How we calculate your true profit
Most eBay dashboards — and most competitor tools — show you gross sales minus eBay fees and call it profit. That number lies. It ignores materials, labor, mileage, supplies, and the slice of your overhead that actually belongs to each flip. ResaleTruth is built to answer one question honestly: are my flips profitable?
The formula
Per item, true net = sale price − purchase cost − eBay fees − shipping label − item-level expenses (materials, labor at your configured hourly rate, parts, repair costs) − allocated overhead share (optional).
Across your business, we roll those item-level numbers up and layer business-level expenses (subscriptions, mileage, storage, tools) on top for your P&L.
What pulls automatically
- eBay final value fees — pulled via API per order, including international fees, promoted listing fees, and regulatory operating cost fees. We use the actual fee, not an estimated percentage.
- Shipping label costs — for labels purchased through eBay Managed Payments, the cost lands on the order automatically.
- Refunds and returns — when eBay issues a refund, we reverse the corresponding revenue and fees.
What you enter
- Purchase price — what you paid for the item at Goodwill, an estate sale, or wherever. Required for any cost calculation to make sense.
- Materials — bubble wrap, tissue, boxes, cleaning supplies per item. You can set defaults by category to speed up entry.
- Labor — you set your hourly rate in Settings. When you log time on an item (listing, cleaning, packing, driving), we multiply hours × rate. Most resellers are surprised by what this does to their margin.
- Item-level expenses — anything else that belongs to a specific item: repairs, authentication fees, custom packaging.
Labor: why it matters
If you’re making $5/hr net after labor, you have a job, not a business — and a bad job at that. Most resellers skip labor because it’s painful to track. We make it as low-friction as possible: set your rate once, log minutes per item, and let the math surface the truth.
You can turn labor off entirely if you don’t want to track it. But the number will lie to you.
Overhead allocation (optional)
Business-level expenses — your ResaleTruth subscription, label printer, storage unit, internet — can be allocated across items proportionally by sale price. This is optional and turned off by default. Enable it in Settings → Overhead.
The timeline
Costs accrue when you enter them. Revenue hits when the sale is marked complete (or synced from eBay). If an item is listed but unsold, all its costs sit in inventory. When it sells, those costs hit COGS. This matters for Schedule C: you don’t deduct COGS until the item sells.
What to do when the number is ugly
The point of ResaleTruth is to surface the truth early enough to change something — not to explain why last year was bad. If a category is consistently underwater, stop sourcing it. If certain sources produce low-margin items, route those trips differently. The data is only useful if you act on it.
Questions? Email support@resaletruth.com — we reply within one business day.