Has Anyone Considered Cutting Out Ebay?

There is no where you will get the eyes on your stuff like ebay. Nowhere. You get what you pay for.

I am a low end buyer. Due to Covid and health I do not go to shows. I would be sunk without it.

Before the pandemic almost all my purchases were at coin shows, but since then ebay has filled the void. I have had success buying from members over the years, but that has always been luck; the market is way smaller than ebay or any coin show.

I should add that the US Mint has always been a solid second place, which only got stronger as I expanded my modern interests.

When I buy bullion silver/gold I check prices on the major dealers home sites and their ebay stores. Sometimes their prices on ebay are LESS so I buy on ebay. I understand it can be a hassle being a seller on ebay. But as I buyer I've had good luck since I first joined in 1999. I've only had a few problems with sellers, came damaged, shipped wrong product, etc. and the sellers or ebay made it right.

Several years ago I bought a 2009 Abraham Lincoln commemorative silver dollar on ebay. The coin was fine but the mint box was damaged. I sent it back for refund. I tried to contact the seller again, they didn't respond. I contacted ebay. ebay refunded my money, a few days later ebay said the seller closed his ebay account. Then I called the postal service. They said the seller had moved and left no forwarding address. The postal service kept the coin for over a month trying to find the seller. They gave up, sent the coin back to me. I felt a little bad about it but I ended up getting the coin for free.

Pacific thanks for your input. I sold my variety Lincoln Cent collection on ebay 2018 - 2020 and boy I had some good ones and plenty of multiples and ebay was my outlet. I will hand it to them we were both making money until honestly I didn't have any more good coins and was selling 20 30 dollar coins until it didn't add up. ebay did help me finally make a decision and stop because the: taxes, shipping, insurance and fees made it non profitable but main 2 reasons were 1. They wanted my bank account access (read the policy ebay can take, freeze, jam money going into or in account) and 2. I ran into 5 shister buyers who flat out got me and ebay didn't back me, didn't try, and didn't care. In my opionion it became risky profit wise to online to sell.
Would I do it again? Yes...with $20,000.00 of slabbed DDO's to move my outlets with middlemen GC, DL, Heritage etc. were flat out way worse than ebay. I used them, they used me economics 101. I buy only 2 -4 coins a year on ebay now from dealers I can pick the phone up and say hey hey let's deal and it works. I still see deals and snipes on ebay but man its brain stress searching and not the same much slimmer pickings.
This is a stretch...I out grew ebay and just kinda think they ain't so great now. Pacific I see some good shops on the bay and the executive coin company is top notch and another hot shot in CA. is solid I forget his name. I've seen some of your babies on ebay nice real nice.
Ferreider its out there on the bay money is there but you gotta have good coins and have an adhoc office set up and dedicated post office runs etc. If you got the skill savy and knowledge run with it.

Started selling on ebay in 1997 and buying there before that. I'm not a big seller but have sold ~300-400 coins there and bought quite a few more than that, along with other things that suit my hobbies.

It is my main outlet for sub-$100 coins (average circulated, silver-stacking, etc) and I have a great deal of success selling those sort of coins there. I will not sell higher-value coins there due to the fee structures and lack of decent seller protection against fraudulent return scams and chargebacks.

I still scan for late night bargains at times, especially world coins and ancients, but nowadays anything over $100-$200 that I want to buy is sourced through private dealer networks/groups or at the yearly TNA show here in Texas, and I don't buy much anymore anyway.

That being said, nothing is going to replace ebay anytime soon in my opinion. It is by far the single largest consumer-oriented online market for coins in the US. Europe has vCoins, MA-Shops, etc. so at least there are some other options. There have been, off and on, attempts or plans to make dedicated numismatic-focused online auction and buy/trade/sell sites here in the US, some of which I have worked on/with, but it is a struggle to get any sort of traction there. Most major dealers already have web stores on their own web sites, and when they want to move inventory to a wider audience of collectors, nothing else here in the US has the market visibility or exposure to buyers that ebay does. Sellers and dealers are going to go where the most buyers are found, and that's ebay.

That's not correct. Effective this year, you will get a 1099-K if you have total sales of $600 or more, regardless of the number of sales. That could be a pain filing taxes if you don't have documentation of the acquisition cost of the sold coins.

Run it as a business in a proper manner .
Chances are if you do less than a 100K a year in sales
take ALL of your legitimate expenses , deductions and depreciation
You will pay little to no taxes in the first few years of operation.
The Feds in any country run around like the house is on fire
Over this stuff . They rarely raise what they think they will ,
often less .
Best advice ..always seek accounting and legal advice for
any business venture. Best money you will ever spend .
Personally , I have been in the coin business ( vest pocket ,
retail coin shop , online for over 45 years ) and have an idea
Or two as to how to stay out of trouble legally .