Question for people who buy/sell private party

As I buyer I will not ever send friend and family payments unless I actually know the person and honestly, only then would I if it was something small. Fees just cut into the small stuff sometimes... otherwise I really have no reason to put myself at risk because somebody who almost certainly is in a higher income bracket than me doesn't want to deal with taxes.
Read about the tax laws (be sure to read them for your specific location and have an idea the total amount you might be reporting from hobby sales) and read about PayPal fees and from there it's just the cost of doing business, might as well try to get used to it!
Oh right, I still exclusively use PayPal.
I hope that doesn't come across too harshly, it's just, being realistic.

 

FYI, Paypal didn't do anything. The USA law changed and Paypal is now required to report to the IRS/issue you a 1099 if you receive $600 or more for goods or services. Just because you receive a 1099 does not mean this money is taxable. You are only expected to pay taxes on your doll sales if you made a profit (meaning that you sold it for more than you paid originally). Many sellers in the BJD hobby have been requiring friends & family payments via Paypal since this change, but if they are in the USA they are breaking Paypal's terms of service by doing this AND they're doing it for no reason (since the money is probably not taxable).

Having said that, as a seller I expect buyers to follow through when they contact me about a sale (i.e. do not ghost me), I expect them to pay within a reasonable amount of time, and to politely communicate with me if something goes wrong so we can resolve it together. I also expect to be responsible for all selling fees and to mail a sold item as soon as possible. As a buyer I expect that I will not pay any fees, and I will not be asked to pay via friends & family. With expensive items like BJDs, there is no way I'm going to send someone money without any kind of protection.

 

Honestly as a buyer I will never buy from someone who accepts only friends and family payments. A lot of people started insisting on f&f with the tax change but you pay taxes on profit when it comes to selling personal items which I think gets misunderstood. Personally it’s not worth the risk of getting scammed via f&f payments (which happens more often these days with a lot of bjd sales being done over Instagram and Facebook) because people don’t want to figure out how to report the income from a 1099-K correctly.

As for lack of feedback I think as long as you have proof of legitimacy (CoA/proof of purchase/etc) you’ll still be able to sell things, it might just take longer. Expect people to ask for a photo of the doll with a handwritten note in the picture since stolen photos are sometimes used for scams.

 

It's not necessarily that you only pay taxes on profit for personal items... because of state taxes as well, so definitely look it up. There may be a threshold in your state (or not) where if it's over a certain amount (example: over some thousands in sales) then you have to pay on the excess. It's usually under a topic of yard sales I think because this is a common thing. You just have to look it up. Anyway, taxes are one of my least favorite ordeals but even I can muddle through it, it will not be the end of the world.

As a buyer I expect tracking when it's on the way so I can monitor it and handle any problems quickly. I expect good packaging: the doll not able to move around in that box! Everything wrapped with bubble wrap. Just, adequate care. Things like eyes, wigs and shoes not shipped in envelopes where they can get damaged.

I will buy from people without feedback, and I think shopping on social media makes it more difficult to have a properly vetted community... usually I stick to DoA. And using PayPal there is some protection. So unless someone makes me feel suspicious with their communication I will buy without previous feedback because everyone has to start somewhere. However I think it helps to sell some smaller doll hobby items first and see if you can get feedback for those. Not everyone leaves feedback. It's better on DoA than other places.

 

I buy/sell/trade dolls fairly often. Couple things;

• Dolls don't often sell quickly. If you're adamant on a certain price, you may have to hold onto the doll for a time, and/or lower your price until an interested party will purchase.
• Don't expect to make profit on a doll sale. I say expect because sometimes profit does happen. Though in my experience that is an outlier. If you can get close to your initial purchase price, that's all you can really ask for in most cases.
• Most secondhand sales platforms charge a fee, some of which are up to 15% of total sale (some including ship price as well). Sites that do not have fees usually do not allow direct payment so a money sending service is needed, which will have a fee of it's own. These fees are for you and the buyers protection. Trying to circumvent these fees may put your account in jeopardy as it is often against the ToS.

 

This is the first year we have to deal with it but googling “1099-K personal sales how to report gains” or something like that should bring up some results on how to report gains/losses if your PayPal generates a 1099-K. I found a few posts on some tax forums about it - it looks like Personal Item Sales fits better for reselling dolls rather than Hobby Sales. It’s best to hold onto any receipt/invoice from when you paid for a doll to prove your gain/loss in case you get audited or are getting a tax professional to help you.

 

For me "going wrong" means something getting lost or broken in the mail, I made a mistake in the item description so it's not what the buyer expected, etc... these things have almost never happened to me personally, and I've sold a lot of stuff! But it has happened to friends and I've heard horror stories of buyers going absolutely ballistic right away, assuming the worst, threatening Paypal claims, etc. I think most people are mature when problems happen, though.

Minor issues and annoyances happen more frequently. Maybe like... 10% of my transactions. For me this includes things like ghosting me, taking ages to pay, paying the wrong amount, trying to haggle with me, asking me to do things I clearly said I wouldn't do (like take layaway payments), etc. I'm sure there's other people who have these things happen a lot more frequently, it's definitely a common issue (and not unique to BJDs, of course).

Oh and as for Paypal, sorry I didn't mean to split hairs It's just that a lot of people are ragging on Paypal these days because of the tax thing, but it's not even Paypal's fault! I've never had a problem with Paypal, like yeah the fees suck but in general I'm grateful for it so I can sometimes be a bit of a Paypal defender

 

The irs.gov site has some good info as well. The 1099-K is used for several different things, I believe the IRS refers to what we're doing as "online garage sales". If I'm reading it right, in most cases the IRS doesn't even ask for receipts, but it's probably a good idea to have them just in case.