The biggest challenge encountered while selling products online is finding out where to get inventory. When selling products online, there are 4 types of expenses that are involved with selling a product. You have to deal with the cost of the product, Amazon/Ebay fees, cost of packaging, and the cost of shipping. Out of all these fees, the cost of the product will be the most variable and will have the most impact on whether or not a sale will be profitable.
When it comes to used video games, GameStop will probably give you the best selection of games to find however GameStop and other similar shops will charge the highest prices for used games. Since these shops specialize in games, they have a much better idea of what used games go for and they probably have databases that update what a used game should sell for on a daily basis. Well, either they have a database or they just have one guy looking up the used price on Amazon and add an additional markup.
With pawn shops, you can usually get much better deals however the selection will be far more limited. Since pawn shops act as a middle man, they only pay a fraction of the market value for used video games to customers who wish to sell. Pawn shops exist to serve people who are desperate for money. Since they pay so little for games, you can buy them for much cheaper then they would go for at stores like GameStop.
In the last few weeks, I've visited several pawn shops and picked up PlayStation 3 games for $1 to $5 per game. Some of the games I picked up would have gone for close to $10 or more at GameStop.
An important note about pawn shops is that their inventory is completely dependent on the clients in their local area and each pawn shop has different policies for pricing. With this in mind, it will be necessary to check several pawn shops. In one store I visited, I was surprised to find Super Nintendo games (although there was nothing good there).
Another issue I had with some pawn shops is that they might not price their games as they have so many. I suspect that the clerks made up the price on the spot while I was at the counter and I am sure they just searched the price on Amazon.
Lastly, you could try to find some old games at local yard sales however I've not had much luck with yard sales. Often with yard sales, the homeowners are just trying to get rid of junk and make fast cash. The other week, I asked a guy how much he wanted for a Magic Bullet blender and he said it was $20. I wasn't interested in buying it but then he made the offer of letting it go for $10. In this particular deal, I wasn't trying to buy his blender. He was trying to sell it to me.
In addition to all of these methods, it is also useful to network with as many people as possible to get future prospects of inventory.
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