Money for Nothing

Good Friday morning to you. Do you remember the song from the ‘80s by Dire Straits that went: “money for nothing and your chicks for free”? I was never a big Dire Straits fan; however this one had a catchy tune and I liked the name of it. This blog is not about how you can be a RockStar and sing, make a video and money will fall from the sky, and you will have a ton of groupies. I am writing today’s blog on from personal fact. What I’m going to write about today is something I have done. I made a project out of it and wrote today’s post.

A few years ago there was a website, and a book about one red paperclip. It tells the story about how a young man said he was going to trade that red paperclip all the way up to a house and how, in one year, he did it. The book and the web page tell the day-to-day details of his story and how he did it. I have thought and thought so much about that idea, not that I wanted to do something and make it a movie or web page. But how, as I said yesterday, “there is no such thing as a money problem; there is only an idea problem.” I believe the first time I ever heard that quote was from Robert Schuler who built the Crystal Cathedral and built a nationwide television show to inspire people. Well, today I’m going to share how I took some things from my house and turned them into $1200 in Apple stock.

I started by looking through the house to see what I was no longer using. I found an old Edison Phonograph that my partner has been trying to get rid of one way or another for years; an old laptop; a bedroom set; an old motorcycle seat; a set of home speakers; and $150 in spare change. I used the craigslist to list those things that I wanted to sell. Created a sale page for each one. Let me break them down.

First was the Edison phonograph. I listed it for $350; I answered over 10 emails to people who gave interest, I like to use the fishing method of the y can contact me without knowing my email address, and I don’t list my phone number in the ad, So I read the responses to see who is just phishing for scams, working to sell something to you, or just trying to buy deals and sending out emails offering you less money. So I get 10 emails on this of which only four are good ones. I respond back to them, after the exchange they have my email; I may have their phone number, but only respond with email to still make sure they are real. If they respond to my response I either make a call to them, or give them my phone to set a meeting place and time. From there one person came back with a third email with a phone number saying he wanted it and added his phone number again. I then called, agreed on a meeting place that was best for both of us, usually in between. Showed him the item, he gave me the $350 in cash we parted ways.

Second we have the speakers. Those sold for $50 use the same process as above; I always mention in my ads that items are as is condition. Electronics are harder to sell this way unless you have a way for the person to check them out while at the mutual meeting place. Computers you can plug in, but speakers they took a chance.

Third we have the laptop, the bedroom set, and motorcycle seat. Another thing I do when running these ads on craigslist is mention that price is firm and cash only. I do the research to find out what like items are selling for then use that to base my price and making lower then what others are selling it for. I usually mention in my ad what others are selling for, if they did the research they will find I’m right, but most items I sell usually is to someone looking for that specific item. So I sold the laptop for $200 and the bedroom set for$210, the motorcycle seat for $45. If you add all of that up it comes to $855.

I am doing this experiment to take and start an online trading account to be able to buy stock. Well I needed $1000 to start that account, I’m still $145 short. So with nothing else selling I go to my cup of spare change that I have been saving after each day. I pull from there $150 to make my total $1005. I take that and put the money in my checking account. Go online and open a trading account. I put in $1000 to start my account.

Once my money is in the account, then a connection from my bank account  to the trading account has been made,  I was set and ready to go, on June 23 I’m ready to make my stock purchase. Well I have been watching several stocks for a while, and wanted to get the one that was best for both long term growth and for the use of this blog to show a profit.  So I choose to buy Apple stock.  On the day of my purchase I put in a bid for the stock and was able to buy 3 shares. The total cost of this purchase was $995.25, breaking that down was share cost 329.10 each then the broker fee of $7.95 that is how we get to the figure. Most people forget you have those fees to pay when buying and when selling the stock. Factor that into your cost.

As of the day of my writing this the value of the stock is $403.78, if you take that price times the number of shares my total value of stock is $1211.34. This gives me a profit if I sold it of $216.09.  Now think of this that was a few things that I had sitting around. I will tell you that it takes some time to write ads, time to research the stocks, time to go to bank to set up accounts. But it is extra money that was just sitting around in my home. I have turned it into a money making machine for me.

This is only one idea. This week I have had more emails, new comments, and people telling me thanks for the ideas. I want to let you know if you take your eyes off the need to make a million dollars on this one sale, start taking small steps to take yourself from $0 to $1200. Then duplicate the process a few times, you may find over a small amount of time you will have a side income. This may not be money for nothing, but it shows there is not a money problem just an idea problem. The more times you find ideas, or create ideas like this you will soon find more ideas growing for you. It’s been a great week Come back next week when we talk about the daily habits that make those long term goals come to being.

Tim Gillette is the Creator of The Rock’N’Roll Keys to Business Success, using music, motorcycles and mentorship to create Entrepreneurs who lead. To find out more about upcoming webinars sign up here .  Free Online Training that Rocks