How We Made $3,685 in One Month of Flipping Flea Market Items

Last month was a whirlwind of a month. We went from trying to frantically sell everything and move into our 5th wheel by July 24th, to being approached by a production company mid July and shoot a promo for a reality show. So now we are living in limbo and not exactly sure what is going on. Ha. We have still been doing flea market flips, as that is our primary income, but our focus has been all over the place. 

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I have worked a lot on getting our 5th wheel ready for our trip recently, which has taken some time away from my flipping business. I had to redo the back-end of it because the rear brace had been torn off.

I reinforced it with 2 x 10’s on both sides and then capped all the repairs with diamond plate, I thought it turned out pretty good! We bought it sight unseen from an auction and knew it had a little damage, but didn’t quite know what to expect. The damage turned out to be a little more than I thought, but the overall condition of the RV was in better condition than we expected.

Here is the rear damage when I opened everything up:

Here is after I reinforced it with the 2 x 10’s:

And here is when the diamond plate was being put on:

I also have been working a lot on our truck. We bought this truck in Rhode Island in November, and I had a big vision for it. I shortened the frame and then custom built a flat bed for it. I really want to put a f350 truck bed on it, but it will sit too high and I won’t be able to haul the 5th wheel trailer. I will figure out a way to do it eventually though. Here is the picture before we did anything:

I just painted it the day before they came down to film because I knew they would want some shots of what we are planning to move into. It was an all day and night job that my buddy helped me with, but I was pretty happy with how it turned out.

Ok, enough of the truck and trailer redo, now for the monthly income for our flea market flips.

We decided to start posting our income reports here from Flea Market Flipper for several reasons. The first one is to keep ourselves accountable. I have been doing this flipping thing for over 20 years now, and I have never kept track of what I’ve made. It was always a hobby – but one that came in handy when finances were tight. Once we decided to take this more serious we started keeping better records. It has helped us tremendously keep track of what is going in and out each month.

Another reason is to provide encouragement to people who want to do this as a part time or full time income. It is pretty popular in the blogging world for bloggers to post their income reports, and we always found it encouraging to read those. They help us keep going when sometimes we would rather be doing other things.

Lastly, but most importantly is to provide value and information to our friends and interested readers. We have students and readers who are doing flea market flipping (or thrift store and yard sale flipping) as a side hustle or main hustle and we want to provide information to help them become successful.

Now onto the month of July! We made $3,685 in profit this month. Not quite the $12,220 of last month, but we kind of expected the lower month with everything going on. This is where budgeting for a variable income is important. It’s still not our strongest area, but one we are always working on.

The biggest of the flea market flips for the month (in both profit and size) was this hot dog cart. I bought this from a flea market vendor for $400 and sold it on eBay for $1,500.

Another larger flip for the month was this printer. I bought it for $40, and sold it on eBay for $500. This printer was a little trickier to ship because it was so heavy! I palleted it up and shipped it freight across the country.

If you have been around here awhile, you know that at one point I bought 100 TV’s from a vendor at the flea market. And not just any TVs, but broken ones. Melissa wasn’t super excited about this one, and I have to admit it wasn’t the best investment. I had every intention of fix them up and reselling them for a good profit, but it didn’t quite happen like that. I didn’t lose money, but I didn’t make as much as I would have liked to on them.

One great flip for the month was a couple of spin bikes we sold. The great thing about being in this business for some time is people call me when they are looking to unload some things. A friend was looking to get rid of 12 spin bikes quickly and I was able to get them for free! The kicker was I brought them home and unloaded them in the living room at the same time Melissa was trying to declutter and minimize our house. This is what she thought of them.

Itemized Monthly Flea Market Flips

Sleep Number Foam Pieces: Sold for $200, Paid $20, eBay and PayPal fees $26, Total Profit $154

Combination Module Programmable Control: Sold for $175, Paid $10, eBay and PayPal fees $23, Total Profit $142

Commercial cleaner: Sold for$25, Paid $3, eBay and PayPal fees $3, Total Profit $19

Lamp warmer: Sold for $140, Paid $15, eBay and PayPal fees $18, Total Profit $107

Dome mirror: Sold for $200, Paid $25, eBay and PayPal fees $26. Total Profit $149

Twine: Sold for $80, Paid $6, eBay and PayPal fees $10, Total Profit $64

Dome mirror: Sold for $200, Paid $25, eBay and PayPal fees $26. Total Profit $149

Boat antennae: Sold for $250, Bought for $25, eBay and PayPal fees $33, Total Profit $192

Commercial printer: Sold for $500 Bought for $40, eBay and PayPal fees $65, Total Profit $395

Bedbug machine: Sold for $600, Bought for $75, eBay and PayPal fees $78, Total Profit $447

Hotdog cart: Sold for $1,500, Paid $400, eBay and PayPal fees $195, Total Profit $955

Door handle: Sold for $200, Paid $7, eBay and PayPal fees $26, Total Profit: $167

5 TVs Sold for $300, Paid $175, no fees because sold on Craigslist, total Profit $125

2 Spin Bikes Sold for $670 total, Paid $0, no fees because sold on Facebook Marketplace, Total Profit $670

Total Sales: $5,040    Expenses and Fees: $1,355      Total Profit $3,685

I don’t include the shipping on here because the buyer pays for shipping. I almost always make a little extra on shipping to cover my packaging materials and time.

One flip that I didn’t include was one of our spin bikes. We actually bartered it for a few acupuncture sessions when my back was giving me all sorts of problems. Melissa did acupuncture several years ago to help her when she was going through infertility issues, and it helped her out a ton. Her acupuncturist saw our Facebook ad for the bike and was interested in one. At the same time my back was giving me a lot of issues so we decided to trade out services. One spin bike for $350 worth of acupuncture sessions. Bartering is not a dead practice! I’ve done it several times over the past couple years. I sometimes love trading my flips for other items to flip as well.  

Do you love going to flea markets, yard sales, and thrift stores? Maybe doing flea market flips could be a great side income or full time income for you! Check out our e-course Flipper University to see if this might be a good fit for you! Our goal is to help people be successful in this business and we love sharing our passion with others.

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What are your favorite kind of flea market flips? Unique items? Furniture? Mechanical items? Do you like repurposing something old into something new? Comment below!

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How We Made $12,220 in One Month of Flipping Flea Market Items