Selling 101

How to list, what it costs at publish, and what's locked once a listing goes live.

How do I list an item?

Head to Sell → List an item. Pick a category (Plant, Supplies, or Other), choose Auction or Buy It Now, fill in the details, save as draft, then drag-drop photos on the next screen. Click Publish listing to go live. The auction timer starts at publish, not at form-save — drafts can sit as long as you want.

How many photos can I upload?

Up to 10 photos per listing, JPEG / PNG / WebP, capped at 8 MB each. The first one is the cover thumbnail. Drag to reorder while the listing is still a draft. Once you publish, you can add more photos but you can't remove or reorder — Trevul treats publish as a commitment to the gallery the buyer was looking at.

What's the reserve fee?

Charged at publish to your saved card: 3% of your reserve price, minimum $0.50, capped at $80. Non-refundable in general — Trevul covers the cost of holding your listing on the marketplace whether or not it sells. The exception is the 15-minute grace window described next.

Listings without a reserve price still incur the $0.50 minimum.

I just published and need to fix something — too late?

You have a 15-minute grace window after publish to cancel cleanly. Inside it: full refund of the reserve fee + any Spotlight tip, no bidders to notify (a fresh listing has no bids in 15 minutes), and you can re-list with fixes. Past 15 minutes the listing is locked — photos can still be added but no field edits, and cancelling refunds nothing.

The grace cancel button shows up on your own listing detail page during the window, with a countdown.

What's Spotlight?

Optional paid placement at the top of the listings page. Tip anywhere from $1 to $500 when you publish — the higher tips ride higher in the Spotlight strip, and older tips at the same amount win ties (so an early Sapling-priced tip stays visible against late upgrades). Non-refundable except during the 15-minute grace window. The visible-slot cap auto-adjusts between 12 and 24 spots depending on overall site traffic.

Can I edit a live listing?

Photos can be added (not removed or reordered). Title, description, price, shipping cost, etc. are locked once the listing goes live — Trevul treats publish as a binding offer to buyers. If you need to materially change anything, cancel + re-list (outside the grace window the original reserve fee + Spotlight stay non-refundable, so re-list with the new info and you'll pay a new reserve fee on the new listing).

What can't I put in a title or description?

Email addresses, phone numbers, or external URLs — Trevul rejects them when you publish (anti-fee-circumvention; the same rule applies to pre-sale messages). Plant Latin names and known horticultural terms won't false-positive against the filter. Profanity is also blocked. Once a sale exists between you and a buyer, those gates open in messages so you can coordinate shipping.