One person’s trash is another person’s ticket to financial freedom.
Clever college graduate Kelsey Mikula, 26, found a genius way to pay off $80,000 in student loans in just three years by using sites like eBay to buy and resell used clothing.
Mikula was able to accumulate a small fortune simply by wandering the aisles of the Salvation Army, Goodwill, and other local thrift stores near her home and keeping an eye out for vintage yarn that might be sold online. .
After graduating from Liberty University in Lynchburg, Virginia, the profit-minded Philadelphia girl struggled to find work in her field of expertise, zoology.
However, she started working immediately after graduating in 2020, in the midst of the pandemic, and paid off her education in full by March 2023 while working as a secretary at a local hospital.
Eventually, she decided to pursue a side hustle, quit her day job, and focus full-time on her clearly thriving resale business.
“My main specialty is clothing and shoes, especially for women, but I also dabble in household items,” Mikula first told SWNS.
“I make $5,000 a month, but it really depends,” she said of her business, which she runs through her TikTok account @mellowstate.
She said: “My first experience with reselling was when I was in middle school, selling mascara that was out of print.
“I didn’t start taking it seriously until 2020, when I graduated from university, but I couldn’t find a job in my field,” she said.
“The first platform I started selling on was Poshmark and gradually moved to eBay and Depop.”
Most months, she spends about $1,800 on products and resells them for a profit of about $5,000.
Mikula has made some lucky discoveries, from reselling a Christian Dior sweater she bought for $10 for a $700 profit to buying Chanel shoes for $20 and making $200. Did.
Although she is a fan of fashion, it helps that she is never tempted to obsess over great finds. The money is too good.
“I’m not one to store clothes, but if I do, I store them for a few months and then sell them,” she said.
“I’m not a materialist, so I’d rather have a salary.”
And because she was making a much better salary than she was making at her day job, it was easy to work full time after paying off her loans, she said.
“I love the freedom this job has given me. I’m my own boss. If I don’t want to work in the morning, I don’t have to and I can work any time I want,” she said.
And with his debt paid off, Mikula was also able to buy himself his dream car, a Ford Explorer.
Next step? She moves out of the basement of her parents’ house where she lives and runs her business and buys her own home.
