Rob & Melissa Stephenson from Flea Market Flipper share what they flipped in the last three days on eBay to make $1,600 in sales with only $85 invested.
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Reseller Hangout Podcast - How We Turned $85 Into $1,600 In The Last Three Days
Rob: Do you think finding high profit items on a regular basis is impossible?
Melissa: Well, it's not because it's the basis of our business. And we want to talk about how we turned $85 the last three days into $1,600.
Rob: So do you think it is impossible to find those high profit items? Have you been searching at thrift stores, yard sales, on the apps, have you been looking for those cool items to resell, but you can never find the ones that have the high profits?
Melissa: We're going to dive into a little bit of that today and what we look for when we're looking for those high profit items and some of the things that we just sold the last three days, we sold three items.
So we only had $85 invested. We had $1,600 on sales. So we're gonna dive into those.
Rob: That's right. So we're going to pull the curtain back and we're going to tell you guys where we found these items, how much we sold them for and what our eBay fees were on the item. So you guys have a good understanding of the profits.
Exactly. The profit is what everybody wants to know. Okay, so I can buy an item for a hundred dollars and I can sell it for $120. Okay. That's not really what we're going for. We're going for high profits. And that's what we have built the basis of our business on. So we want to try to help you guys do the same.
Melissa: And now we kind of finished just a series of starting from the basics.
So when you're just starting out, it's harder to be as picky. So you're going to do more of the items that maybe aren't as high profit, but as you get into this business, you can be pickier and you develop your skills and you can do those items. And really like, that's the only thing that we buy now is stuff that we can sell or our goal is 10 X.
So that's kind of our right?
Rob: Yeah, absolutely. And the items that we just sold last week in three days, none of them are going on a pallet, so a lot of misconception is high profit items have to be shipped on a pallet. All of these items got shipped through FedEx and USPS. So do you guys want to know what we sold? We've already talked it up, so let's get into it.
Let's get into the nitty gritty of what we sold last week to make $1,600 in sales.
Melissa: So the first one was the valve.
Rob: The valve, and I don't know what this is. This is a valve that I think it's called a gas or a wastewater valve. Bought two of them.
Melissa: A seal or I don't know what it is.
Rob: I bought two of them at the flea market.
They weighed 35 pounds a piece. So not super big, went into a 12 by 12 by 24 box. So nothing major 35 pounds, bought two of them together at the flea market. They caught my eye because the whole thing was stainless steel. I know stainless steel is an expensive metal. I saw them. They even had model numbers on them.
So I went back and I started doing some research. Well, we found out that they were thinking the neighborhood of $1,700, it was either $1,700 or around $2,000 per unit new. So I thought I could get at least half of that. We sold that one for $900, paid $10 a piece. We bought two of them, one we sold a couple months back, this one we finally sold.
But we paid $10 for it and sold it for $900. Killer flip on that one, hardly anything invested to make a sweet profit.
Melissa: And I think one thing before we jump into the fees and stuff, one thing to note is we, I mean, for $10, that was like, okay, you'll risk $10, but you also knew that it was worth more than that in scrap, because if it was, it wasn't even a high, expensive piece, it was worth more that scrap metal.
So you thought for sure it's going to be worth more.
Rob: Absolutely.
Melissa: You didn't know what it was.
Rob: No, but I knew it was stainless steel. Stainless steel stuff is expensive. It looked odd. It looked weird, but it also had a ball valve on it that was threaded into the side. And that's how you could turn, whether air, water, whatever's going into it. That's how you could turn it off. And the ball valve alone is probably a $60 ball valve now with stainless steel as well. So I knew even if I bought it for $10, I could valve a ball belt for probably $30 or $40 and that didn't include any of the other stainless steel portion of this unit, which was awesome.
So I knew going into it that $10 was actually absolutely nothing to invest on this. And I knew I probably would hit a home run with it. It just might take a little bit of time to find the right person.
Melissa: And a lot of times people ask, he'll say all the time, I don't know what it is, I don't really know.
And you still sell it. Well, how do you know how to sell something that you don't know what it is? That's a question we get a lot.
Rob: That's a great question, but guys, most of the stuff that we find will have a brand on it, will have a model number. We'll have some way of us being able to do the research, finding it on Google, finding it on eBay, doing that research and finding out what it is really worth or what it retails for.
And then we have a starting point of what we can do, what we can get out of the item.
Melissa: Yeah. So even if you don't know and you still don't have to know all the mechanics, like you don't have to know how it works, why it does what it does, but if you can look it up, okay. Yeah, I dunno. I dunno. If anything could break on that?
Like how did you test that?
Rob: There's no power to it yet. No, there's not a lot to this unit. It did have a something down inside of it because I pulled it apart to clean it before I shipped out. But it did have some type of the best way I can think of it is like a toilet. If you pull the top off the toilet, it had like that floating ball.
It had this, that was hanging down inside of it. All I do is wipe the sucker down. It didn't look like there's nothing. Anything that could have gone bad. No, absolutely not. But that's, that's exactly how it's sold. And, the first one we sold a couple of months ago, didn't hear anything back from the seller, which is a good thing.
It means it worked, everything was fine. And I'm assuming this one will be the same way.
Melissa: So eBay fees were $118 plus $9 for promoted listings. So you promoted, do you remember what you promoted it at?
Rob: 1%. This is when we were doing this inside. Exactly. This is when we were doing this inside of our group. A lot of us were experimenting with a 1% promotions.
I did this a while back and it actually sold from it. So, which is awesome. $9 extra to have eBay, show it to more people. I'm absolutely, fine with that. So, yeah, it's really, really cool. We love flips like this. They are out there and what attracts my eyes are the weird ones, the weird looking things that look like they could be expensive.
If that will help you out when you're out there in your search, definitely do it. Look, just look for odd things and then do a little bit of research on them. That's how we find our deals. That's how you can find your deals as well.
Melissa: If it has a brand and a serial number, you can look it up pretty easy on Google, if it's not on eBay and find the comps to see if it's worth getting. The second one, oh, so that, sorry, the shipping was $47 on that one, which brings the profit to $716.
Rob: $716 for a $10 investment. That is high profit flipping that we absolutely love. That is why we do what we do, we love it.
Melissa: All right, the next one was the mirror.
Rob: This is a reverse mirror. So we bought a truck a couple months ago. We got with the truck, a actual, a rear view mirror that goes up on the windshield and it has a little screen in it. So when you put the car into reverse, it's supposed to play, a camera out back is supposed to show you what's behind you.
You guys, most newer cars have this. Our car is not new, 20 some years old, but the person that I got it from ordered this and never installed it. So it was brand new in the box. They gave it to me with the car. And I was like, I don't really feel like installing this. So I'm going to sell it. It's still brand spanking new in the box.
I think retail on these, if I'm not mistaken, $140, $160, somewhere in that area. I listed it for a hundred dollars and sold it in like two days. It sold really, really quick. So probably could have got a little bit more, but I was okay. I didn't pay anything for it. It was given to me in one of our deals that we bought the car to keep.
So just got rid of it. So a hundred dollars profit on nothing invested. I love that too. That was a killer, killer flip as well.
Melissa: It was a $75 profit because we had $13 in fees and $12 to ship.
Rob: That's it. That's what it costs us to do the transaction. But the cool part is we didn't have to pay anything for it. That's the other thing that people have to remember about eBay fees.
So once you sell the item, you're investing in this item, you're listing it for free. If you're listing it the right way, you're listing it for free. You don't have to pay anything in shipping, anything in fees until that item sells. So when you're doing that, all the money that you're paying out to eBay is coming out of the sale.
So if you're picking and choosing your items, wisely, finding those high profit items, then you can do this and it's not going to cost you anything because all the money's coming from the profits, which is pretty awesome.
Melissa: Yeah, that was a, that was a fun one. It, and if you can throw it like this one, wasn't a huge one. I mean, even a huge $75, but $75 from zero is not too bad.
Rob: Absolutely. And it was the size of a rear view mirror. It's the same size as the rear view mirror that's inside your car, your truck, your SUV, whatever it is not very big at all. So it went in a small box and it only costs us $11 or $12 to ship.
Melissa: So, and to elaborate on your point, we do get that question a lot too. Are eBay fees worth it? So, if your profit is there, they are worth it. So that is a huge thing. A lot of people probably invest too much in their items. And so then when they go pay the fees and the shipping costs, then there's not enough profit leftover.
So, and that's when fees don't make sense.
Rob: So everything, if I can emphasize anything in this podcast, your money is made in the buy, make sure you are seeking out those items that have the high profit you can find items everywhere. And you can find items to flip and make a little bit of money, but you really want to start honing in your skills on the high profit ones.
So the ones that you can get for next to nothing and then make a lot of money on them. That's what you really, that's how to take this business to the next level.
Melissa: Yeah, yeah, to double your money is awesome, but when you have to pay fees and shipping costs, it might not always be there.
So like a lot of things that we get, say they're worth a thousand dollars, but if we're going to go pay $500 for it, plus fees and shipping, it's not really worth our time to do it. So we'd rather get that item for around $200, a hundred dollars or less.
Rob: Exactly.
Melissa: Yeah, to have that worth it. So they're out there.
Rob: They absolutely are.
And that is our goal. Our goal is to 10 times our investment. But we don't typically like to invest a hundred dollars, $500 and stuff like that. We will do it every once in a while. But the majority of our investments, typically $20 to $50, that's our comfort zone. And we'll go up to a hundred dollars to if the profit's there, if it's over $1,000, you know, around $2,000 we'll do it. We'll go out to that money as well. So, great, great point. So that brings us to flip number three.
Melissa: Number three was the Airdyne that we got on the road trip.
Rob: Really cool one. I was attracted to this, so I've sold a lot of Airdyne exercise bikes, the majority of the Airdyne the old school ones. They have a big wheel in the front and I've even shipped a couple of these through FedEx and UPS, but the problem is they are so, so close and the cutoff so it will cost you almost a lot of money, almost as much as you can sell the units for once it gets to that size. So this one I bought, I was attracted to it because it was a smaller, a newer version of it. I paid a little bit more on this one.
We bought this on a road trip and I was, I really wanted it and I've never done one this size before, so I paid $75 for it. We ended up selling it for $600. So just under our goal, like I said, is the 10 X. So just under that 10 X, but still a cool flip plus this one, I have not shipped out yet. I'm, I'll be shipping it out tomorrow, but it's giving me the opportunity to take it apart, put it into a box.
And I know it will fit in a box because it's a lot smaller than the fan on the front is a lot smaller than the large one, the old school one. And so I'm super excited about this and the learning process that I'm going to get out of doing this and knowing that I can sell these now and know exactly how hard it is, how much it's going to cost me to ship, but I'm estimating shipping on this probably to be about $40 and it is going inside of our state, which will help it a ton.
I might even get it lower than $40. Exactly. Once I get it apart, it will fit into a smaller box, package it properly. And then it probably, like I said, on average, I think it's going to be about $40 to ship this, but killer deal as well.
Melissa: Tend to get a lot of sales from California. So it's nice when we get some closer sales.
Rob: The valve, the valve went to California.
So a lot of stuff and that cost, I mean, it's across the country. It cost us a little bit more to do that. But at the same time, when you got profits, like $700, they can't complain about it.
It's worth it.
Melissa: So we had $600 it sold for. You paid $75 did you say that you found it on OfferUp or Facebook?
Rob: I don't remember. We were on a road trip, so, and those are the two apps that I typically check on road trips is the OfferUp and Facebook Marketplace, depending on where we're at. And I found it on one of those for sure. I just don't remember which one. Paid $75 for it, brought it back and yeah, listed it. Actually took some pictures on the road, in a hotel to get it listed, while we were on the road.
And those were the pictures that sold it. So yeah.
Melissa: You could have come back and made better pictures.
Rob: Absolutely. And I even saw that night, I had a mental note to do that and I just never did it. So, but that's okay. It's sold, sold for $600, which is, which is a good, good profit for us. EBay fees on that one?
Melissa: $77.
Rob: 77 bucks on that.
Melissa: You said shipping would be about $40.
Rob: Yep.
Melissa: So, $408 is the profit.
Rob: $408 profit for a $75 investment. So we love that.
Melissa: I wanted to make one note too. So when we're talking about what we sold it for, just because somebody brought this up on TikTok the other day. So I think today, they said, well, that's not the total because it was like, it was a $7,000 sale that we sold.
It was $6,999.90 cents or something. And I was like, okay, well, yes, you're right. We rounded up 10 cents because it's just easier for the math for everybody when we're talking about it, to see it and to say it, it just makes it easier than that, obviously. But there is a point to note that you do list your items
99, like $699, $899, like that. So the Airdyne actually sold for $599 and not $600. So people like to see that like mentally, instead of the $600. And stores, retail stores have used, forever. Like, it's not a new concept, but that is how you list it. You don't list it for a flat rounded dollar amount.
Rob: So, and, yeah, that's a great point for sure.
And I, I did it years ago and I realized it, but that's how you always list, but it's a great thing to point out if you can get it right underneath that next dollar amount. In this case it was $600. If you can get it right underneath that, then that's awesome.
Melissa: And the funny part is our total profits on that were $1,199. So $1,200. So if we round up, it's usually a couple pennies or a dollar just to make things easy.
Rob: And I did that on all of our fees. Our fees don't work out to be like the fees from eBay and the shipping fees don't work out to the dollar, but we just do it. So we can tell you guys that.
Melissa: It's easier when we're dealing with the larger numbers. If you're dealing with smaller numbers, you do have to watch the thing the pennies a little bit more.
Rob: Your profits mean a lot when it's down to the penny.
Melissa: Yeah, I just wanted to point that out because that's how we like to list our items.
Rob: So that was it. That was $1,200 profit on this three flips that we had in the last three days.
Absolutely.
Melissa: And the recap, the biggest point is to know that your money is made in the buy. And we've talked about that before, but it really is.
Rob: Hit that home guys, that is real. Search for those items that you can make the higher profit on. It just makes it that much easier because you can buy, anybody can go and make you know, $50,000 a year and spend $42,000 on operating costs and all that stuff. And that's not that impressive, but when you can go out and spend a $1,000 to make $50,000, that's pretty impressive. That's where you know that you're honing in on your skills. So definitely shoot for those higher profit items, search, they are out there. I mean even last year, our total was and what was our average sale? $1,400, $1,400. And we sold 56 or 67. So 56 items and $1,400 was the average selling price of those items. So it's doable. We did it all last year is what that averaged out to be.
So it is totally doable.
Melissa: I think this year so far our average sale price for the first three months of the year was $800.
Rob: $800, but that's tricky too.
Melissa: Why?
Rob: Because we sold two items with multiples. One of those items was seven items going to one buyer. And one item was 10 items. A lot more than that, but that's what eBay shows it as is our average being $700. It really is up more towards $1,500, over $1,500 because we had buyers that bought multiple items.
Melissa: 10 panels is one transaction.
Rob: So, and we only had to ship them to one place, but anyway, that's beside the point.
Melissa: That's another podcast.
Rob: It is for sure.
Melissa: So, thanks guys for hanging out with us.
Rob: You guys rock. Have a great day. Hopefully you guys enjoyed this. Like, subscribe guys. We greatly appreciate it.
We love giving you guys this information just to motivate you, get you out there and finding some cool stuff.
Melissa: Thank you.