Facebook is one of the online platforms with a vast amount of buying and selling being conducted between members. You can find a lot of used home medical equipment for sale, and usually at a reasonable price. You do have to sort the junk out from the good items, but there are a lot of bedside commodes, shower chairs, and sometimes a larger item such as a patient lift or a hospital bed.
Do remember, though, that any items that you buy online from another private individual will come with no guarantees. If you have an accident, or the item you bought breaks, you are not going to be able to hold the person you bought it from, as responsible for your injury.
Buying used medical equipment on Facebook
To be able to buy items on Facebook you will need a Facebook account.
You can buy items in two places on Facebook –
- in Facebook “Buying and Selling Groups”
- on the Facebook “Marketplace” (online listings)
Buying and Selling Groups, and the Facebook Marketplace, are not one and the same.
Facebook Buying and Selling Groups
To be able to buy used equipment, the first step is to find Buying and Selling groups to join –
Step 1/
As I said previously, you have to have a Facebook account to be able to do this, so if you don’t have one, you need to create an account with Facebook.com.
To create an account doesn’t cost anything – you just use an email and a password.
Step 2/
Once you have an account and are logged in, or have signed in to your existing account, click on the group menu icon in either the main Navigation Menu, which is situated across the top of the homepage, or in the left-hand sidebar menu – either one gets you to the next stage.
You can see the blue group icon in the Facebook primary navigation menu, in the image below, so you know which one it is.
Step 3/
A page for “Groups” will load, and you now want to click on the “Discover” tab, situated in the left-hand sidebar menu.
Check the image below.
As in the page that you can see below, clicking “Discover” menu tab will load a page full of all the available types of groups in your area.
Step 4/
There are groups available for many topics, activities and professions, and we want to select the buying and selling groups.
I am going to show you what I think is the quick way to finding groups, without being submerged by all of Facebook’s suggestions, which are based on what it thinks you like, because your “friends” like it.
So….
Go to the top left menu tab “Groups”, and the entry field with the magnifying glass underneath it – indicated below.
Next to the little magnifying glass icon, type in “buy and sell”, as I have done in the second image below.
Step 5/
Hit enter, and the page will load with a new menu to search for groups.
There are several filters which will allow you to choose different towns and cities, including your own, so that you can narrow down the search to select the groups in areas you are willing to travel to pick up items.
This will allow you to be as local as possible.
The page will load as in the image below.
The Groups tab is still in the upper left-hand corner, but with the new filters, which we will use.
See below.
Step 6/
Click on the “Groups” filter tab, the one below the “All” filter.
This will open some new filters for us.
Step 7/
Click on the “Public Groups” tab to turn it on.
See below.
When you do this, you will doubtless see that many more groups appeared on the page, to the right, but they are from all over the country, and we need to apply one more filter.
Step 8/
Click on the word City, just above the “Public Groups” filter, and then type in the town where you are looking – Facebook will auto suggest towns of the same name in different states, and you just select yours.
For my example, I chose Oxford, Mississippi.
You can see it in the three images below.
The page is now populated with “buy and sell” groups from in, and around, Oxford, Mississippi.
Step 9/
To join a group that you like the sound of, you can just hover over their little image, or their name, and a pop-up window will appear with a tab to join the group.
Or, you can click on the group title, and that will open their group page and timeline, where you can see the kind of stuff they have available. And if you like what they have, you will see another tab – the blue one – to join the group, just below the header image of the page, on the right-hand side, opposite the title of the group.
See that below.
Step 10/
Now, you may want to join groups in towns nearby as well, or maybe look further afield.
To do that, you just go to the filter in which you entered the name of the town you were looking in, and you click on the little white cross on the blue circular button, next to the name of the town, and it clears the field.
You can now enter the name of another town, or city, and find groups to join there.
See the images below.
Step 11/
Join as many groups as will have you – the more groups you join, the greater your chances of finding the medical equipment you are looking for.
You will have to wait for the group admins to approve your memberships before you can do anything – they will send you a message.
Step 12/
Once approved, you will be able to make purchases.
To do this, you go to your main “group page” – use one of the menu tabs on the homepage, as I showed in the beginning.
If you have joined at least one group, you will get a left-hand sidebar menu tab “groups you’ve joined”, on the group page, where you will select the group listing you wish to look at.
You can select the group listing you wish to look at, as I have indicated the image below on the left.
Step 13/
To go to the group timeline and listings, just click on the group image or name.
Step 14/
Once you have found an item that you would like to buy, click on either the name of the person offering the item, or on the photo of the item, and a link will load, with which you can message the person who is selling the item.
How to buy used medical equipment on Facebook Marketplace
The Facebook Marketplace is –
- a platform of online listings for buying, selling and donating items
- available to anyone with a Facebook account after several months of becoming a member
- and you do not have to be in a “buy and sell” group to use it
You will not instantly gain access to the Facebook Marketplace when you first get a Facebook account, it may take several months.
Do note that the “Groups” are instantly available on opening a Facebook account.
If you are in “buy and sell” groups, you will be able to do some actions on Marketplace, which will simultaneously post on your Buying and Selling Group listings (if you are in a group).
To use Marketplace –
Step1/
The easiest way to get to Marketplace, is on your homepage.
The Marketplace menu tab is in the left-hand sidebar menu tab, you can see it indicated in the image below.
Click on the Marketplace menu tab, and a page will load with “Today’s Picks”, as you can see in the image below.
“Today’s Picks” is a selection of the listings for sale, or for free, which Facebook has decided it wants to show you for the day.
You may see something you like, but if you haven’t set a distance filter, the results will be all over the place, and my aim here is to show you how to find things in your area which are easy to go and pick up.
So, let’s look at the left-hand sidebar (you can see it all is in the image below), you have –
- a first block of tabs which is only related to things you have bought or sold already
- you have a tab to create a listing to sell, or to donate an item
Below this you will see a number of menu tabs which interest us here –
- Filters
- Categories
- Free Stuff
- Buy and Sell Groups
You will need to scroll down through the categories to the bottom to fin the tab for “Buy and Sell Groups”.
This tab is going to show you everything that is available from any groups you have joined (in one combined listing) – if you are not in any groups, you won’t get anything.
This tab will also allow you to post a listing to all of your groups in one go, if you are selling something.
Step 2/
To Select listings in your area, you need to set the distance, which is done with the Tab below “filters” in the sidebar.
Automatically, you should see below “Filters” that the input field has the name of your village, town, or city, where you live, and a distance setting.
You can see the filed below.
- select another town to search if you wish
- select the distance of the radius of your search – this can go up to hundreds of miles (you can search cities by neighborhood and by zip code)
See the image below.
Step 8/
In the pop-up window shown above, as you increase the distance of the radius of search around your location, the map will change accordingly, showing the towns and villages, or neighborhoods included in that search.
To increase the distance, or the location, just click on the corresponding field and type in the location, and for the distance a drop-down menu will open with all the available distances – up to hundreds of miles.
Once you have done that, click on “Apply”, the blue tab in the bottom right-hand corner of the pop-up window.
You can do this as much as you want – just repeat the process.
The page will load with all the listings of items for sale and for free in the area that you selected.
Step 9/
You are now going to need to select a category to search for listings for used medical equipment, unfortunately there is no setting for medical equipment.
So you can either –
- not select a category, and you will see all the listings for all items, for the area you selected
- or select a category like “home goods”
You select this in the Category section, which is just below the Filters tab in the sidebar, where you set for your location and distance, in the previous step.
See below –
As I noted, a little earlier, there are also a few other filters which are available to choose from, and they are also found in the Categories Section, just below the “Filters” section –
- Free Stuff
- Buy and Sell Groups
The categories’ section is there to help you narrow down your search.
You can search the listings by category, and one which is “Free Stuff”
If you click on that, you will get all the “Free Stuff” available for pickup in the area you set for your search.
If you are in any Buy and Sell Groups, there is a tab right at the bottom of the categories list which will let you see all of your listings and to add a listing to your groups, all in one go.
Step 10/
Once you have all your settings set, you can browse through the listing to see if there is anything you want to buy.
To accept an item and arrange a pick-up, click on that item, and next to the photograph of the item, there is the message tab.
Click on the message tab to contact the person who ran the listing.
There are no guarantees when you buy on used equipment on Facebook
I have to make a couple of points now about buying equipment from private individuals on any online platform – there is no guarantee that the items are safe, and you are buying these used items at your own risk.
Buying used medical equipment from a reuse center, which refurbishes the equipment, is entirely different. Typically, the refurbishing is done within State guidelines, and the equipment will have been sanitized and checked for safety.
A reuse center will say if they have refurbished and checked the equipment for faults, or if they are simply passing it on “as is” and will not be held responsible for any breakages, or injury, related to that piece of equipment.
Online platforms for listings, do not accept responsibility, or liability, for equipment when you enter into a sale with a private individual on their platform.
And when you buy “used equipment” on Facebook, it is bought “as is”, and it is an agreement between two private parties.
The equipment pick up
When you go to pick up the equipment, it is a good idea to have someone else go with you, if you don’t know the person you are going to be dealing with – you have no proof they are who they say they are.
Don’t let people that you don’t know deliver to your home, especially if you have an elderly loved one living there.
Stay Safe !!
Where else can I buy used medical equipment online near me ?
You can also find free used medical equipment locally online on –
- eBay.com
- Craigslist.com
- Nextdoor.com
- usedHME.com
Where can I find used medical equipment online near me for free ?
You can also find free used medical equipment locally, online on –
- Craigslist.com
- Freecycle.org
- Usedhme.com
- Nextdoor.com
I have written quick, illustrated guides, on how to find, and obtain, free used medical equipment on each of the above websites/online listings –
“How to get free medical equipment near me on Craigslist ? A Quick Illustrated Guide”
“How to get free medical equipment near me on Freecycle.org ? A Quick Illustrated Guide”
“How to get free medical equipment near me on UsedHME.com ? A Quick Illustrated Guide”
“How to get free medical equipment near me on Nextdoor.com ? A Quick Illustrated Guide”
I’m Gareth, the author and owner of Looking After Mom and Dad.com
I have been a caregiver for over 10 yrs and share all my tips here.
