Where to store items / base

[Geeko]

I’ve recently been doing a lot of exploring and there aren’t may buy orders for the items I am trying to sell. I have heard that Jita was the trade center or something like that so is that a good place to base up or no? Also if I was going to transfer my ships and items I was curious if there is a way to get there safely because I’d be carrying everything I own

[Giddy_McFee]

Jita IS a trade hub, but there are others, Amarr, Dodixie, Hek and Rens being the main ones, google “eve trade hubs” and you should find out more.

Dont carry everything you own in one ship, carry as much as you would feel comfortable to lose (as you may get ganked), or depending what you have and its value consider a pubic courier (dont forget to add a collateral to your contract).

[Gerard_Amatin]

Trade hubs like Jita have a lot of players and a lot of sell and buy orders.

It’s easy to sell loot and buy ships there, but it’s hard to find a relatively empty place in space to do things.

Set your base up somewhere else and sometimes bring your loot in a quick ship with lots of health to Jita, is what I recommend.

[ShahFluffers]

Here are some pro-tips:

• Roughly decide what you want to do first. Do you want to do mining? How about industry? Hauling and logistics? Market shenanigans and trading? Mercenary-mafia work? Straight “warzone” combat?
  What you want to do will largely inform to where you want to set up your primary “base.” Different areas of the game will offer benefits for some of the things I listed while being a problem in others.
  – Example 1: If you want to do Industrial work then you want to set up in a place where there are numerous factories and/or stations to do this work. You also want good access to certain market hubs to buy/sell materials.
  – Example 2: If you want to do mining then you want to set up shop in a place that sees little traffic and has little in the way of other competition (and danger).
  – Example 3: If you want to do combat then you want to set up in a place where you can easily jump into the fray and pop on back to when you lose your ship (you WILL lose ships)… someplace with many connections to many places if one area gets too quiet.

• Market hubs are generally not a good place for most professions to set up shop (sans trading and market stuff). There is simply too much traffic and too many eyes looking for potential targets.
  And this is before you consider the large amounts of lag and chat spam that occurs in market hubs.

• There is more than just “Jita” if you are looking for a market hub. As someone mentioned before… Amarr, Dodixie, and Rens are also decent trade hubs.
  Though, yes, some things may not be as cheap or available in these hubs.

• Move things around piecemeal if you can. Don’t load up one ship with too many things unless you have some someone to properly scout and/or assist you into warp faster.
  Remember, most people who are potentially hostile are using some form of teamwork to achieve their goals. If you do the same you can stack the odds of survival more in your favor.

• Yes… moving stuff around IS a hassle and IS risky. More so when moving entire bases of operation. This is by design.
  Keeping this aspect of the game “inconvenient” keeps large groups from truly steamrolling over everything and everyone.
  This game is as much about “supporting economics” and “supply lines” as it is about straight up competition and combat.

[Shipwreck_Jones]

Some very good answers so far, but I wanted to add my two cents.

First, doo note that you don’t have to live in the same region that you sell. Naturally, you don’t want to live too far away from where you sell, or you’re going to be wasting a lot of time traveling (and possibly increase your risk of being ganked). However, most corners of HS have a major trade hub within (what I consider to be) a reasonable distance.

Second, do be aware that the market only shows orders within the region. So, if you’re on the edge of the region, there might be a major market hub nearby that you can’t see, simply because it’s in another region. For example, the career agent system of Hadaugago is only two jumps from Hek, but you’d never see it from the market window in Hadaugago because Hek is in a different region.

Also, you might be interested in the section, “How not to be ganker bait” from the following post.

Nerf Ganking Megathread

Okay. Someone proposes a nerf to suicide ganking (or getting rid of it entirely) about twice a month. Rather than keep saying the same things over and over again, I figured I’d just create a catch all thread.

Myth: Suicide ganking is unbalanced in favor of the gankers.

False. It is unbalanced, but actually in favor of prey. In fact, game mechanics stack the deck so heavily against suicide ganking, that sustainable ganking is entirely dependent on prey making at least one mistake, if not mor…

Oh, and you can typically get more money by using standing sell orders, rather than selling to standing buy orders. However, you won’t get your money right away, and you might have to periodically update your orders because competitors undercut you. That being said, you shouldn’t have to deal with too much market competition as an explorer. As a demographic, explorers seems much more inclined to accept overpriced standing sell orders and low ball buy orders than other professions (I used to do industry and region trading, and I loved my explorer customers ).