SIDE HUSTLE: How To Flip Couches & Books For Money! (Try This!)

[ZackerySprague]

Hey Guys,

So a few years ago, I came across a video from a YouTube channel called JT Franco and he started doing a Couch Flipping business challenge to which he was inspired to do by Ryan Pineda. The whole premise of the idea is that you could take free couches from your city, clean it up, and sell it for cash.

I did this a couple years ago and was able to turn a couch I found on the road into $150 dollars to a Uhaul store down the street from me, I may have the photos here somewhere on my Facebook to which I'll share it here. I didn't continue this a few years ago, but wish I did. I got inspired a bit because after watching JT Franco's recent video he created a 8 months ago. Some people where able to profit $100,000 a year.

The value skew or problem you are solving is helping people buy couches at a cheaper price in this economy or people who are moving and no longer want their couch. Apparently to some statistics there are about 2,000,000 people who move per month

So here is how the entire process works:

1. You, first must be in a populated city, I am in Dallas-Fort Worth (so it's very populated with people).
2. Identify your most populated marketplaces within your area: Facebook, Craigslist, and OfferUp.
3. Find a place to store your couches: I picked up a 10 x 20ft public storage. Sometimes they have promotional offers for your first month for a $1.
4. Purchase, Rent, or Borrow a truck from your friend. This will be one of the main requirements when you are picking up your first couch.
5. Go on to the marketplaces and find your first couch. Usually real brown leather is the best to sell. I'll post a guide that I have downloaded from JT Franco who no longer offers it on his channel for you guys. He has some message templates you can use to message people.
6. Pickup the couch and store it.
7. Cleanup the couch, take really good pictures, and price your couch.
8. Post it up on Facebook, Craigslist, and Offerup.

FAQs:
1. How do you price your couch? -> Easy, try to find a couch on the marketplace that looks similar to yours. Match the price or undercut just by a little bit.

Message Templates:



Example of Startup Costs Here in Dallas-Fort Worth, Texas:
1. Truck -> $30-$50 dollars. $30 dollars would go towards a Uhaul Pickup Truck Rental, $10 dollars for gas. It was 0.69 cents per mile
2. Storage Unit -> Public Storage (Cooled Unit) $209, sometimes they have promotions for $1 dollar.
3. Marketplaces -> Facebook (Free), Offerup (Free), Craigslist (Free).
4. Lifting Partner -> Free.

Resources To Help You Get Started:
1. Couch Flipping Guide from JT Franco: LINK HERE
2. Account Spreadsheet for Couches: LINK HERE

*Instructions*
1. For the guide, click download on the top right hand corner of the guide.
2. For the accounting spreadsheet, from Google Sheets. Click make a copy of your own.

Videos:

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y6zpqBzicZk

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UvJXuLu5eIE&t=455s


Happy Flipping & Good Luck!

I hope this guide helps you in anyway

Thanks for reading

 

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[thechosen1]

Hey Guys,

So a few years ago, I came across a video from a YouTube channel called JT Franco and he started doing a Couch Flipping business challenge to which he was inspired to do by Ryan Pineda. The whole premise of the idea is that you could take free couches from your city, clean it up, and sell it for cash.

I did this a couple years ago and was able to turn a couch I found on the road into $150 dollars to a Uhaul store down the street from me, I may have the photos here somewhere on my Facebook to which I'll share it here. I didn't continue this a few years ago, but wish I did. I got inspired a bit because after watching JT Franco's recent video he created a 8 months ago. Some people where able to profit $100,000 a year.

The value skew or problem you are solving is helping people buy couches at a cheaper price in this economy or people who are moving and no longer want their couch. Apparently to some statistics there are about 2,000,000 people who move per month

So here is how the entire process works:

1. You, first must be in a populated city, I am in Dallas-Fort Worth (so it's very populated with people).
2. Identify your most populated marketplaces within your area: Facebook, Craigslist, and OfferUp.
3. Find a place to store your couches: I picked up a 10 x 20ft public storage. Sometimes they have promotional offers for your first month for a $1.
4. Purchase, Rent, or Borrow a truck from your friend. This will be one of the main requirements when you are picking up your first couch.
5. Go on to the marketplaces and find your first couch. Usually real brown leather is the best to sell. I'll post a guide that I have downloaded from JT Franco who no longer offers it on his channel for you guys. He has some message templates you can use to message people.
6. Pickup the couch and store it.
7. Cleanup the couch, take really good pictures, and price your couch.
8. Post it up on Facebook, Craigslist, and Offerup.

FAQs:
1. How do you price your couch? -> Easy, try to find a couch on the marketplace that looks similar to yours. Match the price or undercut just by a little bit.

Message Templates:

View attachment 47889

Example of Startup Costs Here in Dallas-Fort Worth, Texas:
1. Truck -> $30-$50 dollars. $30 dollars would go towards a Uhaul Pickup Truck Rental, $10 dollars for gas. It was 0.69 cents per mile
2. Storage Unit -> Public Storage (Cooled Unit) $209, sometimes they have promotions for $1 dollar.
3. Marketplaces -> Facebook (Free), Offerup (Free), Craigslist (Free).
4. Lifting Partner -> Free.

Resources To Help You Get Started:
1. Couch Flipping Guide from JT Franco: LINK HERE
2. Account Spreadsheet for Couches: LINK HERE

*Instructions*
1. For the guide, click download on the top right hand corner of the guide.
2. For the accounting spreadsheet, from Google Sheets. Click make a copy of your own.

Videos:

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y6zpqBzicZk

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UvJXuLu5eIE&t=455s


Happy Flipping & Good Luck!

I hope this guide helps you in anyway

Thanks for reading

Awesome post man! This is a great way to make some cash when starting out or even just to fund some investments/build cash between projects. Love the step-by-step.

 

[JAJT]

FYI - people do this with ALL kinds of products.

I know flipping furniture is a huge one. Most furniture being sold is battered and worn. Sand it up, fresh coat of paint, and boom - you just turned a $20 used dresser into a $400 "new" dresser. Anyone with basic woodworking skills could make easy 'side hustle' money out of their hobby this way.

 

[Ismail941]

This is awesome content!
Love the breakdown

 

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[AmazingLarry]

Nice post.

My wife started doing this with a couch and loveseat she found at a thrift store for like $30. It was a vintage fabric couch with a really cool design. Apparently vintage furniture is pretty popular these days.

She removed the skirt and rented a steam cleaner from Home Depot and cleaned it up really nice. It ended being a gift for her sister, but she could have easily sold it for a couple hundred bucks.

The steam cleaner works really well by the way, but it takes some time but cleans all the stains and dirt and makes the fabric look new.

It's a lot of work for each couch, but could be an easy way to make some money.

 

[ZackerySprague]

This is awesome content!
Love the breakdown

Your welcome .

 

[ZackerySprague]

FYI - people do this with ALL kinds of products.

I know flipping furniture is a huge one. Most furniture being sold is battered and worn. Sand it up, fresh coat of paint, and boom - you just turned a $20 used dresser into a $400 "new" dresser. Anyone with basic woodworking skills could make easy 'side hustle' money out of their hobby this way.

I haven’t tried any other furniture other than couches.

I was looking yesterday on Facebook, Offerup and Craigslist. Theirs supply, but not a lot of good couch’s.

I think the popularity of this side hustle has increased over the years.

I found that OfferUp here in DFW was a really good place to source couches, free ones in this case.

I have a friend who I did this with and was talking to him yesterday of doing this again. Honestly it was amazing feeling to just flip a single free couch for $150 dollars. Honestly blew my mind. How easy it was, all it takes is just your time and muscle.

All I need is a truck to do it with and a storage unit. I don’t suspect to get this started until the end of the month when I have free cash flow for the costs. Next week Thursday to be exact.

I just thought I’d share this with the community since I know it works, since I got paid from a single couch.

 

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[ZackerySprague]

Awesome post man! This is a great way to make some cash when starting out or even just to fund some investments/build cash between projects. Love the step-by-step.

Thank you ^^ .

 

[BizyDad]

I was looking yesterday on Facebook, Offerup and Craigslist. Theirs supply, but not a lot of good couch’s.

My two best friends have passed in the past year. It has recently fallen to me to clean out their house. (I chose this because I want to honor my friends, raise some money for their kids, and ease the burden on my best man's mom who is now a grandma raising two preteens in a city far away from where they grew up).

ANYWAYZ

My point is I still felt under a time crunch and put brand new couches (literally less than a year old) on offer up. I got a mere $400 out of them when they went for over $2K new. With limited time to devote to the "Clear out the house" project, I took the path of least resistance so as to not distract from my businesses and kids too much.

For you reading the thread, I think this is an additional opportunity somehow. Estate sales. Death records. County recorders office might help you find opportunities before other people find them. Maybe a post on craigslist "We Buy Couches".

Plus, on my end, the couches sold relatively quick. You'd probably want to check these services several times a day (or pay a VA to do it, or write a script) if you wanted to scale it up.

Hope that helps.

 

[MJ DeMarco]

There was a guy here who would flip washer/dryers. He claimed he did pretty well. Very similar vein.

 

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[ZackerySprague]

There was a guy here who would flip washer/dryers. He claimed he did pretty well. Very similar vein.

Washers and dryers? That’s interesting haha.

 

[JAJT]

Washers and dryers? That’s interesting haha.

99% of people don't know how to fix anything, and those that could, generally don't bother.

A LOT of stuff gets donated, thrown out, sold for cheap, etc that would have tremendous value if restored.

Phones, small/old electronics, watches, appliances, small engines, furniture, vehicles, etc can all be restored and usually pretty cheaply (compared to the restored price). Anything you would feel bad about throwing away because it FEELS like it should be worth something, probably is worth something if given a few dollars worth of repairs and some elbow grease.

All those phone repair places didn't crop up overnight because there isn't huge margin (and demand) for phone repair. My wife's $1000 phone broke recently and from what I can tell needed $100 worth of parts (the screen aka digitizer) and she was quoted over $500 for it (which we declined while laughing, but anyway..). Takes maybe 20 minutes to fix a phone for $400 profit.

You can't easily scale a business around this stuff but if you are sitting on your a$$ or have spare time, there's money out there.

 

[ZackerySprague]

Update (03/29/2023):

So I have decided to change my side hustle to flipping couches and flipping books.

Today I have found an image on the internet of books, downloaded GIMP (Free paint software), added the text as you will see in the image below, and posted it on Nextdoor.

I'll posting the service in Buyer/Seller Facebook groups.

Here is the image below I have created:



Nextdoor Post:



Facebook Post:

 

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[ZackerySprague]

Update (03/30/2023):

No updates or messages so far from any of the postings I have made in Nextdoor and Facebook. One facebook group has removed my post.

Yesterday I was looking at Arbitrage idea's, one in particular of logo design. Reviewed craigslist and found very little postings, but I did find that people are paying for computer help. One example, is that a SAAS was willing to pay $400 dollars, $200 dollars a day for a convention they were going to attend last weekend.

I might check out doing Arbitrage with Upwork.

I will be texting my friend today about couch flipping. I will continue to find ways to find books.

 

[ZackerySprague]

Update (03/30/2023):

First message! I will be picking up the books tomorrow after 2:30pm and we have our first couch from my sister. Her couch has stains. I am speaking with another friend to start this business.

I understand the costs of renting a Uhaul Truck, and it's honestly a bit in-expensive. My sister will be dropping off the couch when I get a Storage Unit.

 

[ZackerySprague]

Update (4/1/2023):

So not many people are interested in the Free book service, it has been several days. One of the posts in the Facebook Group communities removed the post. One person was interested on Facebook. Facebook removed the service as I listed it as a item for sale haha! So that's also probably why I have lost visibility and reach to many people in the marketplace. This worked before in the past.

No bites on Nextdoor. I'll have to add more channels such as going to books stores, but before I do that. I will need to buy a scanner and get an application I believe it's called Scout IQ.

 

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[Saint]

Thanks for sharing this guide! Do you see this as something you could turn into a fastlane business, or just another income stream to support your other work?

I'm interested to hear more about your approach with books too. I assume you're not refurbishing those?

I've always thought it would be cool to trade in books. I'd be fascinated with understanding the value of books in the marketplace and profiting off that.

 

[ZackerySprague]

Thanks for sharing this guide! Do you see this as something you could turn into a fastlane business, or just another income stream to support your other work?

I'm interested to hear more about your approach with books too. I assume you're not refurbishing those?

I've always thought it would be cool to trade in books. I'd be fascinated with understanding the value of books in the marketplace and profiting off that.

Couches:

I see this as more of a side income. I don't thinks would be Fastlane, as it doesn't meet all of the CENTS requirements. In reality this is just to get you some quick cash to get you going.

I've been recently active in finding couches in my area and I think this side hustle has gained in popularity, still doesn't hurt to try!

Your main sourcing websites will be Facebook, Craigslist, and Offerup. You are going to be looking for leather couches, their should be a guide in my original post that can definitely get you going .

Couches and relatively sell fast

Books:

For the books, sourcing is gonna be a bit hard, but here are a few tips I can give you.

1. Check any stores that sell books.
2. Find Estate Sales, these are good places to find books that are sale.
3. Find stores that take books in bulk, you just may be able to get access into the back and then find some good books re-sell.
4. Post up on Facebook groups and Nextdoor.

You will need a Scanner with bluetooth and Scout IQ.

For books, it will take time to sell. But getting to a full-time income, according a person I spoke to, you would have to have an inventory of 1500 to 2000 at Amazon.

 

[Dakoded1]

Hi @ZackerySprague, great thread and thanks for sharing these ideas. I drive a pickup truck and always keep an eye out for any gems left out on the side of the road for my own use (also in a city in TX) but haven't yet tried to cash in on any of my finds.

To add on to your idea, there are a few homes I pass regularly that have had the same old couch or mattress sitting outside for a long time and only getting worse from the weather. Obviously there is no resale value in such beat up items compounded by weather damage.

The city, for one reason or the other, hasn't picked these items up for weeks so I had the thought today to approach some of these houses and just pick them up and take them to the dump myself for a cash fee. It seems sensible enough and after a while, the homeowner will probably just be happy to see them gone.

Out of curiosity, what made you want to focus on flipping books?

 

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[ZackerySprague]

Hi @ZackerySprague, great thread and thanks for sharing these ideas. I drive a pickup truck and always keep an eye out for any gems left out on the side of the road for my own use (also in a city in TX) but haven't yet tried to cash in on any of my finds.

To add on to your idea, there are a few homes I pass regularly that have had the same old couch or mattress sitting outside for a long time and only getting worse from the weather. Obviously there is no resale value in such beat up items compounded by weather damage.

The city, for one reason or the other, hasn't picked these items up for weeks so I had the thought today to approach some of these houses and just pick them up and take them to the dump myself for a cash fee. It seems sensible enough and after a while, the homeowner will probably just be happy to see them gone.

Out of curiosity, what made you want to focus on flipping books?

Flipping books versus couches allows you to get access to a huge volume of books. For flipping couches, the supply will always be the question. Example, in the DFW area, several weeks ago when I started this, the market or couches or couches being given away for free almost little to none. That doesn't necessarily mean that this side hustle isn't viable, as it still is, but it goes to show how popular this side hustle has become. So in order to combat this you would then have to expand your channels to finding more couches by adding Craigslist and Offerup as alternative sources.

Books however allows you to not only scan in volume, but you can also easily scale very fast. But the hard part here is sourcing. Sourcing will be something that you will have figure out, either by not only shopping/finding books at thrift stores, but also by collecting books from estate sales and other areas.

One cool thing that others pointed out was the idea of flipping everything. I know a resource that I studied upon a few years ago, a guy goes by the name of bonefide hustler. He actually flips items for a living, he has such great guides on how to flip more items. Might be a good idea to read it.

 

[ZackerySprague]

Hi @ZackerySprague, great thread and thanks for sharing these ideas. I drive a pickup truck and always keep an eye out for any gems left out on the side of the road for my own use (also in a city in TX) but haven't yet tried to cash in on any of my finds.

To add on to your idea, there are a few homes I pass regularly that have had the same old couch or mattress sitting outside for a long time and only getting worse from the weather. Obviously there is no resale value in such beat up items compounded by weather damage.

The city, for one reason or the other, hasn't picked these items up for weeks so I had the thought today to approach some of these houses and just pick them up and take them to the dump myself for a cash fee. It seems sensible enough and after a while, the homeowner will probably just be happy to see them gone.

Out of curiosity, what made you want to focus on flipping books?

Now that I think about it, finding couches on the side of dumpsters is also not a bad idea as well to source.

Just be careful with apartment complex's catching you or offer it as a "service" to pick up old stuff.