Jump Start Aug: Holiday Money Week: Day 7

This is a task for the end of our Holiday Money week. Today’s Jump Start activity is to try out a buyback or buying site. If you haven’t used one of these sites before, they’re businesses that buy specific items from you at a set rate.

You offer them the goods, they offer you a price, and you can then decide to sell or not to sell based on their offer. They will also give you prepaid postage labels so you don’t have postage costs, in most cases. Sometimes you are also offered a free courier service.

Generally speaking, you can get better rates selling on auction sites, tabletop sales, nearly-new sales, Facebook groups, Gumtree, local papers and forums etc. That’s why this is the last idea of the week – because buyback sites are where you can go with your unsold items once you’ve exhausted the other selling avenues.

Here are some to try:

• MusicMagpie – this site mainly takes CDs, DVDs and Blu-rays, but you may also get a few quid for things like GHD hair straighteners, branded clothing etc. They even have a smartphone app that lets you easily scan in barcodes, to save time.

• Other music and DVD buying sites – some new MusicMagpie competitors are springing up. I hope to review one of them soon, but won’t recommend until I’ve tried and tested it.

• Book buying sites – WeBuyBooks.co.uk and FatBrain are simple ways to turn old, unwanted books into cash. AbeBooks also offers a similar buyback service.

• Clothes buying sites – be warned, you may get as little as 50p per kilo. Examples include Clothes-Xchange.co.uk, clothesbank.co.uk and Return to Earn. As I haven’t used these particular services myself, I’d suggest doing some research to see what other customers think of them before taking the plunge.

Have you used any of these services before? What do you think of them? I’d love to know!