I turned my online reselling side hustle into my full-time job after paying off debt. Side hustles are successful when your back's up against the wall.
Courtesy of Colton Rockwell
- Colton Rockwell picked up reselling as a side hustle to help pay off debt and earn more money.
- Eventually, he turned it into his full-time career.
- He works about the same amount as his previous job, but can be more selective of his schedule.
This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Colton Rockwell, an online reseller in his 30s who lives north of Seattle. The following has been edited for length and clarity.
In 2022, I made a career change from a marketing job to a sales job because I was looking to make extra money.
I thought going into sales and earning commissions was the right path to do that. I didn't realize how hard sales was until I was working in it, making $60,000 a year pre-tax.
I owned my home, and I'd taken a pay cut to go into the sales role. I had over $10,000 in credit card debt and about $5,000 in my bank account.
What I was making at my sales job wasn't enough. I needed to make a change and find a way to create additional income. I started researching different ways to make money and landed on selling on eBay. A few years later, I turned reselling on different platforms into my full-time job.
My first full year reselling in 2023, I grossed about $50,000 on eBay. At this point, I'm $0 in credit card debt, but I still have student loans that I'm paying off. My goal this year is to gross around $100,000 to $120,000 among all the different platforms that I sell on — eBay, Depop, Poshmark, and Facebook Marketplace.
Selling on eBay started as a side hustle to pay off debt
I had some video games that were stored under the bed in my guest bedroom. I was like, "Why don't I throw those up and see what happens to kind of test it out?"
Within a couple of days, a bunch of them had sold, and it evolved from there. I started by selling video games and a couple of things around my house, then I began researching how people source and find new items to sell. A lot of people were finding things from Goodwill and garage sales. So I started doing that and sourcing from a couple of other places.
Eventually, I started sourcing and selling primarily clothes. I got good enough at it that I wanted to start talking about it publicly on social media. I was so inspired by being able to pay off my debt, start saving money, and see my bank account go from negative to positive that I wanted to help other people. I made a social media account named Rockwell Resell.
I quit my job
My wife was working up until July of last year when our daughter was born. I was still in a full-time job, and doing eBay and social media on the side. I was able to support the family on my income.
I come from a family of entrepreneurs. So the goal, whether it was eBay or something else, was to have something of my own and support my family through it.
Earlier this year, my wife and I began having more conversations about it and decided we would be comfortable making the jump if we had six months of expenses saved up in case everything failed. We saved almost $50,000, and then on April 1, I quit my job.
The number you need to save will be different for everybody
Maybe you have roommates, and your rent's a little bit cheaper, and you split utilities or something else. Saving this amount gave us peace of mind so that if things don't work out, we have something to fall back on.
The sales job I held when I initially started doing eBay was different from the job I quit. I was with my last employer for about three years, and they were like family to me. I was worried about what they would think. Luckily, they were super supportive, and they kept the doors open if I ever wanted to go back.
I figured out health insurance through a healthcare sharing ministry program we found, which works in some ways like a high-deductible insurance plan. It has an initial amount we're responsible for before eligible medical expenses can be shared.
I now sell online full-time and have more time with my 1-year-old daughter
Selling on eBay and other platforms helps pay my mortgage and my bills. Everything else I make from social media or other opportunities goes into savings and other things that my family and I want to do, like investments or vacations.
I base my pricing on other similar items that have sold. I'll look up an item on eBay, turn on the sold filter, and see exactly how much each item sells for. I usually offer a price 5% lower than competitors', so that my items are seen as a slightly better deal.
In my previous job, I worked four of the five days remotely, but on the day I went into the office, I had about five hours of commuting. It was an hour and a half there, and then about three and a half hours home with traffic. About once or twice a month, I would travel across the country for multiple days.
On the days I worked from home, I was confined to my office space. Even though I was at home, I didn't get to spend much time with my daughter.
I'm probably working about the same number of hours a week now, maybe a couple more, but I'm able to be selective about when that happens. I can pick and choose when I get to spend time with her instead of being constrained by a 9-to-5. When I was done with work at 5 p.m., I only really got that hour after work to hang out with her before she went to bed at 6:30. I also have more time to spend with my wife.
My advice if you want to do this as a side hustle or full time
What pushes someone to make it with a side hustle on top of a 9-to-5 is having their back up against the wall. For me, being in a hard position with my debt made it a little bit easier to put my foot down and figure it out.
If you're in an office job and you only have those hours before or after work to work on the side hustle, you have to be very dedicated to the craft or the hours you're going to put in, because your time is so limited.
You have to schedule your time wisely. With eBay and selling online, it's a lot of taking pictures. It's a lot of sitting at your computer, typing in listings, going to the post office, and all the other tasks involved.
The toughest part of reselling is sometimes sourcing, because I get my items from Goodwill bins, garage sales, Facebook Marketplace, and thrift stores. Sometimes you have a really good day. Sometimes it's not so good, and you don't find as many items, and it might not be as worth it.
For me, if I go three to four days a week and source, I'll find enough stuff to list about a dozen items every day on eBay. That should all average out to a decent sale price.
Have you done any side hustles? Share your experience with this reporter at mhoff@businessinsider.com.
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