5 Reasons Why I Don't Quit My Job and Become a Full Time Shopper

1) Stress.  In general, I stress about two things related to running my business.  The first is getting negative feedback and the second is being unable to sell things and winding up more in debt than I started.

2) Money.  At a whopping profit of - MAX - $500 a month (before taxes, and that's if I'm doing the numbers right), my family would starve to death.  It would help if eBay didn't charge such astronomical fees - or if Bonanzle traffic picked up a bit - but that's still only a small faction of what I make doing my full time job.

3) Energy.  I took the day off Thurs and Friday, and yesterday was a public holiday in the U.S., so I had 5 full days of tracking down ridiculously expensive crap for cheap, and as fun as that is, it's exhausting!!

4) Location.  I mentioned in a previous post that I'm here on a work visa.  It's a company-sponsored work visa.  And no, despite the fact that I've been here for a gagillion years and I'm probably as American as they come, I can't get a Green Card.  If I quit my full time job I'd have to pack up my stuff and move to Europe (where I can get hot shoes for cheap, but where supermarkets don't open on Sunday, so no thanks!) or Nicaragua (where I'd throw myself in front of the first oncoming ox-drawn cart I laid my eyes on).

5) Money.  Did I mention money?  My margin on the things I sell is not very high.  Typically I try to make between $15 and $50 on shoes and $10 to $20 on clothes, depending on how good a deal I got and how good a deal I can give the customer.  I don't like selling things that don't allow me to offer at least a 50% discount on retail, so that limits the margin or fee I can keep for myself.

As you can probably tell, after five days of shopping, hanging out online and spending a ton of time with my son, this list is my way of convincing myself becoming a full time retailer is a BAD idea.  I like my full time job, I really do, but I love the independance my side business provides.

Alright folks.  Back to work before my boss catches me blogging on the job.  Hope you all had as nice a weekend as I did!

What's With All the eBaying, Man?

Since I started writing this blog, a few of my friends have asked me "what's with all the eBaying, man?" There are a few reasons for the eBaymania, most of them personal, but you asked so here it is.

My husband and I have a TON of debt. It stems from the fact that I'm impulsive almost to the point of being wreckless. It mostly stems from the fact that for the longest time I couldn't live in a place for more than two years without feeling the desperate urge to move. Right after we got married, my husband and I were living in our hometown and I again had the "let's go" itch, not to mention my desire to complete my education by going to business school.

So we cashed in our savings, took out a high interest student loan and with just enough money for 1 year of business school for two of us (or two years for one of us!) we moved to Barcelona and started our MBAs at ESADE.

The experience was phenomenal, but times were ROUGH. Let's just say budgeting is not my strong suit, so there were times I literally had to walk to school because we didn't have enough money for the bus. Luckily I got a very well paid summer internship, and that fueled part of our second year, along with my trusty Amex.

Needless to say, we came out of the experience much richer in spirit but much, much poorer in essence. We had over $100k in debt by the time I started my new job in London, and in retrospect, London is probably not the best city to move to when you're in debt and have to live on a tight budget.

Fast forward three years and our debt has been cut by nearly half. We have a little under a year left to go on our high interest loan and we've managed to pay off that Amex a couple of times in the meantime (even though it's nearly maxed out again now).

So what does this have to do with eBaying? I'm getting to the point soon, I promise.

Moving to the US, where we live now, really helped alleviate the situation. But we're still coming up short every month and have very little disposible income. The apartment needs decorating and we can't spare the cash to do it. I don't want to charge ANYTHING to my credit card unless absolutely necessary. In short, I'm sick and tired of being BROKE.

I don't usually give out unsolicited advice, but this is relevant to my story (I promise). There are TWO golden rules I swear by, and I'm going to tell you what they are right now. You ready? Here we go:

1) The only thing in life you can control is what you do. My pet peeves are people who complain and do nothing about their problems and control freaks. A) You have no right to complain unless you're willing to get your ass in gear to fix the problem, and B) You gain nothing by stressing over things you have no control over (other than causing me annoyance).

2) Life is not an all or nothing proposition. My husband and I have been meaning to lose some weight for a WHILE. As part of our weight loss plan, I proposed we replace the white bread with whole wheat and the whole milk with skim. His response was, "that's not even going to make a dent!" My thought is that EVERYTHING makes a dent. If you can't go for an hour, going to the gym for 15 minutes is always better than NOT going to the gym. Eating a tub of fronzen yogurt is marginally better than eating a tub of ice cream. EVERYTHING COUNTS. Every ounce, and every penny.

So, now that you know how I think, you can understand why I started trading on eBay. Sure, I'm not making millions by selling my trinkets for $.99 (or $20.71, woohoo, go piñata skirt!), but hey, the 170-odd bucks I've made in the last couple of months are $170 I didn't used to have. If selling a couple of items here and there means I can allocate an extra $5 to paying off my credit card, then it's all well worth it. And if you can think of a better way for me to get a little bit richer, I'm willing to tke suggestions, too!