Best place to sell gear these days?

[loki1957]

I'm going to try and sell all my Tube gear. What site is the best for listing some expensive amps, phono stage, and preamp? Also, what's the best way to get paid? PayPal. Bank transfer. Bank check?
Thanks, John

 

[Cellcbern]

I'm going to try and sell all my Tube gear. What site is the best for listing some expensive amps, phono stage, and preamp? Also, what's the best way to get paid? PayPal. Bank transfer. Bank check?
Thanks, John

Audiogon has always worked for me. I believe all three payment options are accepted.

 

[Gjo]

Audiogon has high sales fees modeled on E-Bay, and allows payment alternatives to Paypal only if you choose the listing option to pay a final sales fee up front rather than when the item sells.

Paypal reports aggregate Goods and Services payments over $600 in a fiscal year to the IRS, who then issue you a 1099-K for this income because they assume you’re running a business. To avoid paying income tax for goods you sold at a loss, you must prepare a report itemizing the sales and the original purchase prices...similar to sales of financial securities.

Many sellers no longer accept Paypal Goods and Services for this reason.

Listings on USAudioMart have a much lower fee, and USAudioMart does not restrict a seller’s choice of payment.

These two sites get the most buyer eyeballs by far.

 

[Gregadd]

iMost of us lose money or break even.

 

[Ron Resnick]

I used to use U.S. Audio Mart (easy to deal with) and Audiogon (annoying to deal with).

 

[tima]

I'm going to try and sell all my Tube gear. What site is the best for listing some expensive amps, phono stage, and preamp? Also, what's the best way to get paid? PayPal. Bank transfer. Bank check?
Thanks, John

I used to list on Audiogon. Today I find their fees are excessive and their policies are too controlling. Same for the payment processor PayPal. Unless those conditions change I will not use either again.

Currently I use an audio forum named Audioaficionado.com. It is fairly large -- Threads: 46,735, Posts: 1,004,184, Members: 179,626. It is unencumbered with all the ads you see on most audio forums. It has an annual membership fee of $25. Among other benefits, that includes a discount at AcousticSounds and access to their Buy and Sell area. You can place as many ads as you want without charge and without time limit. Once you and a buyer make contact you can continue via email or phone. This year I sold my ARC Ref 10, Ref 10 phono and Alexia 2 speakers there with no ads placed anywhere else. Previously I sold a Kuzma 4Point and a SME V tonearm there. Ads are accessible only to the membership so you are working within a known community where reputations are known.

For shipping I make that the buyer's responsibility to arrange and coordinate any insurance. Pickup at my home.

For payment the easiest and cheapest method is Bank Wire. My experience has that as a $15-$20 cost to each party.

Imo the key to selling is to set an attractive and realistic price for buyers that will minimize back and forth dickering. If desirable equipment takes months to sell, it is probably because the price is set too high. If buyer says "I want to buy from you but need to sell my XYZ first" or has a problem with price, I will offer to hold the piece for them with a 15-30% non-refundable down payment and the balance in 1-3 months. Those terms can be negotiable. It gives the buyer time to raise funds.

 

[PYP]

I've used U.S. Audio Mart, Audiogon (which includes the marketplace beyond the U.S.) and The Music Room. https://tmraudio.com/ TMR is an easy place to start with since all you do is fill out a form, add photos and ask for a quote. Two days later they email a quote. This gives you an idea of the market and if you hate the direct sales path, this may work for you. They take their bite, of course, so you can get more selling it yourself. They do pay for shipping to them and that can be a factor if, for example, you are selling speakers. TMR pays via PayPal (without fees). Good luck.

 

[loki1957]

Thanks for your help. I'm going to start with US Audio and see if I get any bites. I absolutely hate trying to sell expensive gear.

 

[Gregadd]

Don't overlook WBF Classified.

 

[waltersalas]

US Audio Mart. I used to use Audiogon exclusively, but as others have said, they've made it too cumbersome and pricey. I've had no problem selling gear of all kinds on US Audio Mart.

 

[brad225]

I just had some AudioQuest cables on USAM for 2 weeks. Posted them on Audiogon and sold them in 5 hours. PayPal is the worst part of any transaction.

 

[PYP]

I just had some AudioQuest cables on USAM for 2 weeks. Posted them on Audiogon and sold them in 5 hours. PayPal is the worst part of any transaction.

I've had the same experience. Audiogon is a very big market that works well. Especially if what you are selling isn't too expensive to ship. That said, I have sold cables there that the buyer wanted shipped express, so sometimes folks don't care about shipping costs.

What I found difficult at times was Audiogon's insistence on controlling the conversation by not allowing exchange of email addresses or mailing addresses. I can understand why, but it can be very inconvenient if you need to reach the person quickly or you mention where you purchased your equipment and the address (and the entire message) gets blocked by the auto censor.

I have to revise my recommendation of The Music Room. They bought speakers from me many years ago and it was a smooth transaction (and free shipping at that time). In recent years, the spring cleaning of my audio closet went to them -- just a collection of audio flotsam and jetsam that they purchased for cash (paid to my PayPal account). Just did another cleaning and received a quote within two days. I accepted the quote but there has been radio silence for days. I've called and left voice mail as well as emailing multiple times. It seems to me that their recent expansion has led to overload. Can't be sure since I cannot get an answer.

 

[rooze]

Selling your Allnic gear so soon? Say it ain’t so! What are you switching to?

USAudiomart for starters, then Audiogon if it doesn’t move.

 

[Solypsa]

Might want to consider having buyer pack too ( via a service ). If insurance is needed they always say your packing wasn't good enough....

 

[Kingrex]

I tried to get into Audiogon on my phone today. Its not possible. I could not use the site as pop up adds were so pernicious It inhibited all search ability. I gave up on them a couple years ago because of this. There was an amp I wanted to see today and I had to try. FAIL.

 

[christensenleif@msn.com]

Audiogon is useless for anything.....and the forum contributions are plain dumb/stupid

 

[Ron Resnick]

I agree, Rex. Somehow the marketplace functionality on Audiogon is pretty clunky and annoying.

 

[unboxed]

I've had the same experience. Audiogon is a very big market that works well. Especially if what you are selling isn't too expensive to ship. That said, I have sold cables there that the buyer wanted shipped express, so sometimes folks don't care about shipping costs.

What I found difficult at times was Audiogon's insistence on controlling the conversation by not allowing exchange of email addresses or mailing addresses. I can understand why, but it can be very inconvenient if you need to reach the person quickly or you mention where you purchased your equipment and the address (and the entire message) gets blocked by the auto censor.

I have to revise my recommendation of The Music Room. They bought speakers from me many years ago and it was a smooth transaction (and free shipping at that time). In recent years, the spring cleaning of my audio closet went to them -- just a collection of audio flotsam and jetsam that they purchased for cash (paid to my PayPal account). Just did another cleaning and received a quote within two days. I accepted the quote but there has been radio silence for days. I've called and left voice mail as well as emailing multiple times. It seems to me that their recent expansion has led to overload. Can't be sure since I cannot get an answer.

I found Music Room offering prices were so low I could blow things out on US Audio Mart quickly for more money. Remember the Music Room needs to make a profit when they resell and, in addition, there are 2X shipping charges to recover.

 

[Kingrex]

Mikes old 108 is for sale on there. I wanted to talk to the seller. Its not possble on my phone. I saw it through Audioshark.
You should make sure this marketplace shows up on Audioshark. I think it does.

 

[Kingrex]

I want to sell my older PAP trio 10 with Voxativ. I also have some Ampsandsound amps to sell.