How to make money buying low and selling to traders

Traders pay a fixed price for the items they buy. Flea market prices are whatever players ask. Every so often a player lists an item for less than a trader would pay for it, usually because they are in a hurry, misread the price, or just want the stash space. Buy it, sell it to the trader, and keep the difference.

This is one of the few ways to make money in Tarkov without going into a raid. It does not need gear, skill with a gun or a good hideout. It needs knowledge of prices, a bit of patience, and fast hands.

Why the gap exists

Traders are run by the game. Each one has a set price it pays for each item it buys, and that price does not care what is happening on the flea. If Therapist pays a certain amount for a medical item today, he pays the same whether there are ten offers for it on the flea or a thousand.

Flea prices are set by players, and players make mistakes. Someone coming back from a raid with a full backpack wants their stash space back, so they list everything fast and cheap. Someone else adds or drops a zero by accident. Another player undercuts the lowest offer without checking what a trader pays, and the price slides under the trader price for a few minutes.

Most of the time the flea price for an item sits above the best trader price, because sellers would rather take the trader money than list under it. The gap only opens for short windows, which is why flipping is about watching, not about one big find.

Know the best trader price

Learn the best trader price for a handful of items you see a lot. You do not need to memorise every item in the game. Ten or twenty items you understand well beat a long list you only half know.

To find a trader's price, open the trader, go to the sell screen and drag the item in. The trader shows what they will pay. Do this for each trader who buys that kind of item, and note the highest one. Prices on the sell screen also drop for damaged items, so compare like with like.

Therapist pays well for many medical and barter items, and Jaeger is often the best buyer for food, drink and some barter items. Check each trader's offer before you assume; the best buyer is not always the one you expect.

Jaeger is not available from the start. He has to be unlocked through a quest from Mechanic, so a new player may not be able to sell to him yet. Fence buys almost anything, but he usually pays less than the other traders, so he is rarely the right buyer for a flip.

Finding the gap

Search one of your items on the flea and sort by price. Any offer below the trader price, by enough to be worth the clicks, is a flip. If the cheapest offer is above the trader price, move to the next item on your list.

Some flea offers are priced in dollars or euros. Convert them to roubles before you compare, or skip them. To pay one you need that currency, which you buy from a trader at their exchange rate, so convert at that rate. A dollar offer with a small number on it is often not as cheap as it looks.

Skip barter offers too. They ask for other items instead of money, and working out whether they are cheap takes longer than the gap is usually worth.

A worked example

Here is a simple run with made-up round numbers. Say Therapist pays 20,000 roubles for a certain medical item, and that is the best trader price you found. You search it on the flea and the cheapest offers are 22,000 and 22,500. Nothing to do here, so you move on.

A few minutes later you check again. Someone has listed three of them at 15,000 each. You buy all three for 45,000, open Therapist's sell screen and sell them for 60,000. That is 15,000 roubles profit for about a minute of work, with no raid and no risk.

Now say the cheapest offer had been 19,500. Buying it and selling for 20,000 leaves 500 roubles. That is technically a flip, but you spent more time than it was worth. Set yourself a minimum gap per item and ignore anything under it.

What eats the profit

Items bought on the flea are no longer found in raid, so you cannot list them on the flea again. Found in raid is the mark the game puts on items you brought out of a raid yourself, and only items with that mark can be listed on the flea. That does not matter here, since they are going to a trader anyway.

Small gaps on cheap items are not worth the time. Look for gaps of a few thousand roubles or more per item, or offers where you can buy several at once.

Damaged items pay less. If you buy a weapon part, armor or anything with durability, the trader price depends on its condition. Check the condition shown on the flea offer and compare it against what the trader pays for an item in the same state.

Stash space is a cost too. If you buy faster than you sell, flipped items pile up and get in the way of your raid loot. Sell to the trader straight after you buy, before you go back to searching.

Speed decides who gets the deal

Speed matters most. Other players hunt the same gaps, so a cheap offer can be gone within seconds. Checking a long list of items by hand means most of the bargains are bought before you reach them.

Keep your list short and focused when you search by hand. Pick items that are listed often, since more offers means more chances for someone to misprice one. Search them in a loop: check, move on, come back. The same item can go from no gap to a big gap between one search and the next.

Buy first and think later. If an offer is well below your known trader price and above your minimum gap, buy it before you double check anything else. Hesitating for a few seconds is often how you lose it.

Early wipe and late wipe

A wipe resets every player's progress, and flipping changes over the life of one. Early in a wipe, many players are short on money and the flea may not even be open to them yet, so fewer offers are listed. Gaps exist, but you need to be patient and you may not have much money to spend.

Later in a wipe, more players use the flea and more items get listed. That means more chances for someone to misprice an offer, but also more people hunting the same gaps. Deals are still there, they just go faster.

Late wipe is also when many players sell in bulk to clear their stash before they stop playing, which can push some items under trader prices for longer. Keep an eye on items that people loot a lot but rarely need.

Common mistakes

Assuming you know the trader price. Prices on the sell screen are the only reliable source, and the best buyer is not always the trader you expect. Check before you start flipping a new item.

Chasing tiny gaps. Five hundred roubles per item is not worth a minute of searching. Set a minimum and stick to it.

Comparing against dollar or euro offers without converting. A small number on a foreign currency offer can be more expensive than it looks.

Planning to relist on the flea. Anything you buy from the flea loses its found in raid mark, so you cannot put it back up. The trader is the exit, not the flea.

Ignoring condition. A cheap offer on a worn-out item may be cheap because the trader pays less for it too.

A quick checklist

Pick ten to twenty items that are listed often and that a trader buys at a decent price. Note the best trader price for each from the sell screen.

Set a minimum gap per item that makes the click worth it.

Search each item, sort by price, and skip barter and foreign currency offers. Buy anything under the trader price by at least your minimum gap.

Sell to the trader straight away, then go back to searching.

Quick questions

Can I do this with a new account? Mostly, yes, once the flea is open to you. You will not have every trader unlocked, so stick to items that a trader you already have will buy.

Do trader prices change? They can change between game patches, so check the sell screen again after an update instead of relying on old numbers.

Why are there no gaps when I look? Most of the time there are none. The gaps open briefly and get bought fast, so you have to keep checking. Try items that are listed more often.

Is this better than running raids? It is lower risk and needs no gear, but the profit depends on how much time you put into watching. Many players do a few searches between raids rather than flipping as their main income.

Watching a list of items over and over is the slow part, and it is the part Tarkbot's snipe mode was built for. The method does not change either way: know the trader price, buy under it by enough to matter, and sell straight away.