NFTs are the hottest things on the internet right now, and people are making thousands in profit buying and selling NFTs. In this post we are going to cover Flipping NFT’s
What is Flipping? You’ve probably flipped something over the course of your life. Maybe you bought a bunch of candy and sold them at a mark up price at school or sold your neighbor’s kid a nice bike for more than you got it for.
If you did something of the sort, then you flipped something. You purchased something for a lower price and due to time or scarcity sold it for an increased price.
For newbies still trying to understand NFTs, you can check out our beginner’s guide here.
Caution: Making money on NFTs is not guaranteed and it is possible to lose money. However, if you follow our steps you are more likely to make some profit. As a beginner, we recommend starting with a smaller amount, anywhere from 0.002eth to 0.1eth.
Before we get into the nitty-gritty details there are a few terms that you need to understand.
Floor Price: This refers to the lowest price of an NFT on a marketplace like OpenSea, Rarible, Mintable, etc.
Whitelist: This is a group made by NFT creators to allow a certain number of people to mint NFTs exclusively earlier before public launch and at a lower price.
Rarity: NFT art in collections vary in terms of characteristics. NFTs with rarest characteristics or traits are considered to be super rare and usually fetch a higher price while NFTs with the most common characteristics command lower prices.
Pre-Sale: Pre-sale refers to the period during which whitelist members can mint their NFTs.
Public Reveal: Some NFT projects have public reveals, which means the NFT art will only be revealed after public launch. Before the public reveal, the creators usually use a generic placeholder so anyone trading such NFTs won’t know what they have until the reveal happens.
Gas Fees: Gas Fees are charges incurred when performing a transaction on the Blockchain. e.g Ethereum.
STEP 1: LOOK FOR VALUABLE PROJECTS
One of the best ways to make a good profit margin flipping NFTs is by getting into projects early. If you want a more detailed guide on how to do this, check out this post. Getting into a project early will allow you to get on the whitelist and mint at a lower price during presale.
This will give you a head start as you can list your NFT on the open marketplace even before public launch and flip it for a good price.
STEP 2: BUYING & SELLING ON THE MARKETPLACE
Strategy One
After the pre-sale, you can list your NFT on the marketplace, usually for higher than you minted for. What happens is, people are most likely to buy a project’s NFTs before public launch as they are going to be wary of missing out during the public launch due to large whales trying to scoop up everything.
For example, a popular project, Cryptodads was profitable for many of the early investors. The pre-sale price and public launch price was the same, however, this didn’t matter as the project’s NFTs were in high demand and in-fact sold out. The mint price was 0.07eth and as per the current floor price, investors can still flip for a profit.
A good rule of thumb is that if a pre-sale sells out you are more likely to be able to flip for an immediate profit. If the pre-sale does not sell out, then the demand is not present.
At the time of writing the floor price of Cryptodads is 0.2.eth. So if someone still has one of those cryptodads minted during pre-sale, he or she can flip for 0.2 or more and enjoy a profit of around $600, if it is of low rarity. A higher rarity can fetch much more.
As you can see from the above image, these two Cryptodads were last bought for 0.6eth and 0.5eth and now they are being sold for 777,777eth and 69,420eth. The reason they are priced so high is because they are rare pieces. In addition, the owners most likely bought them right after pre-sale or public sale.
Again, to prove that you can make a lot of money by choosing the right project and getting on early, Cryptodads NFTs were sold on pre-sale on 7th September and public sale on 10th September.
After the pre-sale, you could flip your NFT for at least 5 times more than you paid at mint. This is because the prices were rising in the period leading up to public launch. The prices remained stable leading up to public launch, and since this was a popular project, all the NFTs sold out, and as a result the floor price on OpenSea kept climbing.
Therefore, anyone who got in early definitely made a good amount of profit.
Strategy Two
If you missed out on the pre-sale, you can scoop an NFT for the project you like on the marketplace right after pre-sale. This is because those who are looking to cash out are going to list their NFTs.
In the period leading up to public launch, you can flip for a good profit as the prices are likely to rise. As I mentioned earlier, people would be afraid of missing out during the public launch and would opt for getting one on the marketplace and avoid the high gas fees altogether.
For a popular project that sells out during public sale, the floor price will keep rising providing another flipping opportunity if you bought after pre-sale or during public sale.
STEP 3: Trading on the Marketplace
If you feel like you don’t have the time to prospect for worthwhile projects, you can flip NFTs already launched and trading on the marketplace.
Strategy One
The key here is to do research and look at the stats and floor price. For example on OpenSea, you’ll go to https://opensea.io/rankings and check out the recently traded NFTs, just to get an idea of what projects are trending.
You can then sort the list by period, category and chain. In the period filter, you’ll want to look at the last 24 hours to see what projects feature lots of activity. In the chain filter, I will recommend polygon as it has low gas fees.
For ethereum, although popular, the high gas fees can erode your profit margins when flipping, so I would only recommend it if you find an opportunity to flip for a high profit margin.
Once you choose a project, head to the project page and sort the list by “Buy Now” and the price by “low to high”.
This will allow you to check for a flipping opportunity. A good flipping opportunity is a floor price that moves fast and a project with a high activity. For example, at the time of writing, the Doodle’s project floor price presents a flipping opportunity.
From the image above, the first two NFTs are going for 2.35eth and 2.376eth respectively. So if you bought the one listed at 2.35 eth and relist for 2.39, just below the one listed for 2.4, you are just going to need the 2.376 to get bought and then yours will be first in line.
The floor price will then change to 2.39 unless someone undercuts you by listing for lower. Once yours is bought, your profit would be around $190. Monitor a project’s floor price and if it keeps rising, you can buy the lowest and relist and so on and so forth.
Note: When making calculations on whether to buy at a certain floor price, factor in the gas fees. If the project is based on ethereum, you can make losses if the profit from your flips is lower than the gas fees.
However, for beginners I would recommend looking for projects with a lower floor price, preferably anywhere from $100 to $500, and those based on Polygon and Solana as they feature low gas fees.
The more you gain experience and make more profit, you can gradually increase your trading amount in smaller increments.
The image above shows an example of a good flip. The owner bought it for 1.597eth and is now selling for 2.35eth. Once it sells, the profit would be 0.753eth or $3563.38.
Strategy Two: Trading Rarities
With NFTs, rare pieces in a collection cost more than those with common traits. To check an NFT’s rarity, click on the NFT to head to the NFT details page and the rarity traits would be listed under properties. This should be the same for most marketplaces. For OpenSea, it looks like this:
Anything under 1% is rare and for this piece it has 2 traits under 1 percent, making it one of the rare ones. You can also check the rarity score by using various tools including:
You’ll need the Token ID to get an NFT’s rarity score.
The Token ID is the number after the # symbol. Inserting it into a website like rarity.tools will give you a piece’s rarity score.
A tip to bag a couple of rare NFTs is to look for a project with a public reveal. More often than not, the floor price usually tanks after a public reveal as some may want to liquidate their pieces.
During this period, some list their pieces for cheap without realizing they are in possession of a rare piece.
Bagging one of those means you can flip for 1 ethereum or more and make 20 times your money or even more. Examples of people who likely succeeded in this strategy are:
From the above image, the first guy bagged his for 0.47eth and has listed for 54,911 while the last guy got his for 0.19 eth.
According to rarity.tools, these pieces are super rare. These guys are not looking to sell right now going by the prices they’ve listed for. However, if they were to list for anywhere from 5 to 30 ether, going by the recent sales, they would sell pretty quickly.
You can also look for flipping opportunities by looking at the floor price of NFTs based on a rare trait. On OpenSea, under properties, click a trait under 1% and check the floor price.
For example, from the above image, the Cyborg trait of Cryptodad NFTs present a flipping opportunity. However, you would need to conduct research to gauge how fast your NFT would sell and if there are buyers looking for that specific trait.
Conclusion
When it comes to flipping, due diligence and patience is key. When looking for early projects make sure you’re investing in legit and worthwhile projects. Be wary of scams as some may list replicas of popular projects on marketplaces to trick you into thinking you’re buying the original.
Another tip is to time the marketplaces, track your preferred projects and be ready to pounce on flipping opportunities as they may not last.
Written by Edmond K.