Where Can I Sell My Gaming Computer?

This doesn't sound like a very well thought out plan. Nobody will pay you anything over $350-400 for your pc.

I would invest $30 in a good business book and learn some basics first. Also, what makes you qualified to sell a PC?

If you are goingto build PC's for others, you need to figure out who you are going to sell to? Why would they ask you, a novice to build them a system instead of a reputable PC vendor?

You don't know where to sell your PC...so where will you sell your custom PCs?

What exactly are you going to buy with the couple hundred dollars from your current entry level/lower mid range PC? Enough parts for another PC?

Sorry kid, sounds like you need to think a bit more about this brainstorm of yours...

First rule of business: never do anything you're good at for free. Sounds like you understand that. However, the second rule of business: something is worth what someone will pay for it. You say it's worth $500ish and you may very well be correct, but until you find someone who will pay that much, its only value is whatever personal value it has to you.

You could have the best product around but if there is no market or said market is over-saturated, or you can't get your product there, it means nothing. And it's about selling yourself, at times like a common whore, just as much as your product.

Yes, a completed PC is worth more than the sum of it's parts, but only to those who can't, or more realistically, don't want to, build it themselves. I have done a little bit of this for family and friends and I'd usually charged them 10% over and above the cost of the parts. Sounds like a lot but what is your time worth? If I have a $600 build and it takes me 5 hours to assemble, test and run installs to get it to the point where I'd be comfortable with someone I know judging me based on this product, I only made $12 an hour and killed an afternoon doing it. Granted, it's a bit different when it's just a hobby that pays rather than being your sole source of income. Which is it for you?

It sounds like you can corner the market, so to speak, in a unserved/underserved area. However, before you jump in with both feet, you may wish to consider the reasons why said market is unserved/underserved and really, if there's even any market at all, at least outside of yourself and whatever other "geeks" and/or tech savvy people are around. If you market is just you and a few other people who can do this for themselves just as easily and cheaper than they can pay you to do it, then there's no market at all.

I hope that this didn't sound liek a lecture because that's not how it was meant. What you are talking about is quite admirable and seemingly in the best spirit of (American?) entrepreneurship. However, I counsel caution. Read, do your homework...research. Find out what makes the most successful people successful and do what you can to to emulate them.

There's a difference between wanting to make money and knowing how to make money.

Good luck.

Your motivation is good, however your "business model" is fundamentally flawed.

1. Selling your current PC, to fund a new PC doesn't work in the real world unless you make severe cuts to the components quality and performance level. Why would anyone then buy another computer you built and "just tested the OS" on? That sounds worse and more suspicious than a kid trying to sell his gaming PC on ebay for example.

2. You already know there is a limited market for your products. How many do you expect to sell? have you worked out the margin for each machine?

3. You aren't afforded the same bulk buying discounts as other vendors, how can you possibly make money? You gonna charge hundreds to build the PC?


There are more points, anyway, good luck with your plan. I do hope you succeed.

If you can't get rid of it on Craigslist or ebay, try selling it to one of those locals who comes to you for advice.

Also, I would seriously check up on my own knowledge before claiming to be the go to person for advice. If you want to run through a small quiz with me, PM me and we'll give it a go.

I don't claim to be some master, however I can probably ask questions to crack most self-proclaimed "geeks".