The Reynolds

Turk Stats

2005-11-22T22:15:00.000-08:00

I just hit 1000 hits submitted. These are my stats thus far.

Hits Submitted : 1000
Approved : 934 - 92.6%
Rejected : 75 - 7.4%
Pending : -9 ( WTF )

92.6% Don't seem to shabby to me. I just made my first 20$ transfer today as well. Things are getting approved much faster now, which gives me some more incentive to do more turking.

In Other News...

2005-11-19T17:05:00.000-08:00

It has become official.

I will be attending Illinois State University this spring semester.

wo0t.

Whoops

2005-11-19T17:02:00.000-08:00

Just realized you can't see the titles in that pic below, here is a new one.

Here we go...

2005-11-19T16:32:00.000-08:00

Ok, this post is in response to Andys comment from my last post, concerning Ebay. So, if you haven't read his comment, I suggest you do so.

Point # 1 - "I don't own much of Anything"

Neither do I. I started this ebay thing with my comic books, but since then the vast majority of what I've sold isn't mine, I'm selling for someone else and taking a comminsion. I started with the collection of playing cards we inherited, that were actually my moms. It was a large collection, and I'm actually not quite done with it yet. You wouldn't think that you could make much money off a collection of playing cards, right? Wrong. Playing cards have an entire category devoted to them on Ebay. Right now there are just over 4000 auctions of playing cards on ebay, ranging in price from .01 - to 1100$. There is someone that collects almost anything you can think of, its important to keep that in mind. You would be amazed at the things some people will pay good money for. The 2nd set of items I got from my parents church. These items consisted of about 5 dolls, and a collection of about 40 thimbles. Yes, thimbles, for sewing. There is another entire category for thimbles on ebay, currently just over 6000 auctions in progress ranging in price from .01-999.99$. Just today i'm finishing the thimble collection, looks like I will have taken in about 120$ for the thimbles. I also sold the dolls for around 100$, dolls are obviosly collectable.

Point #2 - "Shipping bothers me"

Shipping is actually very very easy, I usually go to the post office 2-3 times a weeks to ship packages. I ship with the USPS, as do most people who sell on ebay. Inless you are a "big-time" seller, and thus have an account with UPS, its just not pratical to ship through them. Before you post an item you should decide how much you want to charge for shipping. Finding out how much your going to charge is very easy.

www.usps.com

Just go there to find out about how much postage is going to cost. I always add about .50 to whatever USPS says on the webpage, to allow for some margin of error. You also of course have to charge for your shipping materials(boxes, tape, padding, etc). I'm very lucky in that I can get used boxes from my work, this allows me to charge less for shipping(and make more profit). However, I also ship many items in padded envelopes. I get these from Sams Club in boxes of 25. The size I usually use comes out to .21 cents an envelope. So I add that to whatever I think the postage will be, add my margin of error #, and there is my shipping charge.

Above I have posted a sale report for one item I sold. I use excel, as you know, and this line shows me the cost of the item to me, how much I sold it for, profit made off item, how much I charged them for shipping, how much shipping actually cost me, profit made from shipping, paypal&ebay fees, and finally my moms cut, and my cut of the profit. I posted this particular line for a reason, as you can see this deck didn't cost me anything. So the .99 I sold it for is all profit. You can also see that my mom only made .27 cents off this deck, while I somehow made 1.30$. How is this possible? Shipping charges are my responseabilty, not my mothers, so if I make a profit off shipping, its my profit. Thus, off small items like this I still take home a tidy profit.

My Money(s)

2005-11-17T23:34:00.000-08:00

So, how does Mr. Reynolds make his money? Well, let me tell you.

Currently you could say I have 3 incomes...

#1 - REI - This is my job. Where the bulk of my income comes from. I've worked at REI ever since Brainsnacks(best job ever) closed. It will be a year this month. Crazy, haven't had a job that long except Aurelios(2nd best job ever). My 12 month evaluation is next week, I really don't care cause I'm getting out of here. However, I do care about my excels bonus for the 2nd part of the year. I guess I like my job, but i'm not particulary attached to it. One of the assistant store managers is Darren Wilner, from Brainsnacks, which is just funny. He got me the job through, sweet.

#2 - Ebay - This is my secondary source of income. I sell crap on ebay, and man I do mean crap. It started because I had been accumlating a whole lot of comic books I knew I wasen't going to read again, so I started reselling them on ebay. Then my mom asked me if I could sell some stuff for her, I said sure, but I'm taking 20% of whatever we make. She gives me a collection of playing cards we inherited and tells me to sell them. Probably about 150 decks when I started. There is a pretty large market for this crap on ebay. Most will only sell for .99, but some go for more. I think the most valuble I've sold was a Corvette Silver Anniversay deck, got about 18$ for it. Needless to say, I'm not making much off those. If I sell a deck for .99, after all is said and done I get about .12, but it did help build my feedback. Those decks should all be gone in the next couple of weeks, finally. Through my mom, my parents church heard I was doing a lot on ebay, so they asked me to sell a doll & thimble collection that someone donated to the church garage sale. They figured they could get more through me, than at the garage sale. I said sure, but i'm taking 20%. I did pretty well with that stuff, bout 100$ for the dolls, and prob around 50$ for the thimbles. Now, up until this point my book keeping has been less than perfect. At the end of every month I would pull up my paypal records and calculate what I owed to the church & my mom. I wasen't really keeping track of how much I was making from this stuff, or from shipping. Well, all that is about to change. I acquired Microsoft Office today and I'm having a great time with excel, I love this program. My next big Ebay project is a group of belt buckles I picked up at a garge sale for 10 cents each. I bought 39 belt buckles, for 3.90$. A freakin steal, there is a great market for these things on Ebay. Tonight I whipped up a worksheet on excel that will calculate my profit from the item, shipping, and all the totals. All I have to do is put the numbers in. I realize this is not a difficult type of sheet to put together, but I can't wait to start sellin these things. I'm keeping one buckle for myself, and I gave one away, so I'm already operating at -.20 cents. However, I only need to sell one buckle for 3.80$ to break even, and I've got 37. That also doesn't take into account any profit I make from shipping. Above is a picture of what my little worksheet looks like.

#3 - Mturk - This is new, and I'm not sure I would consider a real source of income, but I'm making money, so what the hell. Mturk is down right now so I can't post my stats, but I will later. I've been getting real annoyed lately at Mturk because of all the pending HITS, so I hadn't been doing that money. However, I just learned that after 30 days anything that is still pending, is automatically approved. This means in 30 days if I still have a shitload of pending hits, a lot of money is gonna start coming in real fast. I like that.

www.mturk.com

Check it Out.

Here is what's up...

2005-11-17T14:30:00.000-08:00

So, you wanted a real post, and here it is.

I suppose there is a lot going on in my life right now, and now your gonna here about it. First lets talk about my school situation. After summer quarter at COD, I said I'm done with this. I was fried and had had it with COD. So I took fall semester off to work & reflect. I should be going down to ISU spring semester, which starts in January, which is soon. Why ISU? Because its far enough away that I have to live there, but not so far I can't come back for a weekend every so often. Its affordable. I know people there(namely Pat & Vern). Hopefully I'll like it, maybe I'll hate it, in which case you can count on me transfering somewhere in the city. Now, its only about 95% certain I'm going there, this should become 100% this week or early next week. Sooner the better, cause man I've got shit to do. I'll have to get my financial stuff straight, find a place to live, go down there and talk to an academic advisor, and get ready to move. Ok, that is my school situation.

That was a long one that I doubt you found very interesting. They'll be more soon, prob tonight.

I have a blog now.

2005-11-16T21:50:00.000-08:00

So, due to peer pressure I have finally created my own blog. Whatever shall I post here? I don't know, but I doubt it will be very interesting, so don't get your hopes up.