One of the foremost paths to the home business today are the online auctions. Once you understand the process, making money online becomes not only possible, but can also be profitable if done correctly. If you are serious about making money online, the site to investigate is Ebay. This site generates millions of dollars annually.

For those just starting out, it is recommended that you begin by rummaging through your unwanted items at home and putting them up for auction. By starting out this way you will have a chance to familiarize yourself with the system with only a very small investment. Believe it or not, there may be some serious money sitting on the shelves of your garage, or stored away in your basement. The old saying, “One man’s trash is another man’s treasure” is a true statement.

This is a great way to make some extra money, get rid of unwanted items, and learn Ebay’s process all at the same time. While you are doing this, pay attention to the items that sell the fastest and for the most money, and at the same time, browse the site; take note of what others are selling and what items sell the best. Keep track of all this information because you will want to refer back to it once you have sold all that you can of the items around the house.

Once you have become familiar with how Ebay works and what items seem to do well, you may be ready to get into some serious reselling. Your next step in the process should be to decide what type of merchandise you want to sell. Will it be new, or used?  Unique and hard to find items or mass produced items at a cut rate price?

There is essentially two ways to go about finding products for your online auction business. The first being used items which you can find at estate sales, garage sales as well as thrift stores. For some new items, it may be a good idea to hit some real time auctions. Some people do very well by obtaining their merchandise in this manner and reselling it, but there are some problems associated with this method. The main problem being storage space.

At any given time you will likely have a garage full of items you are attempting to sell, and the reality is you may not be able to sell everything that you buy, or it may take two or three listing to sell. Essentially, you will lose some money on this type of venture, but your potential for making money is good nevertheless.

Another way to acquire you merchandise is buy using a dropshipper. With this method you are actually reselling for a distributor and you never have physical possession of the merchandise. This is a great way to keep the mess down in the garage, but it too has its drawbacks. To make any kind of real money, you do have to sell massive amounts of product. Another thing you have to watch out for when you sell this way are dropshippers that require money to be in their program. If it is costing you money, you will not make near as much money. It makes no sense to pay them, you are selling their merchandise and making them money as well as yourself. These are usually scams and you should steer clear of them.

Once you do manage to get the method down and find what works for you, online auctions can become a very lucrative home business.