Runescape Flipping Guide

DemonSkull · Jun 4, 2014

Runescape Flipping Guide Version 1.0 12/03/2013
Hello and welcome to my all inclusive guide to flipping items for profit!
What is "Flipping" you ask? Well in a nutshell it is simply the buying and selling of items for profit. It’s a great way to potentially make millions or even billions of gold in a relatively short time without much risk. I’ve personally made over 400m in just 3 months starting out with just a little under 5m! You need money to make money so I'd recommend starting out with at least 5m or more to see decent results though you can still turn a small profit with less.
Heres the concept, you buy items for a low price then sell it back for a higher price, like the stock market. The trick is knowing what items to use and their price habits.
To get started you need to pick an item. For quick flips try supplies like ores, herbs, potions, bones etc, items that people buy and sell frequently. These are great for beginners because the prices don’t fluxuate as dramatically as the big money items. Once you’ve got the hang of it you can move on to bigger items like armor sets, barrows gear etc.
Once you’ve chosen an item you want to try you’ll need to find the margins. The margin is the difference between the buying price and the selling price and the profit you’ll make from each item. To find it go to the Grand Exchange, pick your item and "insta buy" it by setting your buy price around 20% to 30% higher than the average price, just click the +5% a few times. Remember the GE will buy the cheapest one available automatically and you’ll get refunded the extra, though if there are none available you’ll end up paying full price. This rarely happens with low end items although once I bought a cowhide for 50k so don’t set your offers too high. When you have your item note the price it bought for as this is the price you should sell at.
To figure out the price to buy, sell the item for a few clicks under the average price, just click the -5% a few times. This is "Insta Selling". The GE will automatically sell it to the highest offer though, again, if no one is buying at the time you could lose a bit. In a rush to find margins I sold a pair of Dragon boots for 1gp and learned not to set offers too low right away. Ok, so you sold your item, you may be thinking "Wait I'm losing money this is stupid" so remember just buy 1 item when your finding margins otherwise your just wasting your coin. Note the price that it sold for; this is the price you’ll want to start buying at. Id advise buying for a few gp higher so you’ll get your items faster, but not too high otherwise you’ll ruin the margins and wont make as much. Heres an example: I want to flip attack potions. I insta buy it for 1050, then insta sell it for 900, the margin is 150gp, not bad. Now Ill set my actual buying price at 902gp and wait until I have them all. The GE will only let you buy a certain amount of each item type and Ill explain that later on. Once I have my 1k potions I put them up for sale at 1048gp and wait for them to sell. When their all sold Id make 146gp from each one and net an easy 146k! This is just an example, the margins may vary.
Ok class you’re nearly ready to start your career as a self made billionaire! Heres a quick recap.
1.) Pick an item.
2.) Insta buy it (just one), note the price. (This is your Sell Price)
3.) Insta sell it, note the price. (This is your Buy Price)
4.) Buy at a few gp above price from step 3.
5.) Sell at a few gp under price from step 2.
6.) Grin uncontrollably at how easy that was.

Item and time limits
When buying and selling you’ll notice you can only get a certain amount before they completely stop and won’t buy or sell no matter what price you’ve put in. This isn’t exactly a bad thing as keeps the billionaires from totally monopolizing the market and keeps the margins relatively fair. Once you’ve reached the item cap you won’t be able to buy or sell that item in the GE again for 4 hours unless you sell the items you have or buy more of what you’ve sold. You can still buy and sell other items and you can still trade the old fashioned way though. These limits differ for different item types such as armor/weapons, supplies, rares etc.

Other things to consider while flipping are the time of day and whether or not any new updates may affect certain items. If you’re on the east coast in the USA there are usually more people online after school lets out and people get out work and less people online in the wee hours of the morning. This can have a substantial effect on item prices since more people online equals more people buying and selling things. One way to capitalize on this is to set up some flips to run overnight. For example before logging off for the day put in an offer to buy X amount of Y items for a lower price than usual. Then the next day you can still sell them for the usual price and make a good profit. This doesn’t work well with everything however and care should be taken when doing this as its a little riskier since your not there to watch it. It’s best to try this once you’ve got the hang of flipping and start to notice certain patterns emerge with your items.
It’s also a good idea to flip multiple items using as many slots in the GE as you can afford to maximize your profits. Once you get your first item set up and rolling choose another then another and so on. If I’m training or doing quests Id leave one slot open in case I'd need to buy food or supplies so I wouldn’t have to cancel a flip.
All in all flipping is a great way to put your gp's to work for you and earn some extra cash while training and doing quests. It’s important to be patient and don’t invest more than your willing to lose. Although a total loss rarely happens it is possible to lose quite a bit if you’re not paying attention. Before the update I had bought some rares I had thought would skyrocket with the influx of new players to the updated version of the game but alas, it wasn’t so. Luckily I had only lost about 80m but still, a gp is a gp. I hope you enjoyed reading this guide and learned a few things and I wish you well in your flipping endeavors. If you have anything you’d like to add or if anything needs correcting please feel free to comment.

If you like this and it helped you out please feel free to paypal me at [email protected]. Every little bit helps, thank you.