Shoes sold on Ebay

I am bidding on a pair of shoes. I noticed that just about every pair
of shoes the seller has ever sold has something like this in the
description, "These are true first quality (brand name) and were
purchased by me at a Chicago area department store."

Her history shows she has sold a lot of shoes. How could every single
pair be purchased new and then resold on Ebay for likely less money?
Am I slow today and not thinking of something obvious? Am I just
paranoid/suspicious for no reason? Do I need to read Ebay For Dummies?

cofarb...

More important than anything, imo: check her feedback. And I don't mean
just the percentages. Go to the feedback pages and look at the comments.
Sometimes people will leave a "positive" feedback token but the comment
contains some less-than-flattering remarks like "Took a long time..." or
"Nice, but not new as claimed...", etc. And also look for "mutually
withdrawn" numbers.

Barbara...

They could be items purchased at deep clearance discount and resold by
her at a lesser discount. I don't have the time to do it, but I've
occasionally wandered into the Eileen Fisher outlet (eg), found
sweaters for $10, and thought about making a couple of bucks on them.

scorpio00girl...

Like Barbara said, she may very well have a local store that has great
sales or she could have an agreement with a store to buy their end of
season leftovers for a pittance.

Are the shoes all new? If she's selling some new and some slightly used
shoes, she may just be a shopoholic unloading her extras. I've done a
bit of that myself...