I can save maybe $500 a month. Trying to figure out my finances

[Kittenpanzer]

I completely forgot about this forum for a minute but it isn't going great. I'm just on a treadmill of repayment and barely existing within my means.

As for reselling: I have very little I actually can resell. Broken off-brand electronics and out-of-date third-hand clothing (even if you filter out the stuff that's actually ragged). I have a few trinkets I bought on impulse, or misordered and couldn't return. I mean maybe I could clear out my furniture and just store things in boxes; most of said furniture is cheap though. I'm just not that desperate when I could pick up part-time work or yes, continue selling plasma.

Buying things to resell is a hard no: I'm positive I'll just end up with my tiny studio turned into a hoarder house, while being out an extra grand.

I have maybe 20 items listed (eBay) and one of them just sold for the first time in months. I've had other items listed for over 2y unsold. I even tried to buy things to flip, and that was the result. Either outright unsold or sold at a loss because I was sick of it being clutter.

No car (or license), so I can't realistically drive around and be a junker.

I'd love to use FB marketplace, but I've given them everything bit of personal info, short of the soul of my firstborn, and they still autoban every account I try to make. I literally cannot have a Facebook account for some unknown reason.

I had one of those data-selling accounts, but lately they won't let me cash out so I've just abandoned it; they don't seem to run properly on my devices anyway. $20 a year didn't seem worth it.

You can see why I absolutely despair of making more money in any kind of short term. Getting a degree takes years and white collar jobs are being laid off. In my own situation, nothing is going into investments, just debt repayments. I gambled my IRA so there's only about $50 in there now. AND I'm older, so time isn't on my side.

I'm kind of at a point where I can't even conceive of 5 figure accounts, let alone more. But I also question the value of scrambling around for $5 here or $20 there.

[Kittenpanzer]

I also completely bombed my attempts to stay in a food budget; went right back to my "snacks and takeout every other day" after maybe a week of sticking to it. I didn't actually add up what I spent, I just know it's a lot.

AND I sorted out an old medical bill: I owe another $1.2k. I'm on an interest-free payment plan that should clear it in a year or less.

[LivingAlmostLarge]

okay so the easiest thing is getting a second job? Maybe nannying on weekend?

[LivingAlmostLarge]

I've been giving a lot of thought to my reselling business now that I'm more than a year into retirement. I really ramped up the business as I approached and entered retirement. It is a lot of fun. I've met some great people. It keeps me physically and mentally active and gives me (and us together) something to do with a lot of our time. The raw return on investment is solid.

All of that said, however, the actual amount I'm earning isn't really that much. I've realized that the total amount I'm making in a year between ebay and Replacements is the same or less than our portfolio earns in a day frequently. I've always said I wasn't doing it for the money and that's still true. I just feel like I'm at a point where there are other things I'd rather be doing with a lot of that time. Also, specifically with the china sales, I got to a point where I was working on that a lot. To prepare for a road trip to North Carolina, I really had to push myself to acquire about $5,000 worth of merchandise to make the trip worthwhile and I have less than 60 days to do that each time. I haven't enjoyed that pressure.

So I'm looking to trim things back. I am not going to stop reselling as I do really enjoy it. If I want to remain a supplier for Replacements, I do have the $5,000 annual sales quota, which really isn't all that hard to meet. I did it this year with my first trip in February. I was on track to do about $25,000 in sales to them this year but that's just more work than I want to do. As long as I can at least keep exceeding the $5,000 mark that would be fine. I'd rather not lose access to their database.

As far as ebay, I've been focusing more on catching up with my "death pile", items that have been sitting around for ages that need to get listed. That includes personal items from our own collection and belongings that I want to sell. This dovetails with our ongoing efforts to declutter. I've backed off some on attending estate sales. I still go to them, as I did yesterday when I bought 3 items, but I'm not hitting several each week or getting there an hour early to be at the top of the list.

So basically I'm trying to take it back to just being a fun thing I do on the side rather than a major focus of my life and time. I'm totally glad I did it the way I did it because I think it helped with the transition into retirement and this phase of our lives. And had I not done it, I would have always been wondering if I could have. Now I know, as I've always said, that if we needed the money, I could always ramp it back up. At the pace I was going, I probably would have done about $40,000 in sales this year and could absolutely have done even more if I wanted to. It's an awesome way to make extra money regardless of your situation. We're just at a point in our lives where I don't need to work that hard at it because it's not about the money for us.

Stay tuned. I will still post my monthly numbers and experiences. I've been reselling since high school. I'm not about to stop now.

This was disneysteve most recent post. Maybe reach out and ask how to start reselling and making real money