There are so many ways to make money by purchasing items from an op shop and reselling them online or through a consignment shop.
The internet has several e-commerce platforms which make reselling easy, such as eBay and Amazon. But you must know which items have the most resale value. Otherwise, it’ll be difficult to make a profit.
You cannot just visit one op shop and hope to find dozens of high valued items for low prices. With so many lower valued items for sale in these shops, you must become a treasure hunter by digging through all the garbage until you find an item of value.
Then you purchase that item and sell it any way you can for a higher price. The big question is, which types of items can you make money reselling?
To help you get started, below are the top 5 treasures in op shops which you can resell for good money.
Designer Handbags
The average op shop has several handbags for sale. If you search through them carefully, you may find designer handbags that are worth a lot of money. You need to familiarise yourself with designer names like Gucci, so you will recognise them in the shop.
You must also be able to tell whether the designer handbags are genuine or fake. Obviously, you will want to purchase genuine designer handbags.
The best thing to do is to sell luxury handbags on consignment after you purchase them from op shops. Find a luxury clothing store like Luxe.It.Fwd which offers to sell on consignment for individual sellers.
Silver
A lot of people with older flatware, such as spoons and forks, do not always realise they have silver flatware. Some people inherit their flatware from a deceased family member and assume it is merely stainless-steel material.
As a result, they will end up donating their flatware to an op shop because they do not know its true value.
The average person who visits an op shop cannot distinguish silver from stainless-steel. That is why you need to learn about how to spot silver flatware and tell it apart from the worthless stainless-steel flatware.
If you can find real silver and purchase it cheaply from the op shop, then you can often resell it for big money.
College Textbooks
College bookstores love to overcharge students for their textbooks. Whether it’s a math or science textbook, students end up paying close to $100 for each one in new condition.
When students are finished using a textbook, they often give it away to an op shop. That creates the perfect opportunity for treasure hunters to snatch up these used college textbooks for low prices and resell them on Amazon or eBay.
Historical Items
There are a lot of people who collect historical documents and old military weapons & gear. In the United States, there was a man who reportedly spent $2.48 at an op shop for a copy of the country’s Declaration of Independence.
He turned around and resold it for roughly $500,000.
Of course, this is a very rare thing to happen, but it goes to show you the potential that is out there.
In Australia, look around your local op shops for old rifles, swords, spears, and government documents. All this stuff has amazing value to collectors throughout the world.
Old Video Games (from the ‘80s & ‘90s)
If you can find classic Atari and Nintendo games from the early 1980s through the early 1990s, then you can resell them for good money under certain conditions.
Mainly, you will want to find games in new condition that are still sealed in their boxes.
For instance, if you have a sealed copy of the original “Super Mario Bros.” on Nintendo, then you could get close to $100,000 for it. That is the potential of reselling retro video games in new condition.
