Dig This Treasure!

Well, I’m in the middle of my second full week of time off from work, and I’m happy to report that I am doing well with purging eBay World. Maybe not as fast as Adam might like, but things are moving. Here are some updated pictures. 

The other day, Adam came in and started opening the drawers of these two dressers. He looked at me and horror and said, “How are you going to do this?” Thanks, babe! 

So as you can see, I spent my first day of purge just organizing things by thing “type”… my main issue so far is that I have some nice clothes and maternity stuff to sell, and I don’t really want to list that stuff along with my stash of old porn that needs to be re-homed. So I have to try to sell things in phases. 

The best thing that happened so far is that I sold this Ralph Lauren sweater that I bought at a sale and never wore. I sold it because this crazy person was willing to pay $65.00 for it. 

Needless to say, we all had a few laughs over this lost in translation style communication. So effin’ cute and funny. Thanksgiving. 

-Sarah

Hi all. 

I can’t believe I’m posting these pictures, but I promised Erin that I would post something today, and I’m frantically finishing a bunch of work before I’m off for summer break, so you all get to benefit. 

I am currently growing a baby, who will be out of my body and in the real world sometime in late October/early November, and he needs a place to sleep! So eBay World is turning into Baby World… except there’s a lot of work to do.

So here’s what has come of eBay world in the last two years or so. Meaning, here’s all the stuff I have to get rid of. 

In an effort to complete operation Move Junk Out and Move Baby In, I will be documenting the purge on a weekly basis. You see something you like? Tell me and I’ll list it on eBay first! 

I hate to admit this but there is also stuff in other areas of my house. Oh, the shame. 

I’m excited about and terrified of the challenge that awaits me! Wait, I’m not even talking about taking care of a baby. I’m talking about getting rid of this sh*t! 

Wish me luck! 

-Sarah

A few weeks ago, Organ alerted us to a seriously amazing eBay store. 

What’s so amazing about this store, you ask? Well, the people running it have decided that including people with their items is the way to go. I can’t say they made the wrong choice. When we looked at the listings, Erin and I were dying laughing. 

I especially love the older lady in these pictures because she sort of looks like my maternal grandmother, and she ALSO sort of looks like Maxine. 

Anyway, here are some of my favorites from their listings a few weeks ago. 

Tag teamin’ it! 

There she is… Miss Amerrrrrricaaaaa…. 

Plate boobs? 

Anyway, I hope nobody thinks we’re being mean here. It was just too hilarious to not post these pictures and hey, they’re already on the ol’ Internet! 

To wrap this up, I will leave you with this listing–you have to read the description to realize how incredible it is. Have you ever seen a more apologetic eBay listing? Also, there are THREE WATCHERS. 

Mad props to Organ for passing this our way! 

-Sarah

I’ve always stayed away from buying vinyl records because they seem notoriously worthless on the resale market.  Most sell for only $1 each, and even if you have a more valuable one, the record grading scale is super subjective and finicky.  On top of that, they’re also impractical to listen to nowadays, so you’re only selling to true collectors (who, like mentioned, are annoying and finicky).

Recently though, my interest in records has peaked. The first thing that changed my mind about these otherwise frisbees was friend Organtitus selling a Misfits record he bought in the 80s…FOR OVER $600.

AND IT WAS IN BAD CONDITION.  Wow.

Then, Zach went to Dixieland Flea Market to shop for old watches and stumbled on this:

And this:

Both of these albums are super rare.  The first is The 13th Floor Elevators debut album in Mono, which is apparently important to collectors.  This record in mint condition sells for over $1,000.  Zach’s copy had definitely seen better days, but for $20, it was worth buying for sure. 

What’s funny is that Zach looked right over this record because he wasn’t expecting to see it.  When looking at record collections, you expect to see the usual 3 Dog Night, Pat Benatar, and Wings albums.  You don’t expect to see a super rare and valuable album…especially not at Dixieland. 

The second album is the Silver Apples self-titled debut album.  While not particularly valuable, it is MEGA rare.  Again, this isn’t in great shape, but it was $2. 

Zach ended up selling The 13th Floor Elevators album for $100, even though the jacket was taped and the album had scratches.  Amazing.

And get this, the other day I was watching American Pickers and Mike Wolfe bought a copy of the Beatles’ “Yesterday and Today” album with the rare “butcher cover.”  The album was pulled for its controversial cover, but supposedly 100 copies still float around in existence today.

Mike paid $500 for his copy because it was pretty beat up, but this record can be worth as much as $15,000.

So what is the most rare record?  Or perhaps the most valuable?  Well, in 1999, a copy of John Lennon’s and Yoko Ono’s “Double Fantasy” sold for over $400,000 at auction.  The reason?  It was autographed by Lennon just hours before his death.  And who did he sign it for?  None other than this eventual murderer, Mark David Chapman.

Ok, so one last record thing.  Check out this super corny deleted scene from High Fidelity. It features most of the rarest records out there. It also features the corniest content of a movie scene possibly ever.

-Erin

Wow, we’ve been Extreme Slackers lately. No, in all seriousness, things have been super hectic and busy so while we’ve got some things to write about, the time has just been escaping us. 

More posts will be forthcoming, but in the meantime, we wanted to give you guys a Big Hug Mug update. First, and most importantly, Adam’s Big Hug Mug sale did not disappoint: 

Also on the Big Hug Mug front, Erin and I have not found another since the discovery. How this is possible, I am not sure.

However, I just did a quick search to see if these babies are still hot commodities and they are. And another interesting thing I discovered is that some a-holes are actually making money selling fakes. 

I guess this one sold to someone who is color blind. 

Here’s another fake with a questionable color: 

That one sold for $36. What the heck?! 

There are few things that annoy me more than FAKE THINGS. Ugh.

The legit ones consistently sell for much more, so all you hunters should still keep your eyes peeled! 

-Sarah

We’ve written about interesting interactions with people on eBay quite a few times, but one of Adam’s most recent experiences as a seller really takes the cake.

Back when Adam and I started our Christmas eBay Battle (he won, by the way), he listed an old TOKYObay watch that nobody seemed to want. 

Finally, a few weeks ago, someone purchased it. And a few days after shipping, Adam woke up to a case opened against him from a clearly insane person. 

He also discovered that this crazy person had left him negative feedback: 

Adam messaged the person and let him know that the listing did in fact state that the watch needed a battery, and that if he replaced the battery, the watch would work fine. The person responded, saying, 

All fine and good, right? Wrong. Because when someone opens a case against you and does not close it after it’s resolved, the amount that they paid for that item is “held” in PayPal, which means that you don’t have access to that money. In this case, it was only $35, but I’ve had people do this to me for items that cost well over $100.

Anyway, Adam kept asking the guy if he would close the case, and the guy just didn’t respond. The other problem was that even though the buyer seemed satisfied, he had already left negative feedback. Adam prides himself on his “over one thousand positive feedbacks” (NERD) and so this was really grating on him. (Fun eBay fact: The feedback percentage that shows up is calculated based on the last 12 months. So even though he had one bad apple, it was calculating as 98.2% positive feedback, which, if you do any buying or selling on eBay, you know is pretty freakin’ bad!)

I asked Adam if he had ever followed up with eBay to get the case closed and feedback removed and he hadn’t, so one day I logged into his account and decided to try to take care of it myself–I figured I would just tell them that we share the account.

Just in case any of you ever wondered about actually talking to a human at eBay–you can! Here’s how: 

So I did this and they immediately told me that I had to officially be added to the account to do anything related to it. I hung up and thought about how I could go around this. Since much of their customer support is outsourced, I decided to just call back and say my name was Adam Kempa. Would they really know that it can’t be a woman’s name? So devious, I know. 

Well, it turns out that NO they don’t know that Adam is a man’s name. Because when I called back and told them my name was Adam, the customer service rep didn’t even flinch. The best part about it was that the woman kept referring to me as Adam, which I was loving. She told me that the best solution was to have them contact the buyer to get them to close the case. I reiterated that I was also concerned about the negative feedback and this is where the story gets INSANELY GOOD. The woman could tell how upset I was about the negative feedback, and provided me with some words of wisdom.

I immediately called Erin and we both died laughing. 

We thought this was the best part of the story, until a few days later, Adam found the following message from eBay: 

Now that we know that I was conversing with a Disney Princess, it all makes sense. 

-Sarah