.
Once you have 8-12 months and some meaningful posts:
Take good pictures, outside in natural light.
Post all the specs etc. The more detail, the less questions you need to answer.
Research the value of your item, if you are close to new price, they would rather buy a new one.
Put a single price including shipping. Flat rate USPS priority is the same price to everywhere execpt maybe AK & HI. It's easy to research.

Oh and welcome to Rokslide! This is a great place to learn stuff (and spend money on new stuff you learn about ). And we can always use your unique experiences to teach us stuff we didn't know.

 

[fwafwow]

First, establish a presence here. No one is sending a stack of money to a stranger that joined 3 days ago. Not being rude, but you wouldn't either.
Once you have 8-12 months and some meaningful posts:

I agree with all of what @Axlrod said, but especially the above. There is a decent amount of scams, on both the buy and sell sides, so as a brand new member you will probably have a smaller universe of buyers, will need to agree to Goods & Services, some verification, and may need to price below what a longer standing member could charge / or some combination thereof.

My $0.02

 

[Cwilliams1214]

First, establish a presence here. No one is sending a stack of money to a stranger that joined 3 days ago. Not being rude, but you wouldn't either.
Once you have 8-12 months and some meaningful posts:
Take good pictures, outside in natural light.
Post all the specs etc. The more detail, the less questions you need to answer.
Research the value of your item, if you are close to new price, they would rather buy a new one.
Put a single price including shipping. Flat rate USPS priority is the same price to everywhere execpt maybe AK & HI. It's easy to research.

Oh and welcome to Rokslide! This is a great place to learn stuff (and spend money on new stuff you learn about ). And we can always use your unique experiences to teach us stuff we didn't know.

I hear you there. Kicking myself for not joining earlier I'm building out a custom Tikka and am trying to sell some gear before diving into the next thing. I appreciate the reply!

 

[Abacist]

Great tips for selling. Will refer to this before I list anything.

What advice do you have for NGs who will eventually be buyers?

 

[Weldor]

I know this will cause some discord, but I do MO or Check. The electronic payment stuff is iffy to me, and way to much personal info involved. JMHO.

 

[tony]

Give and leave feedback - if you buy or sell, leave hopefully positive FB

Everyone wants your stuff for “free”. Doesn’t matter where you sell it. Be prepared for offers up to half your asking and you still paying shipping and eating the fees.

Price things to what you can afford to loose. That $400.00 item, try a hundred off, but realize your probably going to loose money to make a few bucks.

Pictures and make them decent
Item sizes, material types, features, add it all to a listing. People are too lazy to simply google said item. But, they sure as hell know your asking to much for it.

Price reasonable. Even your new in the box sealed item.

Call offer to call buyers.
Cover the PayPal fee, it’s not much money.

Shipping insurance- that covers you my selling friend, not me the buyer.
Buy a cheap scale
Use pirate ship - thank me later.

 

[Steve300xcw]

I know this will cause some discord, but I do MO or Check. The electronic payment stuff is iffy to me, and way to much personal info involved. JMHO.

Theres plenty of info on a check for a guy to screw with you if he wanted to....

I do like MO's though.

 

[Trial153]

One word. Communication.

 

[RockAndSage]

What everyone's shared above is solid. Only thing I can really add, is:

1) Buy something, even something small from someone, who has plenty of good feedback already - leave good feedback for them, and they'll likely do it for you quickly as well. That is a demonstration of trustworthiness, and gets that ball rolling for you.

2) Start selling your cheaper stuff first, as it'll get the deals going without needing high levels of trust. Nobody's going to buy a $2k scope from someone on here with zero feedback/history. But guys will take a chance on a $50 item for $30 quite readily.

3) Limit yourself to 1 item per post, ideally, but at most no more than 2 or 3 items per post. You want the headline to be specific and grab the eye of people in the market for that thing - you don't want them to have to hunt inside your post.

4) Stuff in great or like-new condition priced at about 65-70% of retail will move fast - enough guys will jump on it quickly without lowballing you. More than that, and you get fewer offers and more haggling.

The first thing I do when considering buying something from someone here, is to look at their feedback, followed by their most recent activity. If they haven't made an actual comment on here in awhile, I'm very skeptical of it being a scam. I'll take a chance with little or no feedback if it's a good price, on a small-value item. I think most people are like that here, so build your reputation accordingly.

 

[RockAndSage]

What everyone's shared above is solid. Only thing I can really add, is:

1) Buy something, even something small from someone, who has plenty of good feedback already - leave good feedback for them, and they'll likely do it for you quickly as well. That is a demonstration of trustworthiness, and gets that ball rolling for you.

2) Start selling your cheaper stuff first, as it'll get the deals going without needing high levels of trust. Nobody's going to buy a $2k scope from someone on here with zero feedback/history. But guys will take a chance on a $50 item for $30 quite readily.

3) Limit yourself to 1 item per post, ideally, but at most no more than 2 or 3 items per post. You want the headline to be specific and grab the eye of people in the market for that thing - you don't want them to have to hunt inside your post.

4) Stuff in great or like-new condition priced at about 65-70% of retail will move fast - enough guys will jump on it quickly without lowballing you. More than that, and you get fewer offers and more haggling.

The first thing I do when considering buying something from someone here, is to look at their feedback, followed by their most recent activity. If they haven't made an actual comment on here in awhile, I'm very skeptical of it being a scam. I'll take a chance with little or no feedback if it's a good price, on a small-value item. I think most people are like that here, so build your reputation accordingly.

Oh, and FFS, if you have more than 1 page of bumps, drop the price.

 

[Jimmy]

Welcome, it's custom here to GIVE the first item to a long time member, such as, idk, myself for example. Once I get the free scope and check it out, I can give you the thumbs up and other's can, uh, trust you and stuff....

 

[full choke]

I'm new to Rokslide and have some scopes that I would like to sell in the future. Does anyone have any words of wisdom for the best practices for selling or buying on forums? Is it essentially just an honor system? Is it typical to request payment prior to shipping, or vice-versa with a purchase agreement or something.

First: post your objects for sale in the CORRECT classifieds category

Second: give as clear and concise a description of items as possible

Third: include clear photos of said items

Fourth: price items realistically. Either include the cost to ship in your pricing (TYD), or clearly state the price does not include actual shipping

GLWS

 

[Jimmy]

jk btw