How To Turn $100 Into $1,000+ My Way

in #money8 years ago


So you got yourself $100. Not much scratch, but nothing to sneeze at either.

But how can you turn that $100 into MORE $100’s?

If you type the title of this post into google, you will get a bunch of jokesters saying different ways to spend it. There are plenty of ways to blow $100 by following bad advice.

Here are some things NOT to do with your $100 if you want to turn it into $1,000.

  • Penny stocks
  • Buy an eBook that will tell you the ‘secret’ of making money (Hint: It’s selling $97 eBooks about the hidden secrets of making money)
  • Gambling

An actually decent answer is to invest it in an index fund, but it will take decades to turn into $1,000 – ain’t nobody got time fo ‘dat.

Image courtesy of bplanet at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

A better answer is use that to start your own business.

  • You could buy a domain, hosting, logo and business cards for $100 and start selling a service that you do.
  • You could buy up a used lawn mower and charge your neighbors to cut their grass. Or buy a used leaf blower and some bags and take clear out people’s yards of leaves.
  • Another way would be to grow plants that have a large demand.

But what I do to turn my $100 into $1,000 over and over is flip things I buy locally on eBay or Amazon FBA.

In 2015 I made over $22,000 in gross sales, $12,000+ profit after COGS, fees and shipping/returns. 2016 wasn’t so good since I worked overseas for 6 months and had to stop the side gig.

I enjoy buying low and selling high, it is almost like no work at all. I love, love, love looking for the deals out there – it is like finding treasure. The only thing I don’t like so much is creating the listings if I use eBay.

Obviously you won’t make money by buying any old thing out there. You need to know what is desirable and a great deal. You also have to understand shipping costs and fees to know what you could possibly earn.

Luckily, there are loads of ways to learn.

I would suggest watching some Youtube videos of what people are selling. A few channels I like are:

You could research eBay’s sold listings and see what goes for good money.

Start by selling some small things around your house that you no longer need and is easy to ship. I started by selling off used video games. I made my listings and when they sold I wrapped them in pieces of paper bags that I got from the super market and hand wrote the address.

This is a good way to get your feet wet.

I used my early profit to buy a scale and an address label maker. That allowed me to earn even more as you get a shipping discount from eBay. The label maker is needed to label your Amazon FBA items too, so you won’t have to pay the fee to have Amazon label it for you.

Grow. Use the money you earn to get more items, which will allow you to hit that $1,000 faster!

Image courtesy of bplanet at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Some people say to learn a niche and become a powerhouse in that subject. My father-in-law sells music, specifically vinyl records. He has two booths in consignment stores and sells on eBay too.

I am a generalist, always have been. A Jack-of-all-trades type of guy. I buy whatever I can make some money on.

While I might not have deep knowledge of every type of item, I know the top brands to be on the lookout for and use technology to help me not make a mistake.

If your item has a barcode you can use your Amazon seller app to scan it to see what it would net you after fees.

For other things you can use your eBay app and type in what it is under the ‘show only sold’ to get an idea of the value.

You can find items to resell off of craigslist, facebook selling pages, auctions, flea markets, garage sales, thrift stores, clearance items at big stores or even the trash. Yes, people will throw away things that you can sell for big money – most people don’t know the value of things. There are plenty of other ways to find things as well.

This isn’t easy passive income. This takes effort. It isn’t for everybody, but it’s definitely for me. I love the thrill of the hunt. If you love the art of the deal like me, then selling things you found could be a great way to earn some extra cash.

Heck, I think I will do it full time once I ‘retire’ in two years.

I wonder how much higher I can make that $22,000 number once I can focus on it full time…


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I've already made money selling my own stuff, and I've been thinking about reselling as well. I think I might do it!

You should, there is so much money to be made if you are even halfway decent at it.

Wait, you mean putting $100 on black and letting the roulette wheel spin a few times is not the right move? hehe ;-) Kidding aside, good points.

Let it ride a few times, eh?

A friend of a friend lives very close to a Goodwill and does exactly what you are talking about. The house he bought with the items he has resold is full of items waiting to be be listed. He spends between 2 to 4 hours a day and that's all that he does for income!

Well then you can see it can be quite lucrative!

This isn’t easy passive income. This takes effort.

Even if you were to set up a "passive" income stream, THAT process takes an enormous amount of effort.

Listen to @getonthetrain, folks...the only way to get rich is to do it yourself.

  • you can try to do something that is fun for you, but don't sink a lot into that approach until you know whether it is profitable or not
  • whatever you intend to do, research it a bit. you don't need market reports necessarily (they can help), but look around the local market for similar businesses and hit the forums
  • who is John Galt?

Starting with $100 is a pretty good way to do what @stevescoins is talking about. You won't have too much invested if things don't work out, but if they do you can always use your profits to reinvest into your budding business.

I'm happy to see someone who knows way more than I do about finances touting eBay. I happened upon a couple of YouRube videos about it recently and decided to start some selling my unwanted stuff to build up my reputation on there. After that I will either go the thrift shop & yard sake route or try drop shipping. What are your thoughts on drop shipping on eBay?

Drop shipping has a lot of competition. Not that you can't make money on it, just be aware of it. If you wanted to drop ship you can research the product sales on eBay by searching the sold listing for items you are looking at selling.

I haven't ruled drop shipping out, but I have too much fun searching for hidden treasures to look into that sort of business model fully.

The main thing that attracts me to drop shipping is in the name. I like the idea of having someone else handle the shipping part especially Amazon prime.

I say Forex Market buddy! I can trade with a $100 using 200 X leverage and make $1,000 in two three days ;)
But I like your point of view. I rather see ppl invest a bit then to continue spending on material non-sense!

Since I have a regular job, I take all my profits doing this and other side gigs and invest it. My way of thinking is that I can do this stuff once, and then my investments will earn me an income (hopefully) for the rest of my days.

WPSHF was a good pick getonthetrain from last month fair play
tried to reply on our original discussion and it said it was frozen still getting used to it here lol
what else you been picking chief?
& do you fancey SEDG for a buy or would you have before the latest little up swing

Yea, WPSHF has doubled an I still think there is plenty of run left. I am thinking $1 /share by the end of the year. 3 billion dollar company China CAMCE Engineering has been accumulating shares and now has a 5% stake in Western potash - but I am sure they want more. http://www.westernpotash.com/news/technical-review-meeting-milestone-pilots-horizontal-selective-mining-method-held-beijing

SEDG looks solid (good EPS, minimal debt) but hasn't been growing this last year and I know the US tax rebate for solar installation is not active for 2017. This was about a 33% subsidy for solar, Trump doesn't look like he would be the one to extend it either. I wouldn't be kicking myself if I bought shares, but I don't see a catalyst that will send the shares substantially higher. I didn't look into it too deeply though.

My latest buy is Gener8 shipping (GNRT). Brand new ships with the clean run engines that will be required after 2020, and also have fuel savings of approx. $6k a day. They are selling for way under book and are a possible buyout company for a larger one looking to obtain these new ships at a discount. If not, that $6k a day per ship savings can let them undercut a lot of other shippers and get the contracts. Fair value for the company is above $7ish IMO.

Hi Getonthetrain
thanks for your last insight on GNRT i have been watching it very closely
Do you think they will fall nearer to 4 bucks now ?
Its just after the new builds the cash position in there latest filing is weaker currently @ 162million for current assets compared to 216m current liabilities
And also do you think they have been depreciating the assets sufficiently @ current level? reason I am asking this question is I got burned on DHT a while back after they had a massive impairment charge hitting the income statement for the qtr as they had not depreciated sufficiently resulting in an unexpected loss so the share price tanked temporarily only recouping that now :)
thanks in advance
rgds
g

I'm in GNRT @ $4.54/share. While anything is possible, I see them trading in the 4.50-5.25 range until a breakout catalyst occurs. Very likely a takeover target company. Frontline is currently sending offers to buy DHT, but many analysts are unsure if that will happen. If not, they see GNRT as the most likely company for them to purchase (at a price premium).

They are releasing their earnings on March 14th, so we can see if they can improve from the small loss last quarter. They are currently paying about $18.3 million/quarter in interest - so they have a decent runway with the cash on hand even if the shipping market stays at the bottom a few quarters.

As for valuing the assets, shipping companies tend to always overstate the prices of their ships. But GNRT has the lowest average age vessels for any shipper company with a fleet age of just 4.3 years old. They are almost all the newer designed "eco" ships too.

Did you read my latest penny stock post? https://steemit.com/money/@getonthetrain/my-top-5-penny-stocks-for-2017-gold-lithium-potash

Invaluable tips, my bro. I gotta put these various plans into action and monitor the outcome. Thank you! Simply awesome...

Well, you can just write books and sell them!

Seems your doing great now :)

Well, didn't do it much last year since I was working in Qatar. But I will be home soon and get it started up again.

Good hope you make a fortune. I did start selling in ebay but with becoming housebound I can't get to the post office so gave it up

Thank you Karen - I give it a good effort!

Wow money 😃😃😃

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