The best bargains to be found on eBay are often in a sorry state of repair. From second edition marines covered in 6 layers of gloss acrylic paint, to crisis suits with arms / legs / heads / feet snapped off, thee items are generally consigned to the bottom of someone’s bitz box or painting drawer, until the time comes to abandon all hope of ever recovering the model and sticking it on eBay, to let someone else experience the horror have a go.
Buying to repair can be a bit tricky. While most damage can generally be repaired with a bit of glue and pinning, some damage is almost impossible to overcome, especially if crucial bits are missing. This is not always obvious from the photo or description of the listing, and so a risk has to be taken. If it goes wrong, at least you normally have something interesting to add to your basing material bitz. But if it goes right, there are decent profits to be made from a bit of toy soldier handy work.
1. Eldar War Walkers
Condition: Woeful. Seller was using them as objective markers, heavily damaged and plenty of missing bits (weapons, heads, screens, etc). Had also been put together using latex glue which needed cleaning out.
Work: Clean up & disassemble, then reglued properly back together. I then raided the bitz box to see what Eldar bitz I had accumulated from over the years (mostly from mixed junk lots on eBay) and found that I had just enough to make two (almost) complete walkers, of a sort. Sprayed white and put back on sale.
Cost: 99p
Sale Price: £16.50 (combined for two)
Profit Margin: 1550%!
2. Ork Wartrakk
Condition: Bought as part of a GorkaMorka box of junk, pile of bits with the gun stand snapped off and driver / gunner missing, but otherwise ok
Work: Glued it all back together, with minimal cleaning up required.
Cost: 99p
Sale Price: £9.99
Profit Margin: 900%!
3. Ork Trukk
Condition: Part of the same GorkaMorka boxed set as above (along with a bunch of Orks weapons and bodies that went straight into the bitz box!), again in a couple of bits and one snapped wheel.
Work: Reglued, repaired, relisted.
Cost: 99p
Sale Price: £9.99
Profit Margin: 900%!
So there we have it, three great profits for three straight forward repair jobs – didn’t even have to prime the last two, I knew I wouldn’t get around to it for a white so just stuck them back on eBay in hope rather than expectation and someone snapped them both up!
Languor Management 
This is awesome. I’d love to do more of this, but I’ve two Captain Calsius from Warhammer Conquest to get rid of and haven’t managed that yet. Not to mention a squad of Primaris Marines.
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I know what you mean, I must have twenty or so items up on eBay that are taking forever to shift. At some point I’m going to have to take them down and refurbish them properly to increase their chances of sale, but I still have sooooooo much stuff in the refurb pile already!
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