Infinite Money Hack: Buy Refurb iPad For $350, Sell To Gazelle For $375, Repeat (Update: Chicanery!)


Update: Gazelle has discontinued this “guaranteed” pricing (if you locked in your price already, you’re fine). Details below.

Now I can’t guarantee this real-life cheat code will work (since Gazelle probably knows whether your iPad is refurb or not), but it’s worth a shot. We just posted how you can buy a brand new old-school iPad for $400, or $350 refurbished. That’s as good as new, right? So you order one, and then turn around and sell it to Gazelle for $375, which is buying back iPads for seriously generous prices right now.

I might just do this myself. Of course you don’t want to be iPad-less until the 11th, so you can actually lock in the sell price and send the thing in any time during the next 30 days. You have until Saturday to do the current prices, so think about it. Or max out your credit card and buy 10 refurbs and flip those suckers. You’ll make a profit picking up the new iPad.

I don’t actually recommend doing this, it’s probably a crime

Still a good deal on the trade-in price though seriously

Update: Caution! Gazelle has changed their buyback price. I have asked them to clarify what exactly is going on. I’ve pasted the initial email they sent me below:

Hi Devin,

In the wake of the iPad 2 keynote this afternoon, I wanted to make you aware of one of the easiest and cheapest ways for current iPad owners to upgrade to the iPad 2 – trading in your old one. Gazelle.com, the nation’s leading recommerce site, is offering the below prices for each current iPad model, effectively immediately following the keynote:

· Apple iPad 16GB WiFi: $375

· Apple iPad 16GB WiFi+3G: $446

· Apple iPad 32GB WiFi: $437

· Apple iPad 32GB WiFi+3G: $522

· Apple iPad 64GB WiFi: $463

· Apple iPad 64GB WiFi+3G: $595

Offers can be locked in for up to 30 days (leaving you plenty of time to get the iPad 2 that starts shipping on March 11), and prices are guaranteed to stay at the aforementioned rates through Saturday. In short: customers should lock-in their trade-in price now to ensure they get the most back (and basically get the iPad 2 for next to nothing).

Update 2:

UPDATE ON PRICING FROM GAZELLE:

Initial offers prices quoted cannot be maintained through Saturday unless you’ve already locked in:

Two factors:

1) Price reduction. Apple announced the price reduction (which ultimately will drive pricing down in secondary market). The subsequent drop in pricing in the resale market normally doesn’t happen immediately, but they have to anticipate what will happen in a few days to weeks.

2) Trade-in volume. This will be the single highest trade-in volume in one day for any product ever. With, say, the iPhone, roughly 1,000-1,500 in one day drives down prices in 3-5 days… Gazelle has already seen thousands of trades within hours of the iPad 2 keynote.

The two factors are basically putting the resale market pricing chart in fast forward.

My apologies for any confusion this has caused. Trade-ins of this volume are unprecedented and the market pricing is necessarily having to adjust.

They must have a different definition of “guarantee” than the rest of us. I asked Gazelle not to use that word unless they mean it.