I first heard about reselling from my friend Matt who casually mentioned how his wife made $300 selling his old video games on eBay.
$300.
That number lit up my brain like a neon sign. At the time, I was secretly experiencing anxiety over drowning in bills—my mortgage, my wife’s student loans, and the endless “surprises” of life with a newborn. Diapers weren’t cheap, and neither was daycare. Reselling felt like a lifeline.
But there was one problem, unlike Matt’s wife, I didn’t have a closet full of old video games to sell. In fact, I had nothing worth reselling. So I did what any person would do, I fell headfirst into a Google search rabbit hole at 1 a.m. while rocking the baby to sleep.
- “How to source items for resale cheap.”
- “Best flipping niches.”
- “Is dumpster diving legal?”
The more I searched, the more lost I felt. Every self-proclaimed reselling guru had a different “secret sauce”:
- “Only buy liquidation pallets!”
- “Never touch liquidation pallets!”
- “You need a $200 scanner app!”
- “Just stalk yard sales at the crack of dawn!”
I felt paralyzed. What if I wasted money we couldn’t spare? What if I bought junk that wouldn’t sell? What if I got scammed? What if I shipped something wrong and lost it all?
But the bills kept coming and with no regret I dove into the ocean before actually learning how to swim.
My first attempt was a disaster. I had found SpongeBob SquarePants toys on clearance and thought they were an opportunity… only to realize that they were on clearance for a reason. Luckily, I was able to quickly return them.
Then came the low point when I drove 45 minutes to a flea market at 5 a.m., convinced I could find old video games because I had seen a show called Game Chasers on Youtube of people doing that. Two hours later? The only thing I left with was a sunburn. I sat in that parking lot, absolutely defeated and embarrassed. I thought about giving up.
But here’s where it changed
Shortly after my misadventures, I stopped trying to replicate “guru” advice I had seen online and started thinking like a dad on a budget.
- No longer was I going to drive around from store to flea markets wasting time and gas.
- I wanted a scrappier and cheaper way to source products.
- I learned to spot “safe” inventory. Absolutely no gambling on mystery boxes. No scanners. No pallets. No storage units. No questionable 3 a.m. dumpster diving.
- Just common sense and an immutable rule: Never risk more than $10 on an item until I knew what I was doing
The result?
That first month, I made $224. Not life-changing, but enough to cover diapers and a celebratory indoor date night of dinner and Netflix.
Fast-forward to today. I now consistently average $8k a month. Not because I am a genius or because I am special. But because I finally ignored the noise and focused on what worked for my life. I refused to let fear of risk (or ego) stop me from starting small, learning slowly, and prioritizing low-stress and safety over shortcuts.
This is why I am sharing my playbook. There’s no gatekeeping, no hype. I firmly believe that reselling shouldn’t require a trust fund or blind luck. Just a little grit and permission to start small and someone in your corner telling you, “Start here. You’ve got this!”