Ever since getting my eBay account reinstated after staying dormant for the past year, I've been excited to make some residual income with the many selling methods that I have. Sadly it seems that eBay has changed a lot during the past year. They've implemented many rules and restrictions that completely eliminated any means of me making some money.

I used to sell "items" in a video game that was represented by electronic data in the form of pixels. So, that was totally removed from selling throughout eBay. Then, eBooks (electronic books in the form of PDF files usually) became a restricted selling category. All information products, which were delivered electronically, became illegal items for selling on the site.

These were the best items to sell because they came at no cost to the seller. Many sellers' annual income came solely from selling on eBay. Their lives have been ruined. They must make their own websites to sell their goods but that will most likely fail due to the minimal exposure they'd receive.

Recently, I've came up with the idea of selling mod kits for the PSP on eBay and as soon as I purchased the materials to do so, eBay started removing those listings due to infringement of Sony's copyrights (when all coding was actually freeware).

This company is bound to lose a lot of revenue from listings if it continues to restrict the selling of items on eBay. It seems to be a dying business model and its sideways-moving stock price in the past couple years seems to be supporting my case.

When eBay was first introduced it was great because it was a great place to sell/buy almost anything possible. Now, eBay's high popularity is actually ruining its business. When I want to buy an item, I go straight to eBay. I do not go to Dell.com or visit a Gamestop store to purchase something. Why pay retail when I can go to eBay to get it for less? Now all the big companies realize that eBay is actually causing them to lose money and threated eBay of legal consequences and rights just so that the big companies don't miss out on the money.

For example: I represent Coach or Gucci. A seller is selling REAL handbags on eBay for a lower price than one would find at the retail store. I would tell eBay that the handbags are counterfeits and demand them to remove those listings immediately. Now, the money spent on the handbag merchandise by the seller is kept by me. AND, any prospective buyer would have to go to the store to pay ME AGAIN to get whatever item that person sought on eBay. By locking up the capital spent on the reseller, a future customer would have to come straight to me to buy something.

Anyways, I might be turning to Amazon or some other site to sell my merchandise. EBay is no good, anymore, for selling but it remains a great place to find bargains for other useful items.

Well, it has been about 4 months since I opened my credit card account and checked my credit report. The first time, I used Equifax and this time I used Experian. I've learned that one must keep their credit in check, just in case of identity theft and fraud.

Aside from my school loans and the debt on my credit card, everything else is clean as expected.

I don't know if I really need to purchase my credit score since it is most likely around average (and I'm not even sure what that is). I may be interested in getting a car sometime this year but that'll probably be another 4 months.

I entered college not really knowing what to do with regards to how to manage tuition and school finances. I had the idea that every student didn't have the ability to pay their own tuition in its entirety and that they would always need grants, scholarships and school loans.

Now that my financial sense has been upgraded, I regret not taking all the subsidized Stafford loans to the maximum amount possible. My first and second years, I borrowed just enough to pay off tuition, including grants and scholarships. This school year, my sister also entered college so I received much more financial aid and thus, didn't need to take any loans.

Subsidized Stafford loans require repayments half a year after graduation with an interest rate of less than 5%. I checked my college financial aid account and realized that I could have borrowed more than $5000 per year. Even if I didn't need it for tuition, I regret not taking it so I can put it in my HSBC direct online savings account.

It is much better than taking advantage of 0% Balance transfer credit cards since I do not have to pay every month and I could hold the money for more than a year. So this coming year, I'll consider taking the full amount of my loans and making some money from high-yield interest savings, despite the falling rates.

I recently completed my FAFSA application and as I said in a previous post, last year's Estimated Family Contribution number was 50. This year, my EFC was 93... That probably means I'll be paying a lot for tuition. With an EFC of 50, I didn't have to borrow any many and I gave less that $100 out of my own pocket.

This coming year, I'll most likely lose my SMART grant (roughly $3000 for the year). So, I have applied for several scholarships, which I doubt I'll get, but I'll continue to write essays for additional scholarships. Hopefully, I'll be able to cover all the costs.