If a credit card gives 2% on all purchases, adds up 
(eBay bucks are similar)
Anyone else know a way to get free money from buying cards?
Buy anything vintage, hold for a couple years. Sell.
Edit: Some additional advice: Purchase only PSA 7.5 Wurmples for maximum profit. Good luck out there boyos!
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- Get Ebay master card (5%) + ebay bucks (1%) = 6% total
- You can send purchases to PWCC vault so you don’t have to pay sales tax. But, you’re legally required to do so come tax season.
- Get Ebay “top rated plus” status. =1% deduction on final value fees.
- Sell above 7% of what you bought it for = you make money (7% is based off not claiming sales tax in step 2).
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eBay MasterCard gives 5% back for purchases on eBay? (Or is it more complicated or involving points?) That would be very solid!
Involves points. But at the end of the day its 5% back.
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Be careful with using credit cards as many studies have shown that people have a hard time monitoring their spending while using them. This is particularly true if you are young and inexperienced with financial self discipline. The reason why these cards can afford to give you 5 percent back is because they make more than that off of the people who don’t know how to budget correctly or save money for emergencies which inevitably happen in life. I myself do use these cards but only if I have the cash to cover the payments right that day. Pokemon is very speculative and prices can move up and down so please don’t spend yourself into having to sell parts of your collection to cover your debt.
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Paying a cent in credit-card interest is generally ill advised. But some people do make it work!
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Yeah, credit cards are dangerous because the amount people are willing to spend on them, not so much the interest. There’s studies that people are willing to spend 30% more on credit than if they had to pay in cash. There’s a philological thing there with holding cash in your hand and dispensing it. But, 99% of cards are purchased online so you have to to learn to respect the power.
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From what I understand with the eBay Mastercard is that you earn x5 points per $1 spent on eBay after you have purchased $1,000+ worth of items on eBay in 1 calendar year, resetting every calendar year. Before you reach the $1,000 threshold you earn x3 points per $1 spent on eBay.
For the points system to redeem $10 you need 1,500 points. So for the first $1,000 spent you will earn 3,000 points which equals $20. This equals out to 2% cashback. After you reached $1,000 spent you start to earn x5 points per $1 spent so to get 1,500 points you need to spend $300 which would equal 3.33% back.
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Correct. As an experiment, take $1000 in cash (in 20s) in your hand or place it next your computer and see how you would feel about spending that. Then see how easily you would spend $1000 on a card online from PayPal funds/credit card
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While I agree with all of this, I would highly suggest everyone getting a credit card. It is your job to spend money responsibly. If you can manage to do that you will reap many rewards. You are going to go out every month most likely and buy groceries, put gas in your car, pay utility bills etc. You might as well be putting it on your credit card and using the funds in your checking/savings account to pay off your debt in full before your statement is due. I have made thousands with credit cards and never pay any interest. Also this will help you build your credit, the higher the credit rating you have the lower the interest you will qualify for on loans for a house or a car. This could also save you thousands on a house mortgage.
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This is a really interesting general debate and I have read things from very smart economists and financial experts on both sides of the issue. I certainly agree with everything you have said! and in an ideal world people would always be able to pay off what they spend, but the reality of the numbers is they don’t, either because they over spend, or get hit with an unexpected costly life event. It is definitely about personal responsibility in the end of the day, but these credit card companies know what they are doing and they often target poorer people who have a history of behavioral spending weaknesses with offers for high interest credit cards. However, if you have an emergency fund to cover unexpected life events and never overspend or miss payments then you can certainly save a significant amount of money over time while building up your credit score.
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Another way of getting some free money is to sign up on Honey. The percent back varies constantly, i’m not sure if there is any method behind it. I have got anywhere from .10% back up to 2% back on eBay purchases. While it doesn’t seem like much it all adds up.
I would post my referral link but I think it would be against e4 policy, but if you sign up make sure to use a referral link and they will get $10 once you make your first like $20+ purchase I believe and you will get a $10 welcome bonus.
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Methods:
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buy discounted gift cards then use the gift cards to buy whatever Pokemon product. Ebay gift cards are kinda harder to find these days but that’s one method.
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If you are going to make big purchases then a good strategy is to churn credit card sign up bonuses. It is stuff like spend $3,000 in 3 months, get $500 in points. There is a lot involved in it so make sure you read thoroughly before you do it: reddit.com/r/churning
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sign up for checking/savings account to get sign up bonuses. Spend the bonus money on cards
Also don’t do that method #2 if you suck at managing money. Maybe save up the $3,000 in cash before you charge to the credit card so you won’t be screwed in the end.
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Sign in through Rakuten (Ebates) for additional cash back through dozens of sites that sell cards. I also always buy stuff with my credit card and wait till eBay Bucks time if it all possible.
As a seller also buying shipping through your credit card also earns you quite a bit of money back during the year.
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I tried putting the cash into my floppy disk drive, but I’m getting a “payment failed” error…
In all seriousness, this is the right advice. In most cases before bidding on any cards, it’s best to think through the maximum you’re willing to pay before the excitement kicks in when you get outbid with 58 seconds and make an emotional decision. And overall, it’s good to think about your monthly maximum for spending on cards, too, rather than letting your credit card’s maximum credit line be the maximum… that tends ti not work out so well in the long run.
When I started I was able to maximize my purchases by using a cashback credit card and by buying incomplete sets instead of singles. This means a bit more work, but also generates enough revenue to stretch your budget further.
Let’s say you are missing a couple of cards for your collection which you can buy for a total of $100. If you do that, you get $2 cashback and that’s it. Say instead that you find an incomplete set for $500 which includes the two cards you need and several others. You buy the set, getting $10 in cashback, break it down and resell the individual cards that are left. If you know what you’re doing you will end up with the cashback and a bit of leftover profit.
Basically cashback is a matter of volume, if you can spend $1.000.000 on your credit card and then sell whatever you bought with it for the exact same amount, you will profit $20k. So yeah, given the choice I always stick to larger numbers on which I can recoup my initial expense even if it means more work, rather than going for pennies for no work at all.
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