5 hours ago, TigerEyez said:

I'm on the road for work, so I don't have my spreadsheet with me, but it's around $4k spent. 

As far as exact accounting terms go, I don't know. I have spent about $4k to buy sets for resale and I have sold about $4.2k worth of sets after fees and shipping was removed, and I have approximately $3k worth of remaining inventory. If I built every set I have and immediately dumped them in the trash I would have profited $200 on this venture. 

Total investment: $4000

Total sales (after fees and shipping): $4200

Remaining inventory value: $3000

I understood this from the first post.  I'm not sure why this is confusing.  Am I right, @TigerEyez?

BP MATH

10 minutes ago, Scatterbug said:

Not prying but this reads as if you've made 4.2k on sets that cost you 1k. Or is your total investment 7k?

Was just about to post this. The maths are not computing for me here. This seems like the following happened:

 

Bought $4,000 in sets

Sold $4,200 plus $X fees plus $Y shipping

Sitting on $3,000 of inventory

 

$4,000 in initial outlay - $3,000 in cost basis of sets still in inventor= $1,000 spent on the sets sold for $4,200+$X+$Y

 

 

I must have missed out on all the sets available in the past 18 months that were near immediate 3 baggers.

Edited April 4, 20178 yr by edgecrusher
I'm a dummy and fat fingered a number

8 minutes ago, edgecrusher said:

Sitting on $3,000 of inventory

I think he mean $3000 worth of Lego in current value

8 minutes ago, Scatterbug said:

Not prying but this reads as if you've made 4.2k on sets that cost you 1k. Or is your total investment 7k?

Ok, one more time.  Over the last year I have spent approximately $4k to purchase Lego sets for the purpose of selling them in a profitable manner. As of today, I have sold a portion of those sets that I bought.  For the sets sold, I received money out of which I had to pay for shipping and sellers fees for sales on Bricklink.  The money remaining after paying those fees was $4.2k.  I now have completely recovered the amount of money I have spent on Lego sets and am left with $200 and all the unsold sets.  The unsold sets have an approximate retail value of $3k.

 If the kid next door's millionaire granny went 6' under tomorrow and he offered to buy my remaining inventory for asking price I would have sold $7.2k worth of sets with a $4k investment leaving $3.2k of total profit. (PS this kid doesn't exist)

21 minutes ago, Sfcommando14 said:

Total investment: $4000

Total sales (after fees and shipping): $4200

Remaining inventory value: $3000

I understood this from the first post.  I'm not sure why this is confusing.  Am I right, @TigerEyez?

Yes

PS these math posts are really killing my post-to-like ratio

Edited April 4, 20178 yr by TigerEyez

Got it. Well so far you must have a fantastic ROI. Can you give us a few examples?

Edited April 4, 20178 yr by Scatterbug

 

3 hours ago, Scatterbug said:

Got it. Well so far you must have a fantastic ROI. Can you give us a few examples?

I bought quite a few sets during the >50% clearance sales at Walmart last year, I've bought a bunch of new/open/used sets off CL that I've flipped for profit, I've found recently retired sets in out-of-the-way stores like Ghost & Phantom pairs, and I've bought full used collections off CL.  For example, I bought 13 large, used Technic sets off an AFOL in October for $700 and sold them all before Xmas on BL for about $1,200.  There's a guy in town that I've bought from a couple times who gets beat up sets from Amazon Warehouse, I believe, that he sells pretty cheap, I bought an open box, sealed bag Tumbler, a beat up, sealed GE, minty Avenger Tower, and minty Quinjet for $400, which I sold the Tumbler for $300 on CL, the GE for $290, the tower for like $50, and still have the Quinjet (surprise).  I travel a lot, so when I'm on the road I check Wal Marts and CL where I'm staying.  I also found a used Cafe Corner at a garage sale for $80, which helped a lot.

Another Joker Steamroller...only 42 left.

In order to move this one I had to bundle it into a DC Superheroes bundle of four sets on eBay. Green Lantern, Sky High Battle, and Brainiac Attack were the other three sets. $135 shipped. Luckily my buy ins were low on the Sky High Battle ($15) and Green Lantern ($9), so I could protect some margin on the other two.

Sorry, been kind of MIA lately. Plate has been full.
But I wanted to share how some sets are doing on BL these days.
I flipped five Cindy Castles in one order for $60 each. Buy in $32 each.
I sold three Speed Champs (899, 909, 910) for $30 each, buy in was around $11 each.
An order for five IM vs Ultron at $10 each, buyin $5.
And a shopping mall for $88, buy in $54. Tired of looking at them taking up all that space.
Mystery machine for $40, buy in $20. Forgot I had listed one several months ago when they were selling in the high $20s.
Dimensions starter pack, elements box for $35. Pure profit since I sold the super girl for $40 around Christmas.
And another TC4 for $13

I am happy to announce that I sold my last Dimensions starter disc ($14.95) and platform ($20) on eBay this week out of about 14. Still have 10 of the element boxes left, but that's fine. I don't mind waiting if I can sell them for $35 a piece.

14 minutes ago, donbee said:

I flipped five Cindy Castles in one order for $60 each. Buy in $32 each.
An order for five IM vs Ultron at $10 each, buyin $5.
 

Good to know.  I never posted these when I bought them because margin wasn't high enough yet. 

My last Quinjet 6869 is gone!

Some Milanos (old one) $99 FBA. I didn't realize this is one of my more stockpiled sets with 10+ left. Buy in was in the $40 range

EBay

Used Gingerbread man minifigure for $9.75 shipped

Used mixed lot with parts from Scooby Doo 75903 Joker 76013 Super Hero Girls 41232 and some other random pieces. Nothing complete for $30 + shipping. The guy paid $23+ for shipping to CA.

50 x new Imperial officer hat (pictured below) on BL for $1.08 each 

just realized I have about 100 more of those so I emailed the buyer asking if he/she is interested in some more   

plus sold 62 x ninjago titanium dragon  

Thinking some more (and drinking too), which one of you bought those titanium dragons?

Sold my final Cloud Cuckoo/Benny's Spaceship combo the other day.  Clearing out a lot of non-performers to make way for some sets calling me to be built.(Big Ben, Snowspeeder, Assembly Square)  Next up is to build our Jurassic World sets and get those listed. 

50 x new Imperial officer hat (pictured below) on BL for $1.08 each 
just realized I have about 100 more of those so I emailed the buyer asking if he/she is interested in some more [emoji6]  
plus sold 62 x ninjago titanium dragon [emoji4] 

How much did you sell the dragons for each?

20 hours ago, micbelt said:

 

How much did you sell the dragons for each?

 

30 of them for $33ea, another 30 for $30ea. Plus I had to pay PayPal fees.

Time for some updates - the last two weeks have been crazy in terms of sales. Of course my discovery of FBA helped (moved 30 sets in 2 weeks), but somehow also my EBay sales picked up at the same time. Guess that's tax refund time for you :). Some highlights:

FBA:

7x 41074 Azari and the Magical Bakery - $44 (buy-in $18 after tax)

5x 41035 Heartlake Juice Bar - $35 (buy-in $9 after tax)

2x 70151 Chima Speedorz Frozen Spikes - $16 (buy-in $4 after tax. ROI exactly 100% after all fees and taxes) - YEAH, I SELL CHIMA FOR PROFIT!

BO/BL:

1x 41074 Azari and the Magical Bakery - $35 (buy-in $18 after tax)

1x 75046 Coruscant Police Gunship - $80 (buy-in $37 after tax)

EBay:

1x 21118 Minecraft The Mine - $159 (buy-in $57 after tax), but with $10 FVF promo - my last one, I had to lower my price a bit after the selling frenzy over the holidays but the promo covered most of the difference.

1x Christmas Bundle consisting of 40222 Christmas Calendar + 40223 Snow Globe + 30474 Reindeer poly - $73 (buy-in $1.86, take-home profit after all fees and taxes $54)

 

 

 

Haven't updated in a bit either, but had to report I just sold my last 75053 - The Ghost for $225 and 60057 - Camper Vans for $55, FBA

1 hour ago, exciter1 said:

Haven't updated in a bit either, but had to report I just sold my last 75053 - The Ghost for $225 and 60057 - Camper Vans for $55, FBA

The price discrepancy between FBA and eBay on some sets is almost to the point where you could buy the set on eBay and immediately flip it on Amazon. The Ghost has been available for <= $150 pretty reliably over the past month. There was an auction on NISB 75053 that ended at $106 on 4/6. 

Edited April 10, 20178 yr by tjj1984

35 minutes ago, tjj1984 said:

The price discrepancy between FBA and eBay on some sets is almost to the point where you could buy the set on eBay and immediately flip it on Amazon. The Ghost has been available for <= $150 pretty reliably over the past month. There was an auction on NISB 75053 that ended at $106 on 4/6. 

Agreed. I could buy the ghost right now on  eBay for $200aud delivered and that was one quick look. Amazing how low Americans can buy sets, yet high high they sell for. Sometimes it defies  belief.

1x Sealed 10228 Haunted House to a fellow BP member for £230 posted.

Edited April 10, 20178 yr by TabbyBoy

1 hour ago, TabbyBoy said:

1x Sealed 10228 Haunted House to a fellow BP member for £230 posted.

Thanks Tabby, look forward to receiving it.