Off Topic Selling on Reverb Dot Com

[mynan]

Just wondering if anyone has had any experience selling on Reverb. My only experience was a pickguard that I bought which turned out to be a 4string advertised as a 5string. The return process was fairly painless.

It seems like a good place to list instruments, but the reviews from sellers are terrible so I'm a little hesitant.

 

[racerx]

Its fine, out of ~150 transactions or so, I only had one bad experience. Lookup the "shop" you are buying from and check their feedback, look at their listing details, ask questions. In the event you get burned, Reverb tends to side with the buyer (even if they're in the wrong). I'd guess 99%+ of transactions go through without incident. The ones that go wrong generally are accompanied by people that are loud about it.

 

[mynan]

Its fine, out of ~150 transactions or so, I only had one bad experience. Lookup the "shop" you are buying from and check their feedback, look at their listing details, ask questions. In the event you get burned, Reverb tends to side with the buyer (even if they're in the wrong). I'd guess 99%+ of transactions go through without incident. The ones that go wrong generally are accompanied by people that are loud about it.

Most of the negative feedback that I read was from sellers complaining about not getting paid or not getting paid quickly which may be due to Reverb trying to protect buyers.

 

[racerx]

Most of the negative feedback that I read was from sellers complaining about not getting paid or not getting paid quickly which may be due to Reverb trying to protect buyers.

They very briefly had a ~3-4 day logjam when the SVB bank issues popped up. Otherwise their payments tend to clear from most buyers in 1-2 business days. I think that length depends on the tenure of the buyer (a newer buyer's payment may not clear for an extra day or two to give Reverb a chance to be confident the payment is legitimate). For what it's worth, they advise you not to ship until the payment is clear, then you get approved for payment as soon as the item is marked "in transit" by the shipping carrier.

 

[BIGEJ2]

I’ve sold quite a bit on Reverb and only had one issue caused by shipping damage. Reverb’s insurance was not the best but the options offered were fair and ultimately made the buyer and I happy.

Talkbass can be a great place to sell if you can get through lowball and mundane trade offers. Best thing there is fees are limited to whatever PayPal charges but you are on your own if the deal goes sideways.

Sweetwater recently opened its “Gear Exchange” site. Fees are no where near as high as Reverb and it seems to get pretty good exposure. I just sold a $2,500 bass there and so far so good but the item is still in transit.

 

[DrKev]

I like Reverb. Yes, the fees are a minor drawback but it's easy to guess who's trsutworthy or not because of the ratings. Seeing the final prices of actual finished sales is also useful for estimating the 'right' price (it's an option under "All Filters" -> "Show Only" -> "Sold Listings"). And Reverb is huge, global in scope if you want it to be. If I can't move something on a local small ads kind of site, it will go on Reverb eventually. And as a buyer, setting up a search and notifications is something I want comes up is great!

 

[Calcifer Quinn]

I’ve sold quite a bit on Reverb and only had one issue caused by shipping damage. Reverb’s insurance was not the best but the options offered were fair and ultimately made the buyer and I happy.

Talkbass can be a great place to sell if you can get through lowball and mundane trade offers. Best thing there is fees are limited to whatever PayPal charges but you are on your own if the deal goes sideways.

Sweetwater recently opened its “Gear Exchange” site. Fees are no where near as high as Reverb and it seems to get pretty good exposure. I just sold a $2,500 bass there and so far so good but the item is still in transit.

Wow, hot tip about gear exchange! Gonna check that out asap! I've had a few good experiences on Reverb, but the fee is never fun.

 

[BIGEJ2]

Wow, hot tip about gear exchange! Gonna check that out asap! I've had a few good experiences on Reverb, but the fee is never fun.

Just wanted to update my experience because I didn't completely read the fine print. On your first sale, payment to you is delayed 1-2 days after the buyer has received the item or possibly earlier if they leave 4 or 5 star feedback. I shipped a bass from PA down to TN, which took a good 3 days to get there. Buyer was not home to sign for the package yesterday so it went back on the truck with a redelivery date of today. Now the buyer can ask the carrier (FedEx in this case) to hold it at a location for pickup. If he does, it could push delivery back another couple of days further delaying my payout. I'm not in any hurry but if I needed cash quickly, this is not a great option. After the first sale, payout works like Reverb where it is initiated when the package is scanned by the carrier.

This is not a huge issue but something I didn't expect and thought I'd pass it on.