Selling Books

I love books and reading!  I always have. When I was young I wanted to grow up and be a librarian. When I look at a book I often remember when I read it, what was going on in my life and how the book made me feel. For the books I haven't read yet I like to remember how I acquired them. I enjoy savoring the anticipation of reading them someday.

Since we've decided to sell our house and move, it makes sense to get rid of some of my books. When I made this decision I had 8 big bookcases overflowing with books and several boxes of books in the garage. I'm selling a bunch but of course I'm keeping all my favorites.

Over the past year I have been culling out the books I don't want to keep. On April 17 of last year I started selling books on Amazon. So far I've sold 167 books. After fees and postage I've cleared $384. Listing the books, packaging them and taking them to the post office takes time and It certainly is not going to make me rich but I am enjoying it. Plus, trying to sell the books makes the process of parting with them easier. Currently I have about  260 books for sale on Amazon.

For books that are too old to sell on Amazon I am selling them on EBay. Currently I have several books about books for sale on Ebay. I'm selling other stuff on EBay too. I'm always surprised what sells and what doesn't and for how much.

I'm selling stuff on craigslist too. I don't sell books there, usually only bigger stuff.

Often books don't sell. When that happens I give them to charity. By then I've broken my attachment to them and I'm able to let them go.

Update 5/1/2007 - The sales on Bay have ended. I am still selling stuff on EBay sometimes. My user name is ruthie730 if you want to see if I have anything currently. Here is a list of the books I sold and the selling prices:

$6.60 - Books and Collectors by Maurice Dunbar
$.99 - Dans Ces Bras
$.99 - French Little Women
$5.76 - A box of 13 Nora Roberts Paperbacks
$71.00 - Complete 21 volume set - The Annals of America
** note: I may have to refund this one because the post office seems to have lost one of the boxes I shipped.

$1.80 -The Book of the Month - Sixty Years of Books in American Life edited by Al Silverman
$5.00 - Prince of Forgers by Emile Mabille, Henri Leonard Bordier, Joseph Rosenblum
$3.37 - Prince of Librarians, Life & Times of Antonio Panizzi by Edward Miller
$2.60 - Slightly Chipped by Lawrence and Nancy Goldstone
$1.80 - The Joy of Books by Eric Burns
$11.98 - 18 different back issues of Biblio Magazine
$1.00 - The Bookman's London by Frank Swinnerton
$6.23 - Penny Wise and Book Foolish by Vincent Starrett
$17.50 - Two A E Newton books about book collecting
$3.25 - Dukedom Large Enough - Reminiscences of a Rare Book Dealer  1929-1956 by David A. Randall
$11.51 - Hooked on Books by Maurice Dunbar
$12.55 - Infinite Riches - The Adventures of a Rare Book Dealer by David Magee
$11.44 - Sunwise Turn - a Human Comedy of Bookselling by Madge Jenison
$4.24 - Great Books and Book Collectors by Alan G. Thomas

Comments

[A. N. Nanda]

1.

Quite a practical decision indeed...and money-fetching too. I'm thinking of similar idea for my newly published (self-published) book. For a person like me who is not from US, dealing with Amazon seems to be complicated--or maybe it'll take time for me to understand the parapharnelia!

Thanks for sharing.

Sincerely
Nanda
http://remixoforchid.blogspot.com