I was drowning in £60k of gambling debt & couldn’t afford food… but paid it off in 5 years by flogging charity shop buys
A MAN who was in £60k of debt revealed how he transformed his life.
Andrew sat down with Chris on his podcast, The Everything Reselling, to chat about how he used reselling from charity shops to get out of debt.
Andrew, who lives in Wales, works in crisis management said reselling for him was a break form the crazy hours at work he does during his full-time job.
To resell items, Andrew uses eBay, Amazon and a Facebook group.
But it’s not the first ‘side hustle‘ he has had.
He revealed he began to gamble six years ago, first getting into matched betting which he found lucrative as a side-hustle.
However, his gambling soon became a problem after getting into the casino side of things and becoming addicted to online roulette.
He revealed that in just a few weeks he blew over £60,000.
Speaking candidly to Chris, Andrew said: “I managed to blast through all the money I’d made from match betting, all my credit cards, all my savings and then I took out a loan to pay off everything and instead
of paying off everything I used all that because I thought ‘oh I can
get the money back.’
“I was chasing losses I think is the term, and in about two/three weeks I went through about over £50k.”
He said he had another £10,000 loan from his car payments as well.
I just felt like I ruined my life
Andrew
At one point, Andrew revealed he wouldn’t eat for two to three days in order to feed his gambling addiction and never kept track of his finances until he realised he was no longer getting accepted for credit.
In this time Andrew’s mental health ‘plummeted’ as he realised the dire situation he was in.
“I just felt like I ruined my life,” he added.
The reseller revealed he had suffered form depression and anxiety before his gambling addiction took hold of him – and knew from his experience with mental health that the first step was to talk about the problem.
While he could have gone on to declare bankruptcy, Andrew stated that he wanted to pay his way out of the debt he had raked up.
” I want to take ownership of it and and and sort it out yeah so that’s what I did, I started looking at ways to to make extra income,” he continued.
He then went on to try a whole host of side-hustles, from online surveys, starting a blog and even becoming a mystery shopper.
Remember to gamble responsibly
A responsible gambler is someone who:
- Establishes time and monetary limits before playing
- Only gambles with money they can afford to lose
- Never chase their losses
- Doesn’t gamble if they’re upset, angry, or depressed
- Gamcare – www.gamcare.org.uk
- Gamble Aware – www.begambleaware.org
Find our detailed guide on responsible gambling practices here.
For help with a gambling problem, call the National Gambling Helpline on 0808 8020 133 or go to www.gamstop.co.uk to be excluded from all UK-regulated gambling websites.
While the money slowly began to enter his bank account – Andrew says it was too time consuming and made him burn out – that’s when he turned his attention to reselling online.
At first, Andrew started with buying second-hand cars on eBay – and while he could make a few hundred each time by selling them on, it was risky as you can’t return cars and sometimes they wouldn’t arrive as described by the seller.
But after watching YouTube videos of other sellers, he realised he could make money far easier by hitting up charity shops.
Due to his job as a mystery shopper – Andrew was always in different parts of Wales so could hunt for lots of goodies in different charity shops.
He first started by spending £150 on second-hand items and listing them on eBay – where they went flying off the shelves.
He used the money he made form eBay to reinvest in reselling and kept his money from mystery shopping to pay off his debt in the meantime, and his plan worked.
Not long after, Andrew had to purchase a storage unit to keep his eBay items as business had become lucrative and he was bale to list more and more goods.
After a couple of months, Andrew began to make a steady £600 a month from eBay and began to solely focus on that.
Next, he focused on selling TVs which made him lots of money at the time – but he soon grew fed up of running around picking up and dropping TVs off.
He added that he became known in his local area and people would contact him directly to find TVs to sell them.
But after getting bored, he branched out selling clothes, and smaller items on eBay to earn cash.
Andrew set out to pay off his £60,000 debt within ten years but he exceeded expectations by paying it off in just five.
He also revealed that it was best to have different accounts on eBay, Amazon and Facebook when reselling online in case there are any glitches on one to make sure you cans still sell on a different site.
Do I need to pay tax on my side hustle income?
MANY people feeling strapped for cash are boosting their bank balance with a side hustle.
The good news is, there are plenty of simple ways to earn some additional income – but you need to know the rules.
When you’re employed the company you work for takes the tax from your earnings and pays HMRC so you don’t have to.
But anyone earning extra cash, for example from selling things online or dog walking, may have to do it themselves.
Stephen Moor, head of employment at law firm Ashfords, said: “Caution should be taken if you’re earning an additional income, as this is likely to be taxable.
“The side hustle could be treated as taxable trading income, which can include providing services or selling products.”
You can make profit of up to £1,000 a year tax-free via the trading allowance, but over this and you’ll usually need to pay tax.
Stephen added: “You need to register for a self-assessment at HMRC to ensure you are paying the correct amount of tax.
“The applicable tax bands and the amount of tax you need to pay will depend on your income.”
If you fail to file a tax return you could end up with a surprise bill from HMRC later on asking you to pay the tax you owe – plus extra fees on top.