Price and cost
The marketplace bargain and the graded lot, costed properly
A cheaper listing is not a cheaper purchase. The costs that sit outside the price on an unmediated marketplace, and what a graded auction charges instead.
An unmediated marketplace listing is usually the cheapest number on the screen. That is a real advantage and this piece is not going to pretend otherwise.
What it is going to do is finish the sentence. A price is what you pay; a cost is what the thing takes from you in total. On second-hand goods those two numbers separate, and they separate in ways that are predictable enough to plan around.
The costs that sit outside the price
Verification. On a marketplace, you are the inspector. That means a trip, or a conversation, or accepting the risk. The trip is the honest one to count: an hour and some fuel, per item, whether or not you buy.
Description risk. "Works great" is not a claim anyone stands behind. Sometimes it is true. The cost is not the occasional dud. It is that you cannot tell in advance which listing is the dud, so you price every listing as though it might be.
No recourse. Once money changes hands the transaction is generally over. That is not a criticism of anyone; it is what an unmediated sale is.
Your time, twice. Finding, then arranging. Multiply by however many items you actually wanted.
None of this makes a marketplace a bad idea. For a single, low-priced, easily-assessed item near where you already are, it is frequently the right call and the arithmetic below will say so.
What a graded auction charges instead
The costs are different in kind: they are visible and they are on the invoice.
A 15% buyer premium, handling of $1.50 per lot or $10 for a pallet lot, and tax for your delivery province. The formula is published and the calculator works out any bid: fees.
What you are buying with that is the inspection you would otherwise do yourself. Every unit is checked against a fixed set of questions and the grade is computed from the recorded answers, with a condition card saying how far the check went and what was found. How we grade
New / Overstock, Grade A and Grade B items carry a claim window for major functional defects of twenty-four (24) hours from pickup or confirmed delivery, seven (7) days for accounts verified as resellers, and fourteen (14) days only under a signed reseller addendum. Grade C and Grade D items are final sale as to condition. Regardless of grade, an item that is the wrong item or materially misdescribed is always reviewable. C and D are priced for it. Returns and claims
How to actually compare them
Take the marketplace price and add: the trip, the time, and your own honest estimate of how often you would get something meaningfully different from the description. Take the auction total from the calculator and add nothing, because the total is the total.
Then compare. Sometimes the marketplace still wins, and when it does it deserves to. What changes is that you are comparing two costs instead of comparing a cost to a price.
Where the difference stops being close
Volume, and distance. The marketplace arithmetic is per item: every listing is its own trip, its own conversation, its own risk. Buying ten things multiplies all of it. A catalogue where ten lots collect in one appointment does not. How buying works · What is inside