We have been longtime buyers of items on mercado libre and always the item is shipped to us…sometimes its “for pay” where the buyer has to pay to pickitup…sometimes its “Free shipping” and it just arrives at address or chilexpress, etx
Now we are selling a few household items, a couple of brandnew but old laptops, couple of jbl bluetooth speakers, kids car seat, etc
Does anyone have tips on how to be a small scale, occasional seller on ML?
Noticed that ML when a listing is made they want you to pay a fee to have your listing “promoted”…doesnt seem ro make sense for an item that is say 25k when the cheapest promotion fee is 15k before it is even sold.
Love the escrow system of ML, but gotta sorta out the shipping/promotion cost issues
Trying to balance where an item maybe is only worth 40k clp, but toship it across chile it may cost another 10-20k due to weight? Is it normal to just ship it for pay at the buyers shipper choice? Or is it more common to just ship it via postoffice and seller pays?
Lastly what about odd sized items like a big safe kids car seat?
I sold my old car to someone on MercadoLibre to someone who had the same model and needed body parts after an accident. I didn’t pay for extra promotion and I got a response from the buyer after a few days. Two other people also contacted me. I was pretty surprised to get that kind of response. I didn’t have to deal with shipping because she and her husband came to get it and tow it.
I am thinking it would be easier to use a courier like Starken that will charge the recipient upon delivery. It sounds like Correos Chile does it too? Several smaller online businesses I buy from use that method. The couriers take cards, so it’s easy for the recipient to pay. That way you don’t have to work out how much to add on for shipping beforehand. What I’m wondering is if you can set up your listing to do this on MercadoLibre. I’ve bought a few things on the platform and their prices included shipping. That’s probably where you need to start.
I do not know if it applies to used items, but depending on the size/weight and min. price of I think $19.990, Mercadoenvios (Mercadolibre using Chilexpress, Blue or even their own) will send it free or near free to the client.
Be aware of the scams now prevalent as Mercadolibre rules favor the client. Nothing was in the box, less came than promised, quality not expected/customer right to demand refund in 30 days for whatever reason/etc. (refunded but never returned or something else like a rock or worse returned instead, etc.).
There seems to be less fraud when using Mercadoenvios vs. say Por Pagar using Starken, Correos, Chilexpress (outside of Mercadoenvios).
Be careful if the selling bug gets to you, Mercadolibre/MercadoPago send all transaction info to SII who can turn your life into a living hell because you sold some stuff informally without a boleta or factura.
Yes had some success with this at wife’s prompting. Much easier to connect with locals and avoid shipping, but I expect some things wont have a local market.
When you sold your car how did it work with going to the notary together? Did they commit to buy it on ML and then both of you go to the notary together and then after that they transfer you the money?
The car wasn’t working, so it wasn’t a typical buy/sell contract. I had to first go to the Registro Civil and turn in the license plates, dar de baja, the car, as they say. I agreed on the conditions with the buyers through ML and WhatsApp. Then, my husband drew up a special contract for that situation. We met at the notary and signed the contract. They paid me in cash, because it wasn’t a significant amount. I mostly wanted to get rid of the car because we had bought a new one and it was just taking up space.
The buyers were very happy that they were able to repair their car. Win-win as Giorgio Jackson would say, haha!
