For people who have not sold on eBay yet
Every fee calculator stops at dollars. Nobody tells a new seller the date. eBay's own beginner page lists “Get paid” as step 3 of 4 and never mentions that a new seller's first money can sit on hold for up to a month. This decoder puts the three numbers together — your keep, your limits, and your payout date — from eBay's published rules.
Tell it about the first thing you plan to sell. It answers with the three numbers that decide your first month: what you keep, what fits under your new-account limits, and the date your money lands. Nothing you type leaves your browser.
Free. No account, no email, nothing uploaded. Rules checked October 21, 2026.
Why a date, not just a dollar
Number one
A new seller's funds are held until eBay is sure the buyer got the item. Ship tracked and it frees about 2 days after delivery. Ship untracked and it can sit for up to 21 days. Sell something over $1,000 and it can sit for about 30. Same sale, three different months of your life — the decoder computes yours.
Number two
eBay's standard final value fee is 13.6% of the total amount of the sale — price plus the shipping you charge — plus a per-order fee. On a $40 sale with free shipping that is $5.84 in fees, and after a typical $6 label you keep $28.16. Fees checked October 21, 2026.
Number three
A new account starts at 10 items and $500 of listed value per month, whichever you hit first. One $500 listing spends the whole month. The decoder budgets your item against the cap before you waste a slot.
The hold tree, in plain words
Fast branch
Money available about 2 days after delivery is confirmed. This is the branch to live in: ship fast, upload tracking, sell ordinary things.
Slow branch
eBay can't confirm delivery, so a new seller's money waits out the hold — up to 21 days, and eBay's terms allow up to 30 calendar days from the order date when delivery is never confirmed.
Longest branch
High-priced and unusual sales can be held up to about 30 days while eBay makes sure the buyer has no problem. A month-two sale, not a first sale.
The full rules, with the fee table, live on one dated page: eBay fees & payout rules for new sellers.
Fees & hold rules checked October 21, 2026 — from eBay's own help pages
The gap nobody fills
eBay's beginner page walks you through four steps — list, sell, get paid, ship — and “get paid” sits there with no asterisk. The hold rules live somewhere else entirely: in help-center policy pages, split across regional sites, written for a seller who is already staring at the words “funds on hold.” The flipping gurus skip it too — a course sells sourcing and listing, and the cash-timing shock arrives after the course is bought.
So the shock lands in the eBay Community forums, where new sellers ask the same stunned question every week and volunteers answer it by hand. We built the tool that answers it first, with a date. We don't take money from platforms — no affiliate links, no course to sell you — which is exactly why we can print the wait.
Before you list anything
You get ten listings and $500 of value in month one. The First-10 Planner ranks the things already in your house — tracked and quick-selling first, the 30-day-hold items held for month two — and prices each slot after fees. Start with the closet-first list if you are staring at a blank page.
The First 30 Days Kit turns one decode into the whole month: the day-by-day calendar (limits, holds, when cash actually arrives), the First-10 listing worksheets, the hold-avoidance checklist, the limit-raise playbook for days 30/60/90, and the fee-proof pricing sheet for the common categories.
Included in the $39 First 30 Days Kit
Worked examples, computed
Worked example
Fees $3.12, you keep $11.88 after a typical label — and the payout date, tracked vs untracked.
Worked example
Fees $5.16, you keep $24.24 after a typical label — and the payout date, tracked vs untracked.
Worked example
Fees $7.20, you keep $36.40 after a typical label — and the payout date, tracked vs untracked.
Worked example
Fees $10.60, you keep $56.50 after a typical label — and the payout date, tracked vs untracked.
Worked example
Fees $14, you keep $76.40 after a typical label — and the payout date, tracked vs untracked.
Worked example
Fees $34.40, you keep $201.60 after a typical label — and the payout date, tracked vs untracked.
The seller-entry family
Start here
The door finder: answer five starting-point questions and get one honest verdict on where a beginner should sell first — including “not yet.”
Amazon instead?
Amazon's gates, decoded before you open an account: which categories a day-one account can actually enter, and which are effectively closed.
Etsy instead?
The pre-flight verdict for an Etsy shop you have not opened yet: open it, narrow it first, or don't open this version.
It depends on the branch your sale lands in. Tracked and delivered: about 2 days after delivery is confirmed, plus 1–3 business days for the payout to reach your bank. Untracked: up to 21 days. Over $1,000 or high-scrutiny: up to about 30 days. The decoder above turns your item into an exact date.
No — fees are one of three outputs. A fee calculator cannot tell you your payout date or whether your item fits under the 10-item / $500 new-account cap. This decoder computes all three together, because that is the answer a first sale actually needs.
eBay's own published US help pages — Selling fees, Payments on hold, and Selling limits — read and recorded on October 21, 2026. Every figure on this site is date-stamped, and the full table lives on the rules page.
It can. eBay's published rule allows holds of up to about 30 days for high-priced items and unusual selling patterns, and up to 21 days in limited cases for new sellers. Most ordinary tracked sales free much faster — about 2 days after delivery. The branch you land in is mostly your choice of what to sell first and how to ship it.