Posted By:
honus3415For what it's worth....according to my accountant that slept at a Holiday Inn Express last night....you'll have to forgive me because I didn't and can only remember the jest of his technical jargon.
All personal sales (ebay, auction houses, card shows, yard sales and the like) require being reported on the income side of one's yearly taxes. The opportunity to offset any gains from those sales with expenses (losses, shipping, storage, insurance fees....) can only be used when one has this collection activity registered as a business with the appropriate record keeping in place (including state yearly, quarterly or monthly reporting).
As far as the IRS tapping into ebay's data bank, I have heard of instances where households (not businesses) did attract audits with regards to unreported ebay sales. Wheather this was based on activity volume, dollar amounts or whistle blowers I never knew. But yes, according to ebay a couple years ago, they are required to make all requested activity information available to the IRS since their inception. I wouldn't be suprised if this data included all transaction information down to the IP address or physical card address of the computer involved in each transaction. This may seem like a lot of information but in the electronic world today it's hardly more different than two words on your IPOD.
With the growth of the National Debt, it's probably only a matter of time before the government actively taps this "electronic oil field" and publically starts selling their own PSA graded "George Orwell Collection".