How to: Multiply $100 from buying/reselling from Craigslist

[oddball]

Like theBiz said, you have to start somewhere. Better to learn small then to jump into expensive things an make mistakes. I made mistakes starting but it only cost me a small amount but I learned so it's worth it. Now I won't make those mistake again especially with more expensive things.

 

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[lookingahead]

Aiight, after reading a few pages. I gotta say I like these results. I'm a college student with two jobs and this soundsl ike a great way for some extra cash. soo...I'M IN! Starting tomorrow, dealing in automotive and electronics. I'll post back to let yall know how I'm doing.

beginning at $100

 

[The Spark]

Any fellow hustlers know of a good way to unload luxury bags/totes etc? Coach/burberry and the whole nine yards? Ebay seems flooded.

 

[lookingahead]

How do yall go about pricing. Do you do some market research to see what's fair or just slap a price on it to try and make profit?

 

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[Trevor Kuntz]

I got my first car for $1, put $500 into it, drove it for 2 years and put 16,000 miles on it, and then sold it to a kid at Acura for $700. Does that count? Haha.

 

[rexxkai]

i just got rejected and it hurt...

just tried to lowball a couple selling a $8000 vehicle (prolly could easily sell for $5000-6000) for $2000 on cl.

through email, the wife agreed to the price of $2000 cash, and she said she would sell if i went to buy the car today--it was like she was in a hurry. i wanted to make sure i wasnt getting scammed so i slowed down and started checking out the "used car buying process"

at the beginning of the emailing process, the wife (emailer) sent messages with perfect english, but then later on, her messages drastically changed and it felt like she was a foreigner knowing little english, and lots of the messages had typos ... so i was thinking in my mind if this was really a scam (since she took my lowball offer of $2000)

then, i asked for the VIN number (used to check whether vehicle is stolen or not) and license plate number, but she wouldn't answer my questions and kept saying she wanted my number (i didnt want to give strangers my phone number)

i finally gave her my phone number and then her husband calls me and gives me a lecture, yelling and talking in an aggressive voice that i was playing games with her wife, and that nobody sells a vehicle worth $8000 for $2000. and says how nobody does business like this and how that living in canada, we should RESPECT everyone and that LOWBALLING someone is not RESPECTING them... blah blah blah...

well, thank you for reading my rant. now that i've typed this all up, i feel muchhhhhh better.

GO FASTLANERS!!!

 

[rexxkai]

when you try to low ball ppl for iphones, how low can you go??
i've been trying to lowball iphone 4 for sale with no success. it was a used iphone 4 (used for 4 months and condition is mint) that was listed on craigslist for $400, i called them, chatted a bit with them and said i'd pay $225 and of course they said no thanks.

i've lowballed a couple iphone and ipad sellers, but it seems like with iphone, the profit is not that big, considering the amount of cash investment put in

 

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[BusinessStories]

This stuff is super fun. I made a living doing it for 2 years (by living I mean $40k a year)

The best deal I ever made was a laptop I bought for $400 (the seller thought it was broken) - I flipped it for $1200 in two days. Boom!

I don't do that anymore, but I started a website, check it out [link removed by mod.]

 

[MMatt]

I though I had found a profitable niche and it was for a month or two but last month I brought in next to nothing after selling fees. I've been looking daily and nothing new has come up that I can see as profitable. Time to move on I guess and discover a better product to flip.

 

[westgateok]

Awesome idea! I might have to look into this

 

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[Trevor Kuntz]

Bought some gaming systems at CVS yesterday for $5 each. They normally retail for $49.99-$79.99, but CVS liquidated their stock of them, so the market is saturated at the moment. Gonna hold onto them and try to sell them when the supply drops.

 

[sambreaker20]

Hmm Im gonna try this starting with $0 and tried selling something I have and use that money to start, will post results! thanks for the idea!

 

[Amail]

I'm in for $20. Bought 3 Canon toner cartridges for $20, have one on eBay for $25 BIN (or wherever the auction ends) + $14 shipping. This is an experiment to see what the best approach is for listing these on eBay.

Check out eBay - New & used electronics, cars, apparel, collectibles, sporting goods & more at low prices to see ad #1. All you eBay veterans, please give me any feedback you think would help.

 

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[Ivan]

Hmm Im gonna try this starting with $0 and tried selling something I have and use that money to start, will post results! thanks for the idea!

Another way to start with $0 is to browse the "free" section and resell things that people give away. You just need to make sure that it's worth your time. I know there are a lot of people in my city who waste their lives (in my opinion) running around town picking up $10-$20 items for free and reselling them. Competition is crazy, too.

However, there are a few items I've found that work well with this model:

- Pets: a lot of times, people don't want to take care of their pets any more so they just give them away. I used to have a friend who would pick up free puppies and resell them for $100-$300 pretty quickly. Not sure if this is OK in all areas, but it was really easy money.

- Furniture and household items: some people give away used high quality furniture (because they're moving, got new furniture, or whatever). I never thought there would be a good market for antique furniture in my city, but boy was I wrong. Good deals get snapped up REALLY fast. I suspect that "mom and pop" secondhand furniture stores buy them and sell them in store for close to retail price. There's a pretty good resale market too. We wanted to give away a chandelier, but ended up selling it for $50 within a few hours. Same story with a set of silverware. We thought about posting it in the Free section, but decided to try selling it. Got $30 for it within a few hours.

- Building materials and scrap: Things like copper pipes, aluminum rims, etc have recycling value as well as resale value. It's pretty annoying having this stuff lying around though.

That being said, my advice is to start out with around $500 and try to multiply that. Working with free and low-price items gets really annoying after a while. I'd rather expend effort turning $500 into $1000 than turning $50 into $100. But in the long run, the scalable fastlane plan should always be the main focus. It's easy to get stuck in "technician/trader" mode when you get good at reselling.

 

[Amail]

Stepped it up a notch, but I'm in unfamiliar territory. Bought an iPhone 4S, 32GB for $320, but it's locked to AT&T. I think I can get $450 for it on Craigslist.

 

[SebastianBermud]

If the city you live in is big enough, the easiest way is to go on craigslist, find something someone is selling for less than what it is worth. So you need to look for something you know something about, or do a lot of research. Let's say you like model airplanes and that you know a lot about them, like prices, models, rarity... Search your local craigslist for model airplanes for sale. Find someone asking less than it is worth (meaning you think you can sell it for more), turn around and resell it. Always try to negotiate a better price when you are buying, and price it higher than you are willing to sell it for because people like to negotiate.

 

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[Amail]

Two updates. Sold one of the toners for $13.50 plus shipping on eBay. Told the guy I had three at that price, and he'd save on shipping if he bought them all. So, $20 turned into $40. $20 profit isn't setting the world on fire, but it's 100% profit so I'm happy.

Got dinged on the iPhone. Had it on eBay, someone hit the BIN button and asked how much to ship to London. I told him I'd need the full address to calculate shipping. A day later I got an email from "paypal" saying I had $550 deposited in my account and an address to ship to. In Nigeria.

I logged onto PayPal (the real one), and there's no $550 deposit. So, now it's relisted on eBay.

 

[oddball]

Two updates. Sold one of the toners for $13.50 plus shipping on eBay. Told the guy I had three at that price, and he'd save on shipping if he bought them all. So, $20 turned into $40. $20 profit isn't setting the world on fire, but it's 100% profit so I'm happy.

Got dinged on the iPhone. Had it on eBay, someone hit the BIN button and asked how much to ship to London. I told him I'd need the full address to calculate shipping. A day later I got an email from "paypal" saying I had $550 deposited in my account and an address to ship to. In Nigeria.

I logged onto PayPal (the real one), and there's no $550 deposit. So, now it's relisted on eBay.

Yup, I have had that happen. It's a PITA because then you have to relist and whatnot.
Speaking of iPhones, I have 1 to sell tomorrow for $290, paid $215.

 

[Amail]

Heading off at lunch to pick up a Robot Couple MP450 commercial blender for $180. Lowest sold price I can find on eBay is $300, but I've seen them sell for over $500. I hope to double this money too.

 

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[Amail]

Sold the iPhone on Craigslist for $390. That seems to be the magic number around here for iPhones. Was hoping for $450, but I should have listed one at that price to guage interest. There isn't any.

I'm up $70 on that.

 

[verial]

This all seems like a lot of work. How is this fastlane?

 

[Vigilante]

This was intended just to provide a primer for some working capital. However Fastlane does not equal no work. You might be looking for the four hour work week.

 

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[Amail]

For me, it's an exercise in sales. I'd come to realize I can't remember ever selling anything to anyone, except a car when I was a teenager. Every other car has either died, wrecked, or been traded in on something else. I've sold my services, but nothing tangible. I didn't know what it felt like to sell something, particularly something I'd bought with the express purpose of selling it for a profit.

I do now. Funny how the simplest things can change your mindset.

 

[Amail]

Heading off at lunch to pick up a Robot Couple MP450 commercial blender for $180. Lowest sold price I can find on eBay is $300, but I've seen them sell for over $500. I hope to double this money too.

Well, that auction ended with zero bids. I relisted it with a $1 starting bid to see if I can generate some interest. People are drawn to active auctions, I hope this does it. Also hope I don't end up selling it for $1!

 

[Alan Wu]

I'd bid on it, if you'd link the auction.

 

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[Amail]

Duh! Why didn't I think of that?

NO RESERVE - Robot Coupe MP 450 Turbo VV 720 Watts Hand Mixer - NO RESERVE | eBay

 

[Amail]

To whomever bid in my eBay auction - thanks!

 

[Amail]

My auction closed, but I'm not celebrating. Sold the mixer for $82 - I'm stumped. Looking back thru completed listings, I saw that the lowest one of these sold for was $300, and it went up much higher from there. I figured I'd easily hit my buy in price of $180.

Since the $250 min bid and $475 BIN strategy got me zero bids, I figured I'd change it up. Second strategy was $1 min bid, no reserve, and let the biddiny mayhem begin. Well, I got bids all right, but not what I was expecting.

What did I do wrong? What lesson can I take from this? Should I have put a reserve amount? Experienced ebayer's, please chime in. I'm learning as I go, so I want my $100 lesson to count.

 

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[PatrickP]

How is your auction different than others?

How many items have you sold and what is your rating compared to the ones that sold for $300?

How many and how detailed are your pictures compared to the other auctions?

Do you have a video, is this even allowed on Ebay?

 

[Amail]

My auction included copy directly from the manufacturer's web site (they seem to know how to market them). I took four good photos with a backdrop and addes some original copy. The photos are better than the ones that had sold for more.

My ranking is tiny. I've sold 11 things, so this may be a deal killer.

I did not have video, and I don't know if they're allowed. Video would have been good - it's an impressive beast!