What's the best way to sell collectible English lang books from the EU?
September 29, 2024 2:52 AM Subscribe
Specifically, Germany. I have a few autographed books to sell, but I imagine listing on German sites is not the best tactic for a good profit. The only book-specific site I'm familiar with is AbeBooks, but I don't love their ties to Amazon. Are there avenues better than listing on US-based eBay, AbeBooks, etc? NB I am a US citizen and have residency there and in Germany, in case of any seller location rules I should be covered!
Best answer: There is no more prominent tool for selling used books online than AbeBooks. It aggregates content from many different sellers in one well-known space. Book collectors do trawl eBay, etc. for deals, but unless you are a reputable, known bookseller, you are unlikely to realize a higher price there than via Abe, unless you have truly unusual books.
If you go with a used book dealer, you will realize 0%-40% of the final (re)selling price. To me, I would only want to go that route if I had a genuinely rare book (signed first Christie or Hemingway; actually rare "limited" edition) and didn't want to wait the 6-36 months for the book to finally sell while it sat on my shelf. Were I to go this route, I would either find the nearest fine/rare book dealer and see what they would offer (expecting 10-20% of the value), or I would contact a notable seller specializing in the kinds of books I wanted to sell. The exception to this would be if I had a serious collection to sell and didn't want to deal with the business of selling one by one.
I do not know details about tax, import duty, etc. implications of selling your books outside the EU. Sometimes people in your situation get the books to a friend or family member in the country where the books will be sold and handle the transaction unofficially to avoid taxes and duties that might potentially eat up the entirety of your profit. I am not a lawyer and don't know how often this winds up being an issue for people who go that route.
Good luck.
posted by cupcakeninja at 5:17 AM on September 29
If you go with a used book dealer, you will realize 0%-40% of the final (re)selling price. To me, I would only want to go that route if I had a genuinely rare book (signed first Christie or Hemingway; actually rare "limited" edition) and didn't want to wait the 6-36 months for the book to finally sell while it sat on my shelf. Were I to go this route, I would either find the nearest fine/rare book dealer and see what they would offer (expecting 10-20% of the value), or I would contact a notable seller specializing in the kinds of books I wanted to sell. The exception to this would be if I had a serious collection to sell and didn't want to deal with the business of selling one by one.
I do not know details about tax, import duty, etc. implications of selling your books outside the EU. Sometimes people in your situation get the books to a friend or family member in the country where the books will be sold and handle the transaction unofficially to avoid taxes and duties that might potentially eat up the entirety of your profit. I am not a lawyer and don't know how often this winds up being an issue for people who go that route.
Good luck.
posted by cupcakeninja at 5:17 AM on September 29
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posted by HearHere at 3:36 AM on September 29