Printable View
Can someone give some tips n tricks to doing this? I have been scanning the AH every day twice a day. Im not sure that im actually making any gold. Anyone care to post some tips on what they look for and what others should be looking for? Thanks in advance =)
Everything that involves a player action has a profit on it. So if you buy mats for item X, find a crafter, pay him 10g to craft 10 of item X and sell item X on the AH, you should make a profit. Preferably let crafters craft more then 1, because the more you let them craft, the smaller the tip gets for each item. (finding a crafter to craft something for 1g is gonna be hard)
Before you buy mats, it's good to have a solid auctioneer database so you know what average prices are. And i got several Wowhead tabs running to search what mats are required for an item, what compareable items are there? etc. Everything that could involve the demand.
If you want to do it seriously, i find it handy to make an Exel file and list all items you can craft for a profit + average mats prices. So you don't have to search for the data anymore.
like:
Deathchill coak 218g (the costs)
Bolt of Imbued Frostweave (5), Eternal Fire (6), Eternal Shadow (4), Siren's Tear, Frozen Orb
Then it's just a game of buying cheap mats, finding a crafter, getting it crafted and sell it.
Depends on how much time you want to spend, what resources you have, friends / connections you have, etc. I would checkout some of these blogs:
http://greedygoblin.blogspot.com
http://woweconomist.com
http://www.wowstability.com
http://justmytwocopper.blogspot.com
Hey awesome thanks for the sights gives me something todo @ work today... Ya know besides work because its Friday... Im pro at alt tab lol
Get auctioneer, learn to use it.
The first area you should look at is the fluctuation of prices throughout the week. Some items are more expensive during the week and some more expensive during the weekend.
When to buy:
1. Raw materials (ore, enchant mats) typically sell cheaper during the weekend. My theory is that every casual player gets on and dumps these for quick cash for the weekend. Very popular raw mats may not follow this pattern (titanium ore is in constant demand).
2. Finished items (cut gems, enchanted scrolls) - Sell these on the weekend. People have more time to play on the weekend. They want to get their item and get into some lengthier play.
When to sell:
1. Raw mats - exercise patience on these. Wait for a lull in price and fill it then. Patience will make a huge difference.
2. Finished items - I sell these almost exclusively during the weekend, unless there is a void during the week, when I'll put up a small amount for sale, sometimes at a very high price.
3. Always wait for everyone to get home from work first. If you put something like cut gems up at 3pm, you have about 2 hours before a large rush of people get home and undercut you. Wait until 8-9pm, when most people have already gotten home, posted auctions and settled into play. I get undercut a lot less by waiting until the middle of prime time. There are still lots of buyers up until all hours.
It has been my experience, the best way to make gold with very little effort is exploiting the differences in the server economy between alliance and horde.
I make quite a bit of gold on the AH by monitoring a few things, but it helps that I have every profession capable of using high-end cooldowns. Auctioneer is invaluable. So is an alt with their own bank space & lots of profession-specific bags. Only list items when you can undercut the competition and stay undercut for a long period of time. (late Friday/Saturday nights are best, but late Sunday/Thursday nights have also been very good too.
- epic patterns:
Those Ulduar, ToC, and ICC patterns can sell for a ton, and there's usually a very limited supply. When auctioneer shows one for sale for under 75% average price, buy it and re-list it when 80% of the average price would be the cheapest one available.
- raw materials:
Always buy up all available eternals and uncut blue northrend gems when they're under 75% average price. You'll use most of them to craft stuff anyway.
- enchanting mats & DE:
Monitor enchanting mats prices, especially greater cosmic essence. Go through level 70-80 greens available and buy them if a chance to DE a GCE is high and auctioneer shows the DE value is significantly higher than the auction price. DE and resell mats.
Very valuable items that I always try to purchase when they are available at under 80% average price:
- ilvl 85 Epic LW/BS/Tai recipes
- Titanium Ore/Bar/Powder & Titansteel Bar
- Uncut meta gems
- Damaged Necklace (jewelcrafters pay a fortune to get a daily token faster.. around 200g sale price.)
- Book of Glyph mastery (on my server, I always buy these at 10g and resell for 20g.. and they're much more common than the Damaged Necklace).
- Frost Lotus
- Eternals
- Uncut epic gems.
- Dragon's Eye
- Crusader Orb / Runed Orb / Frozen Orb
- Arctic Fur
- Iceweb Spider Silk
BAGS!
- There are times when frostweave cloth is cheap enough to purchase and sell 20-slot bags at a big profit. Don't forget to include the cost of infinite dust (which you should get as a side product of DE'ing ilvl70-80 green weapons) and eternium thread. Frost bags are ALWAYS in demand, and glacial bags can bring in a lot of cash if you can cheaply make the mats with a few tailor alts.
Depending on server.. can be very valuable due to profession grinding (buy really low %-wise, sell very high when none available):
- Mid-level ores: Mithril Ore/Bar, Thorium Ore/Bar, Truesilver Ore/Bar, etc.
- Mid-level gems: Aquamarine, Citrine, Star Ruby, Azerothian Diamond, Huge Emerald, etc.
- Mid-level herbs: Sungrass/Goldthorn/Golden Sansam/etc
This was off the top of my head, but the main thing to look for is what takes time to find (stuff that require a cooldown to make, or instance runs to collect) and what is frequently used in recipes or gear.
been in the ah for a few years now and figure some where between 1.2 and 1.6 mill has been made. i get asked alot and the couple of things i tell every one seem to be tried and true. \
first, slow and steady. thiers lots of money in the ah but u cant make it over night. keep on with the 2 scans a day, if your ah file is wrong then every thing u buy will be wrong. this to me has been the most important thing u can do. if i transfer or start a new toon i will not buy any thing for atleast a month unless its just listed wrong.
second, keep it small. when i go through every thing i sell every day i am lucky if i have a auction over 1k (kinda). but either way i will have 1k in 10-50g auctions, no matter what. not many people have 10k to spend on one piece of pixle but everyone has 50g to spend on some thing. stay away from high profile items unless u know it will sell.
my 2 cents
Little items that are used often will always make you more than big ticket items in the long run. A lot of playing the AH is having patience. Like someone else said Bags always make money. If you have Tailor it is gold. I sell 15-20 Netherweave bags and 8-12 frostweave bags a day. I buy cloth in bulk thru trade and make bags to sell. On my server this usually nets me 270-400g per day.
I also sell pets cross faction. I have horde toons selling Ally tourney pets. they money i make from selling them goes to buying horde pets and selling them to allies. Prior to 3.3 I would sell 2-3 pets every 1.5 days. netting me 1200-1600g from pets.
Since 3.3 I have stopped doing my dailies as I have now hit crusader and with the money I have made I don't feel the need to daily anymore. On occasion I will do them for the seals. However that has slowed down quite a bit.
Since 3.3 I have turned to buying and selling primordial saronite. I can usually make a 200-300g profit per saronite this way. However this is not really thru the AH so its a little off topic. I buy/sell these thru trade chat.
Short Term.
Purchase stacks of things.... Infinite Dust, Raid Flasks, Gems etc on weekends, for low per each price.
Relist on weekdays, as singles or smaller stacks, for a lot more per each.
Sunday is the cheapest day to buy things.
Fri/Sat is the most expensive days to list things.
I buy 25-35 stacks of dust on Sun, and sell them all by the next Sat. I pay 20g per stack and sell 2g each (100% mark up).
The next arena season is coming soon.
Stockpile gems and enchants, mats for enchants, etc.
Sell these with a substantial mark up, when the season goes live, and people have the new gear.
The same holds true for new raid content.
Long Term.
Have one of every production profession, on an active team PvE progression team.
The team which you run heroics with, possibly raid with some members of the team (or all of them), the team which grinds reputations up.
IE, the team which will have the maximum number of recipes.
You'd want 1x each crafting (not gathering) profession at maximum level, with as many recipes as possible.
Then look at average selling prices for top end gear.
And the average price for the mats to craft these.
Purchase mats when they're cheap.
Also advertise: /Trade Buying every stack of "x" you have for "y" gold per stack. Send CoD to "z" toon.
Pick a price which is advantageous to you, and is still decent for the gatherer.
They'll sell directly to you, not losing the AH cut or paying 0 to 5+ days of listing fees.
Do this with several toons, covering every production skill with combines that sell well.
Ideally, you'll be crafting 20+ high end items, between your team.
Buying mats cheap, is less profit (per piece) then farming mats yourself.
It is also much more profitable (per hour) by a very massive margin.
Don't flood the market with your stuff; 1 or 2 at a time, is ideal.
If others are listing the stuff, try to agree on a price with them, rather then getting into a price war where neither of you make jack.