Yard Sale Arbitrage – Soccer Cleats

In case you didn’t already know, I absolutely love yard sale arbitrage!  This is where you find stuff at yard sales at a bargain and resell them on Craigslist or Ebay for a nice profit.  I’ve written about this previously in these posts: Vera Bradley Purse Arbitrage and Wii Game Arbitrage.  Check those out if you’re interested in learning more.

I’ve had pretty good success with both purses and video games so far.  You won’t get rich doing this type of thing, but you can end up getting $20-$40 per hour of your time once you get a little practice at it.  I have been stuck with a couple “dud” items that I wasn’t able to flip for a profit, but I have always at least broken even.  Let’s take a look at another item that works well for yard sale arbitrage – soccer cleats.

Yard Sale Arbitrage – Soccer Cleats – Background

Just about anything you can imagine is for sale on Ebay.  I have discovered one very lucrative area in particular that we’ll be discussing here.  I’m sure there are hundreds more out there that I’ve yet to uncover.  Did you know that the new and used shoe market on Ebay is huge?

Even more specifically, the soccer cleat section of Ebay is gigantic IMHO.  Why even as we speak, there are currently 44,943 active auctions for soccer cleats!  I smell an opportunity!

Yard Sale Arbitrage – Soccer Cleats – The Find

Our family was out doing our yard sale thing one weekend about a year ago when we ran into an interesting deal.  A lady was selling what looked to be a nearly brand new set of soccer cleats for $1.  I had just read the book Rich Dad, Poor Dad and the gears in my head were turning around different wasy to make money.  A thought entered my brain from the ether…  I’m sure I could sell these on Ebay for at least $10…  I would only be risking $1 to try it so I figured why not go ahead and give it a try.  Before that point in time, I had not even considered that people would buy used cleats, or shoes for that matter, on Ebay.  Boy was I wrong!

Yard Sale Arbitrage – Soccer Cleats – The Flip

So, how do I go about getting top dollar for used soccer cleats?  So far, I’d say I’ve probably sold 8 or 9 pairs of soccer cleats for ~1500+% profit.  Based on this experience, I have three main rules that I’ve developed over the months:

1. Never pay more than $1 or $2 for them.  Anything more, and it really starts to dig into your profits.
2. Make sure the soccer cleats are clean for the pictures.  Most people selling their soccer cleats at yard sales still have them caked in mud.  It normally takes about 5-10 mins a pair to scrub the mud off of them and have them looking good as new.  Who would want to pay top dollar for muddy old shoes?
3. List the soccer cleats as a “Buy-it-Now” type of auction and don’t be afraid to list them on the upper end of the price range.  This will ensure you get top dollar for your time.

That’s about all there is to it.  I can usually buy a pair for $1 and sell them from $12 – $25 a pair.  Not too bad!  The picture above is of a pair I bought for $1 and have listed for $19.  

Yard Sale Arbitrage – Soccer Cleats – Final Thoughts

As I said earlier, you will not get rich by selling used soccer cleats on Ebay, but it is a fun way to make a little extra cash.  Soccer cleats are just one example out of hundreds where yard sale arbitrage is a good way to make a couple extra bucks for your time.

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Yard Sale Arbitrage – Wii Games

I mentioned in my earlier Yard Sale Arbitrage series on Vera Bradley Purses that I absolutely love arbitrage!  This is the process of buying an item for a low price that you are almost guaranteed to sell at a higher price.  One is able to do this well if they are familiar with the  “market” for the good in question and have a buyer “lined” up to purchase the product.  If not, you run the risk of over-paying or getting stuck with the item if you cannot move it.

Yard Sale Arbitrage – Wii Games – Background

One item that is guaranteed to move are Video games.  If you can fetch them for a good price at yard sales, they sell like hot cakes on sites online auction sites like Ebay.  I’ve sold more than 100 video/PC games on Ebay, and I’m constantly surprised at how much some of the rarer games can go for.  Check out this post on how I sold my old used Zelda Gameboy game for $80!  Other very popular games will not net much money and can actually end up losing you money if you’re not careful (over pay for the game).  It pays to have a little bit of knowledge (or a smart phone with Ebay :-)) on which are the rarer games when looking for games at yard sales.

Yard Sale Arbitrage – Wii Games – The Find

We were at a community yard sale this past Saturday bright and early when I hit the jackpot.  The person was selling some really popular Wii games for $3 each.  I happened to know specifically about several of these games as I’ve sold several of my own personal copies for $20+ each.  This seemed like a great opportunity to make a quick buck, so I jumped on it.  I bought eight out of the nine he had for sale right then and there.  I tried to bargain him down on the price since I was buying so many, but he wouldn’t go any lower.  I think he was a little suspicious that I was buying so many of them without much thought…  Here are the games I bought and the prices I have listed them for on Ebay (green ones have already sold):

• Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword – $31.99
• The Sims 3 – $14.46
• Super Smash Bros. Brawl – $22.99
• The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess – $14.99
• de Blob – $4.99
• Sonic Riders: Zero Gravity – $10.99
• Wii Play – $4.50
• Wii Sports – $19.99

I kinda hit duds with the “de Blob” game and Wii Play, but the others will hopefully make up for it.

Yard Sale Arbitrage – Wii Games – The Flip

So, how to I plan to get top dollar for these Wii games?  Why, Ebay of course!  I can set the prices pretty high and leave them as a good ’til canceled auction.  It may take a couple of weeks to sell them, but I should average $15 for each of them.  Because they are small and easily fit in a cheap envelope, there are ideal for Ebay selling.  After all of the Ebay/Paypal fees, I stand to make about 440+% profit.  Not too shabby

Yard Sale Arbitrage – Wii Games – Final Thoughts

In the end, I should make somewhere around $80  profit for selling the Wii games on Ebay.  I figure it should take me maybe two hours of my time to post all of the games to Ebay and ship them.  That should work out to be roughly $40 a hour.  I won’t get rich quick doing this, but it’s not too bad if you ask me

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Free Christmas Present

Now that Christmas has come and gone, I thought I’d share an interesting story with you on how I got my son a free Christmas present that knocked it out of the park.

What was it we got him for Christmas you ask?  Well, an Xbox 360 and three games (Lego Indianna Jones, Lego Starwars, and Marvel vs. Capcom 3).  How did I manage to pull this off and get all of this for free?  Read on to find out!

Free Christmas Present – Background

For more than a year, our son had been asking for an Xbox 360 since they set one up in his daycare.  A couple months before Christmas, I think the systems were selling for around $180 without any games.  We decided that this was just too much money to spend on a Christmas present.  We starting looking into used console options, but these didn’t seem to be all that great of a deal either compared to just getting a new one.

One day in October, I found myself in a chat conversation with a good friend.  I was telling him how we wanted to get a used Xbox, but they were just too much money.  He mentioned that he had entertained the idea of selling all of his Xbox stuff to finance the purchase of a new Xbox One, but he didn’t really want to mess with all the hassle of selling everything.  He had an Xbox 360 with large hard drive, 5 controllers, 3 guitars, 1 keyboard, 3 microphones, a kinect, 50+ games, and a couple other odds and ends.  He offered to sell all of his stuff to me for $500.  “Yeah right,” I said.  What the hell is my son going to do with 50 games?  And, $500 is way too much for us to spend on Christmas for our son!

Free Christmas Present – The Deal

“That’s too bad,” he muttered.  “I really don’t want to sell all of this shit,” he told me.  Then, an idea popped into my head.  “What if I sell everything for you and give you the money?  As payment you could give me the Xbox 360, 2 controllers, and 4 games.  In return, I’d sell everything else, take care of the shipping, and hand over all of the profits.”  It was a true win-win scenario, and he happily agreed.  He was hoping to get somewhere in the neighborhood of $400 – $500 for all the stuff that I would be selling.

Free Christmas Present – Rubber Hits the Road

Well, it quickly became apparent to me that if I was going to do right by my friend and maximize the amount of profit he’d get, I’d have to list all of the items individually.  Creating a huge lot and selling everything all at once would lose 20% – 30% of his profit.  So, I went through the painstaking process of listing all of the games, controllers, kinect stuff etc.  Then, as each thing sold, I’d have to package it up and get it ready for the post office – all individually.

I estimate that I spent roughly 15 hours total for the process!  In addition, my wife probably made 8-10 trips to the post office.  She was a great sport about it, but it was quite a pain in the ass for her I know.  Right around this point in time, Microsoft decided to drop the price of the core system to $99 as a Black Friday special – lovely  So, all in all, we ended up working for about $8 an hour to get the “free Christmas present”…

Free Christmas Present – Final Thoughts

Would I do it again?  I’m not sure if we would or not   It was a ton of work just to save ~$200 bucks.  But, our son absolutely loves the gift.  Also, it’s an awesome feeling to know that I worked so hard to make his dream of owning an Xbox 360 a reality.

What about you?  Does anyone have an example where they got a little more than they bargained for when trying to save a bit of money to get a free Christmas present??

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Selling Pokemon Cards on Ebay

One of the suckiest things about being in MBA classes every other weekend is that I miss out on all the great yard sales with my wife and kids.  Just this past week, I think my wife struck yard sale gold!

Selling Pokemon Cards on Ebay – The Haul

My wife was at one particular yard sale with a couple Pokemon young reader books for sale.  My son had a quick look at them, and they decided to buy them.  Shortly thereafter, the man at the yard sale pulled my wife to the side.  “Would you be interested in buying this box full of Pokemon cards?” he asked.  He didn’t want to offer her the box where my son could hear.  He was going to give her an entire adult sized shoe box full of Pokemon trading cards for only $5!  My wife decided to buy them because she knows how much he likes Pokemon.

Selling Pokemon Cards on Ebay – How Much Are They Worth?

She showed me the box when I got home and I could hardly believe my eyes.  Someone probably paid more than $1,000 at some point for all of these cards.  They are about $11 for a pack of 40 on Amazon.  My son has a handful of hand-me-down cards that his friends have given him over the years, but we’ve never bought any new cards for him because they’re so damn expensive.

So we called our son over to the table, and I told him to close his eyes.  I brought the box over and set it in his lap.  I then told him to open up the box.  He almost had a kids excitement attack when he saw the box full of Pokemon cards in front of him!  As we were looking through them, my brain popped into MoneyAhoy mode – “I wonder if any of these are worth anything?” I thought aloud.

Selling Pokemon Cards on Ebay – Learning to Value Pokemon Cards

A Google search and about 30 minutes of study later, and my son and I knew what to look for in terms of rare and valuable cards.  We spent the next 3 hours sorting through all of the cards looking for all the rare and valuable Pokemon cards that we could sell on eBay.  We made a deal that we’d split any profits 50/50 – I thought it would be a great way for him to learn how to make some money.

Now, these cards aren’t in the best of shape – it’s evident that they been used pretty heavily.  Out of all of the cards, we identified somewhere around 250-300 that were rare and valuable.  Checking Ebay, most of these rare cards have sold for anywhere from $1 – $5 each.  We’d get much more money if we sell them individually, but I’m not sure if it is worth that much time and trouble.  I suspect when we sell they’ll fall on the lower end because of their condition, but we could get $300-$400 buck for all of these in total depending on how much time we devote to listing all of them!  Or so I thought…

Selling Pokemon Cards on Ebay – So Far, Not Too Much Luck

I’ve listed a handful of them so far, and they haven’t really sold at all.  The problem is the sum of PayPal, Ebay, and Postage fees comes up to about $1.  So, if we sell each card for $1.50, it really isn’t going to be worth our time.  I’m going to try and list a couple more of the most expensive cards to see if I can get any takers.  If not, we’ll have to mark this down in the history books as a waste of time  I was hoping we would be able to get $300-$400  for all of them combined (a return of up to 60,000% on our money), but it doesn’t look super promising at this point.  All-in-all, we’ve spent about 6 hours so far sorting through all of them.  I’d hate for it to be a complete waste of time, but I guess some times that’s the way it goes  I may try to combine some together into small lots to increase the chances of getting them sold if I continue to have trouble moving them individually.

Selling Pokemon Cards on Ebay – Final Thoughts

Selling Pokemon cards is just another example of yard sale arbitrage.  You win some and you lose some  The pic on the left below is of the box of Pokemon cards my wife bought for $5.  The pic below on the right are all the cards I’m hoping to sell for $1 – $2 each (fingers crossed).

Box ‘o Pokemon Cards – Whole box for $5

Hope to Sell these for ~$1-$2 each

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Yard Sale Arbitrage – Vera Bradley Purses

One of my all time favorite ways to make money is through arbitrage.  This is the basic process of buying low and selling high with little to no risk.  You may have also heard it referred to as flipping.

We’ve all probably participated in arbitrage at some point in our lives.  I’m not sure why I love doing it so much, but it feels great to make several hundred percent return for just a little bit of work.

In this first part of my yard sale arbitrage series – I’ll quickly cover how I make 300%+ returns on Vera Bradley purses.  Check it out!

 Money Making Breakdown – Vera Bradley Purse Arbitrage

• Difficulty (Super Easy/Easy/Medium/Hard/Expert): Easy
• Average % Profit (%): 319
• Average Profit per Sale ($): 12.77
• Time Required (mins): 30
• Profit for your time ($/hr): 25.54

Yard Sale Arbitrage – Vera Bradley Purses – Pros and Cons

Here are a couple of pros and cons to flipping Vera Bradley purses from yard sales that I’ve learned.  If you’re interested in giving it a shot, keep these in mind.

Pros:

• Can usually get for $3 – $5 at yard sales if you’re good at bargaining.  Package deals are the best and you can get larger discounts!  I found someone selling about 10 of these, I only bought the three detailed here below because I hadn’t tried to flip these before.  Now I’m killing myself for not buying all of them!
• Pretty abundant at yard sales.  I find at least one of these just about every week.
• Sell relatively quickly on ebay (1 or 2 weeks)
• Ship pretty easily and inexpensively

Cons:

• There are hundreds of types of Vera Bradley pattern/style combinations.  The biggest pain is searching through all the similar listings to find the style and pattern of the purse you bought so that you can accurately list it.  This took me 15-20 minutes per bag and sucked.
• If listing on Ebay, then the 15% fees will knock a bit off your profits.  Plus, you have to drive to the post office to ship everything.  If I can get the same prices on Craigslist, then I’ll make about an average of 475% profit vs. 319%.  I plan to test this for future bags/purses.
• Not sure how easy to sell on Craigslist – will give this a shot.
• Profit in $/hr is a little on the low side.
• I haven’t yet figured out how to scale this process to make a lot of money.  You aren’t going to get rich unless you can figure out a way to flip thousands of these things.

Yard Sale Arbitrage – Vera Bradley Purses – Profit Table

Below is a quick tally of how each of the three purses I purchased performed.  As you can see – the larger bags definitely do much better % profit-wise compared to the smaller bags.  I’ll use this knowledge in the future to load up on any of the bigger purses if I can find them for cheap.  These Vera Bradley purses normally sell on amazon for something like $50+, so resale for $15 – $35 is a pretty good deal for the buyers…

Yard Sale Arbitrage – Vera Bradley Purses – Pictures

Here are some pictures of the three most recent sales I’ve made.

Zip Tote – Retired Color – “Houndstooth Brown”

Kensington Large – Tic Tac Tote

Capri Blue (retired) Bucket Tote and Cell Phone Case

Final Thoughts

This was a fun little experiment and turned out to turn a pretty good profit.  I know absolutely nothing about purses, so it was neat to make such a high % of profit on a whim.  I think as I find more at yard sales I’ll try and make a couple changes to the process:

• List on Craigslist to avoid fees and get slightly higher prices
• Not spend time finding the purse style/pattern and just list it by color and size (this will push up my $/hr)
• Try to learn about other types of purses that have good arbitrage potential – we literally run across maybe 50 purses on a Saturday yard sale outing…

Anyone else care to share their good yard sale arbitrage finds or tips???

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