Thank you so much for spending your time with us! We would be so grateful if you could take a minute and leave us a review.
All right guys, 2021’s numbers are in. Drumroll please…
Over $90,000 in sales! You read that right, $90,058 in 2021 with only 56 items sold. The best part is, we only spent an average of five hours a week to make these sales, and we’re going to tell you how we did it.
Now, we did fall short of our $100K goal that we set in January, but we were so close! There were definitely more things we could have done in our business to hit those goals, but it’s a new year!
And we really enjoy the time we spend creating educational videos, helping our Flipper University members, and spending time with our kids. So I don’t really regret not putting in a few more hours.
Today we’re going to dive into all of our cost of goods sold, our shipping costs, our eBay fees, and, of course, the profits.
When Purchasing An Item Think About The Possibility Of Reselling It
This year we sold two of our vehicles. Whenever we buy cars, we buy used, and we also look for vehicles that we know we can resell to either break even or make some money. In our lives, everything we buy is an investment. We want to get use out of the item and enjoy it while we have it, but we want to be able to make our money back in the future when it’s time to make a change or an upgrade.
In 2021 we sold two of our vehicles for $5,800 and $3,500. We had purchased one for $2,700 and one for $6,000, so it was pretty much a wash for what we paid for them and what we sold them for. But we got to use them!
Another example of this is our recent bed purchase. We bought a Sleep Number bed. Now we’ve sold probably over a hundred Sleep Number beds in our past, but we needed a new bed. So I went out and found a used Sleep Number that retails for $5,000 new, and I paid $200 for it. These beds are great because you can take them apart, wash them, sanitize them, and put them back together. Then you have almost a brand new bed for a fraction of the cost, and I know that we can also sell it if we decide to upgrade in the future.
Set Goals For Your Flipping Business
Last year we set a goal at the beginning of the year to make $100,000. We didn’t quite make it this year, but that’s okay because we only spent an average of five hours a week on this. That’s still considered a side hustle. We focused a lot of time on our courses and trainings because we love flipping and sharing it with others. That being said, I still love flipping. Every day I’m either looking for stuff or shipping stuff out and we’re still in the game. We’ll be flippers the rest of our lives. Think about it. We just spent that little bit of time every week to make that amazing income!
Melissa is going to make another board this year for that $100,000 goal, and we’re working toward it.
The Numbers Breakdown
Looking at our numbers without including the vehicles, our total was $80,758. And the total cost of our goods sold was $5,100. That is all we had to spend out of pocket to make that $80,000. Our goal typically is 10 times our investment and we crushed it here for sure.
Without the cars, our average sale price per item was $1,442.
Our sales tax total was $3,615.
The fees were $5,380, and final value fees were $4,978.
Our store subscription cost $335.
Promotion of items cost $44. We actually promoted more than three items, but only three sold from the promotion, so we only got charged for those that sold with eBay promotion.
The international fee on one item was $23.
Freight shipments cost $5,539.
Our total profits after expenses were $61,124.
That is total profit! We made 10x the investment of $5,100, which is super exciting.
What About The Returns?
So nobody wants to talk about the returns. They’re not fun, but we did have three of them. We won two out of the three of them, we actually just talked about one in a recent podcast episode.
The shower pan was a $700 one we were able to get back and the other one we got back was a $1,200 a duplex escalator cleaner.
The third one was a small one that I probably could have fought, but I chose not to because it was such a small amount. It was a commercial baby scale that we paid $10 for and sold it for about $145. I tested it and it worked, but when the guy received it he couldn’t figure out how to change the reading from kilograms to pounds. When I got it back, I couldn’t figure it out either. In that case, eBay recommended I accept the return, so I did, and now I’ll just relist it, but note that it’s in kilograms and not pounds on the listing.
Sometimes taking returns might make sense for your business. We do not take returns, we say all of our items are sold as is. We describe them, take good pictures, and try to underpromise and overdeliver.
Highlights From 2021
Our Family Road Trip
We did our five-week family road trip across the country covering 11,000 miles taking us from Florida down around to Texas, to Arizona, up to Colorado to see some family then back down and around to California, up to Washington, to Michigan, and back down to Florida. We visited many national parks, saw the Redwoods, the Sequoias, Zion, and Mount Rainier.
Along the way, we got to meet eight or nine of our Flipper University students.
We also brought the trailer and filled it with great finds from along the way. The original plan was to end with the 127 Yard Sale in Michigan and head back down to Florida, but by the time we got to Michigan the trailer was already full, so we only went for a day.
We bought 14 items on the road worth about $17,150, and we spent $850 on those on the road. Four or five of those items have already been sold.
One of the cool things was that I was listing items on the trip. At the hotels, I took items out of the trailer, took pictures, and got them listed. One of the items sold within 24 hours of doing that. It was a $75 commercial steamer, and we sold it for $750 within 24 hours!
The Kids Started Selling
The kids really started getting into selling this year to make some extra money.
It’s been so fun to see them learn how to make some extra money and it’s started some awesome conversations about what they really value and how their dollars can stretch so much further at thrift stores and the flea market over buying something new.
Check out Flipper University Kid’s Edition.
Flipper University Student Successes
Some of our students had some cool, cool stuff going on in 2021. We got to talk to Jack and Joan, two of our students who jumped into flipping just over a year ago. They’re retired and they had their highest 90-day total of almost $30,000.
And check out that average! Only 47 items sold for the to make over $29K! They averaged $624/item! Heck yes!
Joanna bought a camper for $9,000 cash all from her flipping money that she’d been saving up.
Adam was averaging about $5,000 a month before he had his newborn. This is just a side hustle for him because he’s got a full-time job, but he’s doing awesome with this side hustle. You can hear more about Adam’s journey and Jack and Joan’s growth on The Reseller Hangout Podcast.
Dena was able to pay for her daughter’s wedding dress with flipping money. And then after that, she was able to quit her second job.
And Amy capitalized on the Queen’s Gambit Netflix series popularity by selling a vintage glass chess set. She picked it for a super low price and sold it for $900. And she’s averaging around $4,000 a month on vintage items.
Those are only some of the wins! Our Flipper University students absolutely crushed it in 2021!
Flea Market Flipper Growth
A couple of cool things happened with Flea Market Flipper.
We launched our sourcing membership where we had people in different areas join, and then we helped them source in their local areas. We’ve sourced all over the country, helping people find amazing deals that they can buy and then resell to make good profits.
We hosted a four-week sourcing workshop and a shipping bootcamp.
And we held our first-ever virtual summit — The Reseller Summit — featuring a whole bunch of other resellers and flippers.
Following The Reseller Summit, we launched our Reseller Hangout Podcast and we’re already at 25 episodes.
We had one of our biggest sales size-wise and money-wise. We sold a 12-foot-tall bus wash. I worked on building the pallet for a couple of hours a day over eight days. We paid $500 for it and sold it for $14,500 so that was a killer sale for last year! That month we also sold an amazing ice cream machine for $8,500, and we paid $0 for it because we got it for free.
We also helped our kids with their flipping business. In the spring they sold 14 items for about $400.
One of Melissa’s highlights was being interviewed by Chalene Johnson, a fitness and lifestyle entrepreneur. They talked about reselling because Chalene does a reselling challenge once a year to make money and declutter the closet.
We attended our first in-person conference this year in two years, which was amazing.
Finally, we also invested in ourselves. One of the biggest things in this industry (and any industry) is to be open to learning and growing. This year we took a big step for ourselves and jumped into a coaching program where we are the ones receiving coaching. We’re strong believers in always growing. We’re always listening to podcasts or audiobooks and investing in ourselves so we can get better, so we can serve better, so we can help better. That’s our goal.
We’re ready for 2022, so let’s go!
Show Notes:
Jack and Joan’s Podcast: How This Retired Couple Averages $12K/Mo Selling On Ebay
Adam’s Podcast: How This New Dad Makes $5K/Mo Selling On Ebay
Flipper University Kid’s Edition
FURTHER RESOURCES
Download These 47 Household Items To Resell TODAY!
FREE Workshop How To Turn Your Passion of Flipping Items Into A Profitable Reselling Business
RELATED EPISODES
How This Reseller Makes $1.7K Flipping Mattresses And Vintage Lamps
How This Retiree Makes $1K/Mo Flipping Cooktops And Mattresses Online
Calculated, Flat Rate, Or Free Shipping? Which Should You Be Using On Ebay?
