Resale Price Calculator

Discount from retail by condition, not by hope

Most people price a used item by remembering what they paid for it. Buyers do not care what you paid. They compare your listing to every other copy of the same thing that sold in the last month, and the only thing that moves your price up or down is condition.

A workable starting point is a fixed share of the original retail price for each condition grade. It is not the final answer, but it gets you into the right neighborhood before you check comps, and it stops the two most common mistakes: asking 90% of retail for something worn, and giving away something that is still new in the box.

Those percentages assume the item is complete, clean, and photographed well. A missing charger, a stain, or a blurry photo pushes you down a grade. A popular brand in a size that sells out pushes you up, sometimes past 65%, because scarcity beats condition for some buyers.

Worked example: $120 sneakers in like new shape

You paid $120 for a pair of sneakers, wore them four times, and they are clean with the box. At 50% of retail the list price is $60. On a platform that charges 13.6% plus a $0.30 fixed fee, the fee is $8.16 plus $0.30, or $8.46.

Now the shipping decision. Offer free shipping and an $8 label comes out of your pocket, along with about $1.50 for a mailer and tape. The payout is $42.04, which is 70.1% of the list price and 35% of what you originally paid. Let the buyer pay the label and the payout is $50.04.

Eight dollars does not sound like much until you see it as a share of the profit. On this sale, free shipping takes 16% of your payout. On a cheaper item it takes far more: a $25 sale with the same $8 label and $1.50 mailer gives up 38% of the price to postage and packaging before the fee is even counted.

That is the whole argument for pricing the shipping into the list price instead of absorbing it. A $68 list with free shipping nets $48.95 after the same fee and label, which is close to the $50.04 from a $60 list with buyer paid shipping, and it converts better because the buyer sees one number.

The fee comes off the buyer's total, not your net

Every platform calculates its cut on what the buyer pays, which includes shipping when the buyer pays for it. That detail matters more than the headline percentage, because a 10% fee on a $60 item with $8 of shipping is $6.80, not $6.00.

Here is what the same $60 sale nets on the main US platforms, with the buyer paying shipping and $1.50 of packaging coming out of your side.

The spread between the cheapest and the most expensive option is $12.00 on a $60 sale, which is 20% of the price. That gap buys a lot of patience. Local pickup is free but slow, and Poshmark's 20% buys a prepaid label and a buyer base that expects it.

Check the current numbers on the platform's own fee page before you list, since rates change and category rules differ. eBay publishes its selling fee table by category, and the sporting goods and electronics rates are not the same as clothing.

Free shipping or buyer pays, on a $60 sale

Shipping is the line item sellers most often forget, and it is the one that decides whether a small sale is worth doing. The table below holds the list price at $60 and changes only who pays the label.

Free shipping is not a marketing gimmick, it is a price cut with extra steps. If you want the same payout, raise the list price by the label cost divided by one minus the fee rate. On a 13.6% platform, an $8 label needs about $9.26 of extra list price, not $8.

The exception is a heavy or bulky item where the label exceeds 20% of the price. There, free shipping usually loses money no matter how you price it, and local pickup or a buyer paid label is the only sensible option. USPS and UPS both publish retail rates, and the USPS price list is the place to check a box before you promise free delivery.

Comps beat any formula

The condition percentages are a starting point, not a valuation. The real number comes from sold listings, filtered to the last 30 to 90 days, for the exact model, size, and color. Asking prices are worthless because anyone can ask anything. Sold prices are what buyers agreed to.

Look for at least five sold comps and ignore the highest and lowest. The middle of the range is your market. If nothing has sold in 90 days at any price, the item does not have a resale market at the moment, and no discount will create one.

Photographs and measurements move the price more than most sellers expect. Ten photos on a neutral background, a close up of every flaw, and the actual measurements in the description cut returns and let you hold a higher price. A listing that hides a scratch gets a return, and a return costs you the original shipping both ways.

Seasonality is real for clothing, bikes, and outdoor gear. A winter coat listed in April sits until October. If you can wait, list in the season when people search for the item, and price 10% higher in the first two weeks when the listing is new and the platform is still showing it.

Costs that quietly eat the payout

Fee and shipping are the visible costs. The invisible ones decide whether reselling is worth your evening.

• Packaging. A mailer, tape, and bubble wrap run $1 to $3 per order. Free boxes from the carrier help, but not for clothing.
• Returns. A returned item costs the original label, the return label, and sometimes the fee is not refunded. One return can wipe out the profit on three sales.
• Promoted listings. eBay and Etsy both sell visibility, and a 5% ad rate on a $60 sale is another $3.00.
• Your time. Photographing, listing, answering messages, and shipping take 30 to 60 minutes per item. At $20 an hour that is $10 to $20 of labor nobody invoices.
• Taxes. Resale profit is taxable income. Platforms report totals to the IRS once you cross the federal threshold of $20,000 and 200 transactions, and several states use much lower numbers, so the IRS guidance on Form 1099-K is worth reading before you scale up.

None of this means reselling is a bad deal. It means the comparison is payout minus costs, not price minus fee. A $42 payout on a $120 item you no longer use is still $42 more than the zero it was earning in the closet.

Price backwards from the number you want

Most pricing advice starts with the item. Start with the payout instead. Decide the minimum you would accept, add the costs you control, and divide out the fee.

Suppose you want $40 in your pocket from a pair of boots, you will offer free shipping at $8, packaging is $1.50, and the platform charges 13.6% plus $0.30. Add the costs to the target: $40 + $8 + $1.50 + $0.30 = $49.80. Divide by 1 minus 0.136, which is 0.864, and the list price is $57.64. Round to $59.99 and you clear the target with a little room.

The same formula works in reverse to check a price you already picked. List at $57.64 and the fee is $8.14, leaving exactly $40.00 after the label and the mailer. If the number that comes out is below your minimum, the item is not worth listing at that price, and the honest options are to wait, bundle it with something else, or donate it.

Bundling is the underused move. Two $25 items sold together for $45 ship in one box, pay one fixed fee, and often net more than selling them separately, because the second item adds almost no cost.

When the item is not worth selling

Run the numbers before you run the camera. If the payout after fees, shipping, packaging, and your time is under about $15, the listing is probably not worth the hour it takes. That is most fast fashion, most used textbooks from older editions, and anything missing a part that costs more than the item is worth.

Donation is the better exit for that pile. A donation receipt only helps if you itemize, and the deduction is for fair market value, which for used clothing is low. The real benefit is the space and the hour back, not the tax write off.

For anything with a battery that no longer holds a charge, a cracked screen, or a missing cable, price it as a parts item and say so in the title. A $30 parts listing that sells in a week beats a $90 listing that sits for three months and ends in the trash.

This is an estimate for planning, not tax or legal advice. Platform fees, shipping rates, and reporting thresholds change, so confirm the current numbers with the platform and the IRS before you rely on them.