How to Increase Your Reselling Margins
The object of reselling is easy, buy low sell high. Or you can find something that will be coveted and buy high and sell higher. But in a recent deal I recently found myself buying high and selling low to increase my gains. I know this is counter intuitive but it worked out because I thought outside of the box.
GameStop Gift Card Reselling
There was a third party gift card sale at Office Max/Depot not too long ago. The most coveted gift card of the deal was GameStop, $80 for a $100 gift card. Most Office Max/Depot locations didn’t even get some, but I was able to track down a few.
So I had some GameStop gift cards and I had a buyer willing to pay 85 cents on the dollar. So I could turn around and sell those $100 gift cards for $85. That would snag me a $5 profit per card, or a 6.25% return. That is an easy win. I make some money and I get 5x Ultimate Rewards points with my Ink Plus. But could I do better?
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Thinking Outside the Box
I started thinking that there must be something I could purchase at GameStop and get a better return. A SNES would be ideal but stock on it is unpredictable. I didn’t think I would be able to track one down since GameStop is further down the totem pole on shipments.
So I started thinking about items that are very popular but widely available, that brought me to the Nintendo Switch. This hasn’t been a great reselling option for a while since they have them in stock everywhere but I figured with my discount I would be able to flip it and still make a larger profit than just reselling the gift cards.
The Numbers
With my state’s 6% sales tax the total for the Nintendo Switch came to $317.99. I paid for the first $300 with discounted gift cards and the final $17.99 with a credit card.
The gift cards cost me $240 and then taxes were $17.99, so I was $257.99 all in. I also went through the Ebates portal but didn’t read the terms fully and only got $1.50 for the purchase…I could have done better.
I only had a week until Christmas so I had to be a little bit proactive with my price. I settled on $290 and posted it on craigslist. If I had a month or so I would have started at $300 and mentioned they would save $18 in taxes. At $290 I could offer them $28 in savings.
After a few inquiries, and some low ball offers, I had a guy who was willing to purchase it for $290. We met at the Police Station…this is a good place to meet for high value items. Most Police Stations will have a designated selling area set up.
With the $290 sale I made a profit of $33.51, when including the portal payout. I also earned 1,200 UR points. This more than doubled my return versus simply selling the gift cards. My rate of return was 10.5%, not too shabby for something I sold below cost.
Conclusion
The purpose of this post was to get you to think outside the box. Sometimes selling something at a face value “loss” can increase your returns. If you are able to get a big enough discount on something you can usually make money on it.
Discounted gift cards open up a world of possibilities. And if you pick an item you can sell for almost face value that will usually bring you a greater return than simply selling the gift card.
Happy Holidays Everyone!!!
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Good post. The thing I always get hung up on though is you made a trip to office max, gamestop and the police station, spent time writing the listing, taking calls, answering emails for $33. In my location it costs me about $3-5 in gas to go anywhere round trip and you went 3 places. If you spent 15 minutes getting to each place and 15 minutes in each place, you made about $4 an hour.
I drive by the Office Depot almost everyday, Gamestop was ordered online and shipped to my house. Meet up was on my normal dialy route too. If I sell on Craigslist/Facebook I pick a spot and time that is convient to me. Probably an hour all in tops. But something everyone should consider though.
@park…he bought a Nintendo Switch. It’s a gaming console
little lost.. can u clarify exactly what did u buy at switch? u never say that. how did it add to 317 ?
Also, officemax had gamestop 100 for 80, right, not the other way around. math behind $5 per gc at 85 cents per dollar is not clear….in other words kind of loose post
Sorry I thought I had made it clear enough but I added some more details into the post – thanks!
I bought a $100 gift card for $80. I could have sold those $100 gift cards for 85 cents on the dollar or $85 a piece…a $5 profit.
I instead used those discounted gift cards to buy a Nintendo Switch from GameStop. The 317.99 price was the price of the switch including tax.
Which cities have such police stations??
BTW GameStop website has some good deals on used iPads which may be good for reselling.
Good tip on the Ipads Al!
Here is a list of participating stations. If your station is not on the list I would call and just ask if they would be ok with you meeting in the visitors lot. I doubt they would care.
http://www.safetradestations.com/safetrade-station-list.html
“Most Police Stations will have a designated selling area set up.”
Now that is something I never heard of…
Must be a spin-off of the Craigslist meeting area? lol.
It is the Craigslist, P2P selling area. Some have assigned parking spots with cameras etc. or allow you to go into the lobby.