Best place to sell a drone? I know MPilots has a classified... what are the best options?

[boldblue737]

So, I've been selling random stuff on eBay for nearly 20 years (maybe 300+ items, it just an electronic clearing house for me lol) and have a 100% positive record etc. I have NEVER sold a drone there before and I'm thinking of doing it because its all I know and I assume it helps to have some protection with eBay and PayPal etc. I'm going to offload a launch time-frame (so I guess older?) Mavic 2 Pro but that has very, very low flight time. It would include the DJI hard case, Fly More Combo with the extra batteries and everything (maybe less props, I might have lost some?), a set of the DJI ND filters for the 2 Pro and a DJI Smart Controller instead of the stock controller (I sold the stock controller on eBay lol when I bought the Smart Controller) so it would be a fairly valuable sale. (I'm buying a mini 2 fly more for travel and an FPV fly more for local fun instead of the one Mavic 2 Pro).

My question is this... how do I protect myself from someone getting the drone, crashing it day 1 and then saying it arrived broken etc.? I do have buyer locks on my eBay sales that prevent buyers with low or no ratings from buying. That's my biggest fear, is that drones inherently are risky and I don't want someone crashing it in the first few days and saying it never worked.

What are my other options? Classified here or elsewhere? Does anyone do a Craigslist and then sell like in the police parking lot transaction points? I just want to make sure I use the best option and for me a drone is just unique and despite selling $2000+ camera bodies and lenses before on eBay, drones seem a different deal.

PS: This post is NOT soliciting offers for my drone, please don't send me PMs or anything, I'm just looking for suggestions of how to sell a nice drone. Thanks everyone!

 

[dirkclod]

Unless your eBay is differant than mine they are stopping PayPal
and you have to give eBay your bank info. So there goes your PayPal protection.

 

[msinger]

how do I protect myself from someone getting the drone, crashing it day 1 and then saying it arrived broken etc.?

The majority of people are honest. However, you could protect yourself a little by posting detailed photos of your drone in your listing, pack it appropriately when shipping it, and require a signature. That will at least protect you from someone claiming it arrived in pieces.

 

[boldblue737]

I had no idea about PayPal! I just checked and you are right, things are changing in 2021, but from what I can tell it hasn't yet, and I still could use and demand PayPal if I list soon. I had no idea that eBay had spun off PayPal back in 2015 and now were breaking it off with them, I'll really have to read about how eBay plans on managing and protecting buyers and sellers moving forward.

 

[tck444]

I have bought and sold a number of electronic devices on "Offer UP" and have never had a bad experience. The advantage being a cash transaction and person to person exchange. Meet at a designated spot and show that the drone works.

The downside may be quite a few low-ball offers. Or if the other party does not live in your area may still need to ship?

 

[Mgrabowski722]

I just sold my Mini 1 on Mercari. Pretty straight forward process that went very smooth. Got the price I was looking for. Not sure how the fees compare to selling on eBay though.

 

[Dale D]

Unless your eBay is differant than mine they are stopping PayPal
and you have to give eBay your bank info. So there goes your PayPal protection.

Yes- e-bay cut ties with Pay Pal but I think they have their own protection programs instead. Not really sure. You will have to review the site and their protection plans. E-bay would not be able to stay in business without these plans.

 

[NG Wildman]

I have never done it, although I believe you can download all the battery information which would include amount of uses. Take a screen shot as well as pictures of all of the equipment and record the serial numbers (to be kept by you and possibly included with the bill of sale only). that's about all the x-tra I can possibly add.
I do like the police station parking lot (especially if you will be waiting for your relative to get off of work there anyway...wink, wink, nudge nudge).

 

[White Tiger Aerial Photos]

I have bought and sold a number of electronic devices on "Offer UP" and have never had a bad experience. The advantage being a cash transaction and person to person exchange. Meet at a designated spot and show that the drone works.

The downside may be quite a few low-ball offers. Or if the other party does not live in your area may still need to ship?

I don't want to be negative, but I've noticed that there are a big load of scammers on OfferUp. It's usually easy to detect them as they always want to use either Venmo, CashApp, Zelle, or PayPal. Also, they adamnantly refuse to do PayPal with buyer protection. Anyway, people on OfferUp (Including myself) are usually wary of people that don't want to use OfferUp for payment, and some don't care if PayPal is safe or not. You're just classified as another scammer. Also, OfferUp's handling of return claims are pretty sloppy. They approve everything.... LITERALLY.

 

[White Tiger Aerial Photos]

I have never done it, although I believe you can download all the battery information which would include amount of uses. Take a screen shot as well as pictures of all of the equipment and record the serial numbers (to be kept by you and possibly included with the bill of sale only). that's about all the x-tra I can possibly add.
I do like the police station parking lot (especially if you will be waiting for your relative to get off of work there anyway...wink, wink, nudge nudge).

I'm thinking after you get the broken drone back, you might be able to go through the flight logs and prove that it was flown on the date it was crashed, which in turn would prove that it was working when received.

 

[Dale D]

Yes- e-bay cut ties with Pay Pal but I think they have their own protection programs instead. Not really sure. You will have to review the site and their protection plans. E-bay would not be able to stay in business without these plans.

Yes- I have been a long time e-bay user and never a problem. I know about the split with Pay Pal. I guess they (e-bay) wants to make the $$$ for themselves! As I recall, when I got the notice from e-bay about the Pay Pal split there was some information about continuing protection under e-bay. I would read their policy or actually try to call them. If you search hard enough in the bottom, you will actually be able to talk to a live human. I have done this through persistence. Then please let us all know.

Dale

 

[Speed750]

You should try FaceBook Marketplace. I've been on Ebay 20+ years but Marketplace charges NO fees and you meet face to face. Be sure to label your price as "firm" "no low balls" because you will get a bunch of that. Then you get cash in hand.

 

[Fernfly]

I sold my mavic 2 zoom in mercari no problem. Now i’m buying dji fpv drone.

 

[rp6]

So, I've been selling random stuff on eBay for nearly 20 years (maybe 300+ items, it just an electronic clearing house for me lol) and have a 100% positive record etc. I have NEVER sold a drone there before and I'm thinking of doing it because its all I know and I assume it helps to have some protection with eBay and PayPal etc. I'm going to offload a launch time-frame (so I guess older?) Mavic 2 Pro but that has very, very low flight time. It would include the DJI hard case, Fly More Combo with the extra batteries and everything (maybe less props, I might have lost some?), a set of the DJI ND filters for the 2 Pro and a DJI Smart Controller instead of the stock controller (I sold the stock controller on eBay lol when I bought the Smart Controller) so it would be a fairly valuable sale. (I'm buying a mini 2 fly more for travel and an FPV fly more for local fun instead of the one Mavic 2 Pro).

My question is this... how do I protect myself from someone getting the drone, crashing it day 1 and then saying it arrived broken etc.? I do have buyer locks on my eBay sales that prevent buyers with low or no ratings from buying. That's my biggest fear, is that drones inherently are risky and I don't want someone crashing it in the first few days and saying it never worked.

What are my other options? Classified here or elsewhere? Does anyone do a Craigslist and then sell like in the police parking lot transaction points? I just want to make sure I use the best option and for me a drone is just unique and despite selling $2000+ camera bodies and lenses before on eBay, drones seem a different deal.

PS: This post is NOT soliciting offers for my drone, please don't send me PMs or anything, I'm just looking for suggestions of how to sell a nice drone. Thanks everyone!

IMO, ebay is not what it was 20 years ago. Now it is a marketplace for professional sellers. Remedies for both unhappy buyers and sellers are complex and time consuming. Selling a drone is not difficult and can be done in most any local venue, IMO. I have had very good luck with Craigslist. It is widely understood that cash is the preferred medium for most transactions. Pick a safe place and complete a cash sale. Once the sale is complete, it is over. You have the cash, the buyer has the drone. Expect to haggle a bit. If the potential buyer sounds like a jerk, simply don't do the deal with him.

 

[RetiredInFL]

Re: PayPal @ eBay. Been selling and buying with PayPal on eBay for 22 years and as recent as today. PayPal is always an option to pay. PayPal used to be actually part of eBay but split many years ago. eBay has always been the PRIMARY buyer/seller protection provider but you always could, and still can use PayPal if that is how you paid as your "protection." What has changed on eBay is their fees (now over close to 14% when all is said and done) and how you are paid as SELLER. You are no longer PAID through PayPal but through direct deposit to your bank. There are no longer PayPal fees but eBay final value fees are now 12.55+% INCLUDING on the sales tax you collect but NEVER see because eBay pays it for you. I sold a $1800 item last week and the 7% sales tax the buyer paid I am charged 12.55% of making my net FV fees over 14%,

As for SELLER being scammed. eBay finds for the BUYER COMPLAINT 99% of the time right, wrong or otherwise. I've been lucky though. It 22 years I have 1400+ feedback all 100% positive, NEVER had a problem.

 

[A.O.]

I sold my MA2 on Craigslist in a day. The guy came over we flew it around a bit to show it worked he handed me cash and went on his way, no problems.

Interesting about ebay/paypal, I quit selling on ebay due to thier regs on having to use paypal! After like11 years on there Paypal would hold MY money for up to 21 days citing some bull about making sure I was legit... and my feedback on ebay was 100%, And there is no chance in hades I would give ebay (or paypal) my bank account info!

 

[MiragePro]

In the last couple of months I have sold three of my drones on eBay. I am very glad that they don't require PayPal any more. Like many others, I had a bad experience with them. I received a large payment from a client through PayPal and they locked my account and held the funds for three months. They don't tell you why, just that you broke one of their protocols. Apparently if you receive a large amount, they will put a hold on your funds, assuming that you are laundering money. YouTube is filled with horror stories about PayPal. eBay's new system allow you to use any card to pay for a purchase, and when you sell, you receive your money in a couple of days with no fees.

 

[Dale D]

In the last couple of months I have sold three of my drones on eBay. I am very glad that they don't require PayPal any more. Like many others, I had a bad experience with them. I received a large payment from a client through PayPal and they locked my account and held the funds for three months. They don't tell you why, just that you broke one of their protocols. Apparently if you receive a large amount, they will put a hold on your funds, assuming that you are laundering money. YouTube is filled with horror stories about PayPal. eBay's new system allow you to use any card to pay for a purchase, and when you sell, you receive your money in a couple of days with no fees.

I certainly have no axe to grind in this issue but I, too, have sold many items one bay, and one recently for over $2000 for a motion slider. In my opinion, Pay Pal put in place those stringent precautions to protect both buyer and seller. I have had at least two spoof buy/offers on ebay for that same item, which, when pursued, did not pan out and I avoided a scam using Pay Pal. They ascertain that both the buyer is getting what he/she wants and that the seller is also protected in getting his money. I would hope that e-bay will protect us as well/ I have sold one item since e-bay dropped Pay Pal and all went well for both of us (I sold an Osmo 2 gimbal and used the $ for an Osmo 4 gimbal. -the OM4).

Dale

 

[MikeinMO]

I'm thinking after you get the broken drone back, you might be able to go through the flight logs and prove that it was flown on the date it was crashed, which in turn would prove that it was working when received.

This

 

[RetiredInFL]

This

Lol. If you’re the seller you automatically lose 99 out of 100 times. eBay is for the buyers. I can give you 10 examples of that in my 22 years selling on eBay. And now between the 13.5% fees and your shipping charges your costs come to over 17% of your sale. It’s hard to be competitive as a small seller. Also eBay now automatically collects and submits your states sales tax on every sale you make from all buyers and you even pay 13.5% fees on that even though you don’t get those funds.