What are the Best Things to Flip for Profit?

Business Education, Selling

2023-01-01

In this guide, we will explain the concept of flipping for profit and explore the top items to flip for profit based on your lifestyle and means.

What is Flipping for Profit?

Flipping means acquiring an asset with the intention of reselling it for a quick profit. Although usually associated with real estate, any product can be flipped for profit. In this guide, we will look at some of the best products you can flip for profit. This guide is going to show that you don’t necessarily need any specialist tools or knowledge to get into flipping.

What Are The 15 Best Things to Flip for Profit?

Clothing and Shoes

Investment Cost: Low – unless specifically targeting designer items – See Collectibles

Specialist Knowledge: Low – unless specifically targeting designer items – See Collectibles

Amount of Storage Required: Low to Medium – can start with small amounts or invest in volume

Ease of Acquiring the Product: Easy – there are multiple routes to buying clothing in bulk

How Long it Takes to Sell: Fast, unless dealing with valuable collectibles

Clothing is easy to buy in bulk from charity and thrift stores – many people have unwanted clothing at home – ask your friends, family or neighbors if they have any clothing or shoes they no longer want – and offer to take them off their hands.

Thrift and charity stores are always selling donated clothing cheaply, and are unlikely to have spent much time researching what they have.

Children’s clothing is a particularly good place to start, as children always outgrow their clothing, and it is always in demand by families looking for discounted ways to clothe their own growing children.

Designer labels are always sought after also, and if you’re lucky and know what you’re looking for, it’s not uncommon to find designer-labeled items in charity or thrift stores that haven’t been identified as being more valuable than other items of apparel.

eBay, thredUP, Poshmark, and flea markets are all ideal places to sell clothing, but also consider consignment stores, garage sales, and Facebook Marketplace.

Apart from thredUP (which accepts your clothing in bulk and lists them for you), all online selling methods will be time-consuming to sort and list each item, so clothing is often suited to local sales. Items with a good brand name are more suited, however, to online sales to reach a bigger audience.

As of 2021, the US apparel market was valued at $318 billion in revenue, with leading retailers such as TJX and Macy’s each bringing in over $20 billion in sales.
In 2022, the global apparel industry market is projected to reach $1.7 trillion in value.
In 2021, the revenue of the global apparel market reached $1.5 trillion.
The resale market for clothing is growing 11 times faster than traditional retail and is projected to be worth $84 billion by 2030.
Projections show that the value of the second-hand clothing market will double from $36 billion in 2020 to $77 billion in the next five years.

Furniture and Appliances

Investment Cost: Low to Medium

Specialist Knowledge: Low

Amount of Storage Required: Large, especially for multiple units

Ease of Acquiring the Product: Easy

How Long it Takes to Sell: Quick to Medium

Furniture and Appliances are often replaced by households as they redecorate, move, or upgrade. As furniture and appliances are also fairly expensive, new and growing families, students, and those looking to move out of home for the first time are always on the lookout to furnish their homes more affordably. These factors help to keep the market for these items buoyant, and will always show cause for demand.

Keep on the lookout for house clearances, items offered for free on local classifieds, and garage sales. You may also get lucky with discount stores and clearance sales to get your hands on quality wood furniture for less.

Upcycling is also a growing trend for a reason – with a bit of time and effort, you can dramatically add value to items that would otherwise be thrown out.

Space is the main drawback to stocking this type of merchandise – you need space to be able to store, but also to work on fixing/adapting/repainting, etc. without getting in the way of your normal home life. Garages are ideal spaces to work on repairing and upcycling furniture and appliances.

Facebook Marketplace, offerUP, and Craigslist are key platforms for selling furniture and appliances, as well as through garage sales, and local classifieds. This type of merchandise, due to the size and weight of the items, is more ideally suited to selling locally, especially when the customer can pick up the items themselves, due to otherwise high shipping costs.

On average, second-hand furniture is more than 50% cheaper, which allows the consumers access to products at comparatively less cost.
The off-the-shelf second-hand furniture market was worth $12.17 billion in 2019 and is estimated to reach $27.19 billion by 2027, growing at a CAGR of 10.16% during the 2020-2027 period.
Metal furniture sales are expected to reach $139.9 billion in revenue by 2027.
Only 14% of consumers buy their furniture online.
The home furniture market is expected to grow by $8 billion in the next four years.
By 2026, the worldwide home office furniture segment is set to be worth $59 billion.

Cars and Motorcycles

Investment Cost: Medium to high

Specialist Knowledge: Medium to high

Amount of Storage Required: High

Ease of Acquiring the Product: Easy

How Long it Takes to Sell: Easy to Medium (especially for vintage vehicles)

Cars and motorcycles are bigger investments. Although you can buy cars for as little as a few hundred dollars, investment vehicles could be worth a lot more.

Buying vehicles that are not mechanically sound, in order to repair and clean them, can be a lucrative business. Some vehicles can increase in value simply by cleaning, respraying, or putting through a vehicle inspection certificate.

Vintage or classic cars and motorcycles have a value of their own, and if in poor condition can represent a great opportunity, if you’re willing to put in the time, effort, and cost to rebuild. Ensure you document everything you do to restore a vehicle, take photos, and keep receipts for parts bought.

The main issue with buying vehicles to flip for profit is the space required, both for the car/motorcycle itself, and any parts you need to store or work on (which may be valuable in their own right). You will need a driveway, storage unit, or garage. You don’t want to park an investment vehicle directly on the street, or if you must – make sure you’re well insured.

It can also be profitable to dismantle a totaled or damaged vehicle for parts – if you have the time and patience to remove all working components to list separately for sale online, you can realize much more than the investment you paid for the vehicle to begin with. People are always looking for parts online to fix their own vehicles, while those who don’t know a lot about mechanics are willing to sell older dented cars cheaply.

In the second quarter of 2022, there were more than 284 million vehicles being driven throughout the United States.
Global motorcycle sales from 2021 to 2026 are estimated to rise by about $40 billion.
American consumers bought an estimated 780,000 motorcycles in 2020, a 67% increase from 2019.
The market for vehicles is projected to grow from $127.44 billion in 2022 to $223.50 billion by 2029, with a CAGR of 8.4%.

Tools and Gardening Equipment

Investment Cost: Low to medium

Specialist Knowledge: Low to medium

Amount of Storage Required: Low

Ease of Acquiring the Product: Easy

How Long it Takes to Sell: Quick to sell

Tools are bought with a specific job in mind, often to avoid the more expensive prospect of bringing in workmen to do the task. This means that once that job is done the tool is often stored away, or becomes obsolete to the owner and sold. As a result, nearly-new tools can be bought for up to half the price.

Used tools can be easily found at yard sales, flea markets, pawnshops, and on Craigslist. There are also a lot of returned tools, which can be purchased through liquidation sites in bulk.

You can also check for clearance tools as your local discount stores – especially after the end of summer, you may find brand-new tools and equipment sold for low prices that you can resell for profit in the following spring.

Many tools listed as not working only need some easy fixes or parts replacements. Repairing them adds a lot of value to a product you can resell for a profit. Popular brands include DeWalt, Bosch, Ridgid, Makita, and Milwaukee Tools.

Tools are expensive to buy new, so there is always demand for discounted tools. Even professional builders and gardeners are on the lookout for tool upgrades at less-than-retail prices.

List on Facebook Marketplace and eBay to increase your reach, and hit the top prices you can make on resale.

The demand for residential gardening tools exceeded $33 billion in 2021.
The market for both tools and gardening equipment reached $88.10 billion in 2022.
North America is the largest region for the lawn and garden equipment market segment, with a share of about 55% of worldwide sales in 2022.

Electronics

Investment Cost: Medium to high

Specialist Knowledge: Medium to high, depending on if any repairs are needed.

Amount of Storage Required: Low to high (think phones vs. televisions)

Ease of Acquiring the Product: Easy

How Long it Takes to Sell: Quick to sell

Online sales are particularly suited to compact but valuable items due to the cost of shipping. Electronics are perfect for selling online for this reason. Find used electronics inexpensively at garage sales, flea markets, or from online liquidation companies. You can also find electronics at discount stores, such as accessories like earphones and chargers that can be bundled with other items to increase their value.

Electronics and books are the products most in demand by online shoppers, and smartphones are now the most popular electronics product, taking over from laptops.

The electronics market keeps growing, being valued at $863 billion in 2021. By 2031, this market is expected to be worth $1.2 trillion in revenue.

The US consumer electronics industry is the 15th largest retail industry by market size and is worth $82.3 billion in 2022.
The market size of the US consumer electronics industry shrunk an average of 5.1% per year during the 2017-2022 period.
Between 2021 and 2022, the US consumer electronics industry is expected to grow by 2.8 percent.

Collectables and Memorabilia

Investment Cost: Low to high, depending on type of item, and if found for significantly less than market value

Specialist Knowledge: High

Amount of Storage Required: Usually low

Ease of Acquiring the Product: Difficult

How Long it Takes to Sell: Medium to high to achieve the best return

The collectibles and memorabilia market is worth billions and represents everything from militaria to baseball cards to stamps. If you know a lot about a certain niche, put this to your advantage.

There are handbooks with guide prices for almost every sector of collectibles – buy a new copy, recently published, and use the guide prices to help as you search through flea markets, fairs, and local auctions to find items sold at prices you can profit from.

The collectibles market was worth at $402 billion in 2021 and is forecast to reach $1 trillion in value by 2032.
The online market size of the antiques & collectibles segment in the US is forecast to grow by 4% in 2022.
The US online market for antiques & collectibles was worth $1.7 billion in revenue in 2022.

Real Estate

Investment Cost: Very high

Specialist Knowledge: Medium, depending on upgrade work

Amount of Storage Required: N/A

Ease of Acquiring the Product: Difficult

How Long it Takes to Sell: Medium

Houses are some of the most profitable assets to resell. Some people make this their full-time business, buying foreclosed properties at public auctions or using contacts to buy old homes that they can then renovate and resell for a massive profit.

Beware, overheads for this type of business often reach into tens of thousands of dollars, even after you have bought the property. This venture is only for those with significant capital investment available.

House prices have increased 0.6% on a month-over-month basis from June to July 2022 and they are forecast to increase 4.3% from June 2022 to June 2023 on a year-over-year basis.
The value of theUS real estate market was estimated as $3.69 trillion in 2021 and is forecast to reach $3.81 trillion in 2022.

Vintage Items and Antiques

Investment Cost: Low to high

Specialist Knowledge: High

Amount of Storage Required: Low to medium

Ease of Acquiring the Product: Medium

How Long it Takes to Sell: Can take a long time to get top price

This is similar to the collectibles and memorabilia market, though broader in terms of potential market. More customers are attracted to antique clocks, watches, furniture, artwork and homewares than to specific niche collections of baseball cards or sci-fi figurines. As a result, you can list your merchandise more widely, though you still need an eye for a bargain, and a good base level of knowledge.

Vendors at antique markets are more likely to haggle with prices than dealers in antique stores that know the exact dollar values of their collections, and you may be able to bring the prices down significantly especially if you bundle items together in a sale.

The same is true of sales at flea markets and garage sales. If you’re lucky, you may even find real antiques sold cheaply at thrift stores.

Art

Investment Cost: Low to high

Specialist Knowledge: High

Amount of Storage Required: Low

Ease of Acquiring the Product: Difficult

How Long it Takes to Sell: Can take a long time to get the top price

Reselling art demands a certain set of skills. You need a good eye to find good pieces for resale. Having prior experience and knowledge of the art world helps a lot.

Look for popular modern styles, or work from known artists that haven’t been well identified by their current owners, in both online auctions and local sales such as house clearances and thrift stores. Be careful of reproductions that are worth nothing, and make sure you know what you’re doing before investing any serious money.

Jewelry and Watches

Investment Cost: Medium to high

Specialist Knowledge: Medium

Amount of Storage Required: Very low

Ease of Acquiring the Product: Medium

How Long it Takes to Sell: Quick

The value of the pieces depends on factors such as brand, style, quality, and demand. It is also important that you ensure you are sourcing real jewelry, not knock-offs. Jewelry can be resold one piece at a time or in groupings. Selling in groupings means you need to set up fewer listings and may be more attractive to customers who want to reduce costs.

Etsy and eBay are good websites for reselling jewelry and watches.

The jewelry and watches market is estimated to be worth over $21 billion by 2025.
The US online market for jewelry and watches is worth $8.7 billion in revenue in 2022.

Toys

Investment Cost: Very low

Specialist Knowledge: None

Amount of Storage Required: Low

Ease of Acquiring the Product: Easy

How Long it Takes to Sell: Quick

It is easy to source used toys at low prices since children tend to outgrow their toys after a short time. Your best options are good quality items like wooden toys, as opposed to plastic toys, which are usually cheap new. Look out for quality toys at garage sales, flea markets and Facebook Marketplace to source locally.

Look to sell good-quality toys on eBay, through consignment stores, and by hosting a stall at local children’s fairs and community events.

In 2022, the toys and games sold in the US were worth $36.32 billion. The market is forecast to grow by 3.67% yearly during the 2022-2026 period.
The US market for the toy industry in 2021 is worth approximately $38.2 billion, representing a 14.2% increase compared with 2020.
Outdoor and sports toys continue to be the largest category, worth $5.9 billion.
In the US, around 3 billion toys are sold each year, with each toy retailing for an average of $10. In 2022, direct toy sales generated around $35.6 billion.

Books

Investment Cost: Low to medium

Specialist Knowledge: Low

Amount of Storage Required: Low

Ease of Acquiring the Product: Easy

How Long it Takes to Sell: Quick

Used books are easily found at thrift stores and used bookstores. In some cases, rare books and especially first editions can be sold to collectors for very high prices online. A first edition hardcover copy of Tolkien’s ‘The Fellowship of the Ring’ can cost as much as $7,000.

It’s not just rare books that can be valuable. Academic books can also be quite expensive, some titles selling for hundreds of dollars, especially if they are newer versions. Students are often forced to spend a lot of money on academic books and will be looking to pay a discounted rate for one online – still leaving plenty of profit for you if you sourced from the right place.

Reclaimed Materials

Investment Cost: Low to none

Specialist Knowledge: Low

Amount of Storage Required: High – including vehicle space for transport

Ease of Acquiring the Product: Moderately easy, depending on where you live

How Long it Takes to Sell: Moderate

Reclaimed materials can be bought for very low prices, and many places will allow you to take them for free, as it saves contractors paying for their removals and disposal. Check with local demolition sites, building sites or businesses – do they have any excess material that they want to get rid of?

Old pallets, tiles, gates, architectural fittings, light fittings, and more all have value when taken to the right place. Smaller items may sell well online, especially if they are decorative. Used pallets are always in demand for those looking for cheap timber.

Any materials you can’t sell through your ideal channels can be sold at low prices or donated to architectural salvage yards or recycling centers.

Medical and Mobility Equipment

Investment Cost: Low to medium

Specialist Knowledge: Low

Amount of Storage Required: Medium to high

Ease of Acquiring the Product: Easy

How Long it Takes to Sell: Quick

Medical and mobility equipment are very sought after and expensive to buy new. As people’s ailments recover, or they pass on, used mobility equipment and medical units enter the market, often sold cheaply to free up space, or in house clearances. Look for listings on Facebook, house clearances, garage sales and local classifieds to find this equipment at low prices. You’ll find many wheelchairs, motorized scooters, and mobility aids on eBay.

Also look for clearance items of this type on retailer’s websites or discount stores – you know this type of merchandise will keep its value, and you’ll always be able to resell it elsewhere.

List on websites such as OfferUP and Craigslist, and offer local dropoff if you can – remember your target customer is one with mobility issues.

This venture is more lucrative in areas with a higher density of elderly people.

Craft Items

Investment Cost: Low

Specialist Knowledge: Medium

Amount of Storage Required: Low

Ease of Acquiring the Product: Easy

How Long it Takes to Sell: Medium

Are you a creative person? People are increasingly paying for artisanal items, either for themselves or as gifts. A growing number of people are looking for something unique for their homes – something they can’t buy on the high street.

Think about what you can make yourself from cheap materials – soap, candles, soft toys, paintings, sculpture, ornaments, personalized gifts, any kind of arts & crafts product you can make/adapt and sell for profit.

Etsy is the best platform for selling homemade items, though sales can do well on eBay as well. Reach out to your local community on Facebook, take adverts out in local circulars and papers – let people know that you can take personalized orders and are a friendly local face, in order to build a brand locally as well as online.

A Final Note: Take Advantage Of Seasonal Merchandise If You Can

Provided that you can store them, you can make some money by stocking up seasonal products during their off-season and then reselling them when they are in demand again. Seasonal products include summer or winter clothing, seasonal decorations (e.g. Christmas, Easter, Halloween), and toys and games at Christmas. Source these products at very affordable prices after the season is over, and pay special attention to clearance sales and liquidation websites.

Why Consider Liquidations as a Source for Items to Flip for Profit?

Liquidation products cost less than sourcing new items from wholesalers, meaning you can start your reselling business for a lower investment. Read more about starting a reselling business by reading our guides which explore what liquidation goods are, how to find liquidators and what it takes to start a resale business with them:

Sourcing Merchandise to Resell from Direct Liquidation

Customers can access an enormous variety of merchandise at Direct Liquidation. This includes overstock and customer returns sourced from top retailers.

You can buy all lot sizes from pallets to full truckloads and new listings are made available every day.

We have multiple warehouses located across the country. Reduce shipping costs by choosing to source from the one closest to you. Check out the merchandise for resale we have available right now.