How easy is it to resell tickets?

Fagatron

There is a concert I want to go to with tickets that I expect will be in ridiculously high demand going on sale soon. I am 99.9% certain they will sell out. I am tentatively planning on purchasing 14 extra tickets with a friend for resale. Was planning on using a combination of StubHub and Craigslist to resell them, the tickets will be purchased from TicketMaster, this is legal in California as it's only illegal to resell tickets at the venue for higher than list price. You can sell them at the venue for list price, or you can sell them for more than list price anywhere other than the venue.

I'm pretty sure this is an easy way to make a quick buck that I will turn into a car in the near future, but I am just trying to figure out if there's any flaws in my plan I haven't considered as it's a sizable investment. StubHub even has a PDF splitter built into their site for exactly what I plan on doing. I figure the worst I'll do with a sold out show is break even if people aren't willing to pay more than list price.

Improvolone

If you use Craigslist, make sure to use the special marker to make sure the bills aren't counterfeit.
Even though this is legal, I hate it when people do this. I think you're a dick, but do be careful about not getting scammed.
You can also sell on Ebay.

Rikushix

Improvolone wrote: »

Even though this is legal, I hate it when people do this. I think you're a dick, but do be careful about not getting scammed.

Auntie Shibby

Where in california, and whats the concert?

MushroomStick

The marker to check the bills is just an iodine pen. The iodine wont stain real monies.

oldsak

Sometimes artists will add another concert day immediately after the first if the first sells out soon enough.

If double the tickets are suddenly available then you might have a hard time unloading yours.

Also, not to sidetrack too much, but there's nothing unscrupulous about doing this. You're essentially performing a service for people who would rather pay more for tickets than wait in line or cannot act immediately when they go on sale.

Deebaser

Improvolone wrote: »

Even though this is legal, I hate it when people do this. I think you're a dick, but do be careful about not getting scammed.
You can also sell on Ebay.

^x1000

Monoxide

Since you sound young, I'm going to go ahead and point out that whether or not these tickets will be in a "ridiculously high demand" depends on a lot more than just your perspective on how popular the band you're a fan of actually is. There's a high possibility the show won't actually sell out, and you'll be stuck with a ton of extra tickets to a show you don't really care about.

If it is actually a high enough demand show to sell out and have ticket prices skyrocket, it isn't going to be easy for you guys to snag 14 tickets within the limited window you have between it going on sale and the show selling out.

If it doesn't sell out on the first day, the tickets probably won't be that easy for you to scalp. People who leisurely wait until a week after the show goes on sale to buy tickets aren't the kind of folks who are going to spend a premium on getting a ticket.

I'd suggest heavily weighing whether or not this show will really sell out before you do this. I frequently buy extra tickets for shows I expect to sell out (I have indecisive friends), and I've ended up with worthless extra seats to big ticket shows (Radiohead, Roger Waters) because either the show didn't sell out or the band announced an additional date.

Also, you're a dick, but everyone else has pointed this out already.

Rikushix

For the record, Craigslist's FAQ about scalping tickets simply says "Many craigslist users dislike, and will remove by flagging, ads which appear to be scalping tickets or hot gift items for way over face value.", presumably because the state of California allows it (assuming that's correct), but I've sold tickets on craigslist before (Olympic tickets, for face value - because I'm noble or stupid, take your pick) and CL explicitly asked me if was posting tickets at face value. I don't know what would have happened if I selected "No". It might have been a process specific to the Olympics at vancouver.craigslist.org.

Fagatron

Yeah, I've honestly struggled with my instinctive hatred of scalpers vs. my need for a car on this one and honestly, someone's gonna do it, someone's gonna be making money off it, might as well be me. I'm commuting for five hours (or more if anything gets delayed) on public transit right now, across three different transit agencies. It sucks, if I'm lucky I have less than two hours a day I don't have to be going to work, working, coming home from work, or sleeping so I'm not tired for work the next day. I need a car, badly.

http://www.goldenvoice.com/shows/details/?id=30682

That's the event, even if they add extra dates because it sells out immediately I feel like they won't be that hard to sell at at least face value because that date will sell out fairly quickly.

To get the tickets me and my buddy are both going to hammer the options for 8 "Best Available" tickets right at 10AM. I certainly hope we get them because I'm dying to go to this show myself.

Rikushix

Fair enough.

I know when the Phase 1 tickets were released during the lottery in 2010, I went on a rampage flagging all the scalpers on Craigslist who started to resell immediately after winning gold medal hockey tickets. Then I realized that if I was someone who won $200 tickets to an Olympic event that could be easily sold for $3000 each, I would have a hard time resisting doing the same.

zilo

If this was a long scheduled tour stopping in a moderately-sized city I would say go for it. But it's Metallica, in Los Angeles, and they have nothing else going on all year. I wouldn't bet the farm on this one.

You're talking about gambling $1400 and there is a lot that can go wrong. If you need the money that badly maybe this isn't the safest way to get it.

Deebaser

That's a lot of scratch to be betting on an outdoor oldies metal show selling out. And even if it does, metalheads aren't exactly known for having deep pockets.

oldsak

Deebaser wrote: »

metalheads aren't exactly known for having deep pockets

You really need to keep this in mind.

useless4

One band that possibly *could* sell out a place on it's own and three bands that have followings but sure aren't playing big venues or selling out the ones they do play.

If you need money, this is not the golden ticket.

I highly suggest not doing this. The money you are putting down could go a long way to getting a car.

Tejs

useless4 wrote: »

One band that possibly *could* sell out a place on it's own and three bands that have followings but sure aren't playing big venues or selling out the ones they do play.

If you need money, this is not the golden ticket.

I highly suggest not doing this. The money you are putting down could go a long way to getting a car.

If you have 1400 dollars to spend on tickets, you can easily buy a car if you want.

http://www.autotrader.com/fyc/vdp.jsp?ct=u&car_id=293567920&dealer_id=100018326&car_year=1987&doors=&systime=&search_lang=en&start_year=1981&keywordsrep=&keywordsfyc=&highlightFirstMakeModel=&search_type=both&distance=75&min_price=0&drive=&rdm=1296140096548&marketZipError=false&advanced=y&fuel=&keywords_display=&lastBeginningStartYear=1981&end_year=2012&showZipError=n&certified=&engine=&page_location=findacar::ispsearchform&body_code=0&transmission=&default_sort=newsortbyprice_DESC&max_mileage=&address=92201&color=&sort_type=priceDESC&max_price=1400&awsp=false&make=&seller_type=b&num_records=25&cardist=89&standard=false

1300 bucks for a Toyota Camry. Toyotas are fairly bulletproof.

OR

Find a used car and use that as a downpayment. Anything from this search:

http://www.autotrader.com/fyc/searchresults.jsp?search_lang=en&start_year=1981&search_type=used&distance=75&min_price=3000&rdm=1296140249622&marketZipError=false&advanced=y&lastBeginningStartYear=1981&end_year=2012&showZipError=n&page_location=findacar::ispsearchform&body_code=0&default_sort=newsortbyprice_DESC&address=92201&sort_type=priceDESC&max_price=8000&awsp=false&seller_type=d&num_records=25&pager.offset=25&first_record=26

might be a viable candidate. Without knowing what kind of vehicle you want, it's hard to say. Even if you buy something worth 8000 with a loan, with 1400 down and a 10% interest rate (no idea your credit rating, so I'll trend towards the worst case scenario), you're only looking at something like $140 / month.

I have a coworker who also attempts to do this kind of thing, and he always is losing money on it. Every once in a while he makes bank on very specific events, but most of the time he loses money.

Monoxide

You better be very sure they're going to have a limited capacity on this one. Empire Polo Club in Indio is where they hold Coachella, which has a capacity of 65,000 per day. The Stagecoach festival, at the same venue, had a capacity of 45,000.

This is a huge venue in a hard-to-get-to location, for a show with questionable amounts of draw. Slayer and Megadeth couldn't sell out the UIC Pavilion in Chicago together, which holds 7500 people.

I wouldn't bet $1400 on this going favorably. Unloading 14 tickets, even at face value, is going to be pretty goddamn hard for an unknown person on the internet to do if they don't sell out immediately.

Fagatron

Eh, decided not to do this. I got my numbers switched around and I didn't realize that this venue was so large, or that it was in such a bad location.