I spent £1.4K on a mystery shipping container & had no clue what was inside – I became £58K richer when I opened it
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A MAN took a £1.4K gamble buying a storage container with no idea what was inside - only to find it full of rare Pokémon merch worth up to £58K.
Wade Venture, 39, snapped up the 10ft by 20ft storage unit in an online auction - with little idea of what was inside.
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Wade Venture, 39, snapped up the 10ft by 20ft storage unit in an online auction - with little idea of what was inside
Credit: SWNS
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Wade has sent some of the cards off to a grading company but estimates in total he will earn £58K from the unit
Credit: SWNS
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Wade has been bidding on containers for the last nine years - and reckons he has flipped 2000 - earning millions of dollars
Credit: SWNS
To his surprise, it contained 1,000 rare Pokémon cards, old PlayStations, Xboxes, and Nintendo 64s as well as retro console games.
Wade has started selling the items and has already flogged five percent of the Pokémon cards for £4.3k - putting him £2.9k in profit so far.
Wade - who shares his finds online under @wadesventures - has sent some of the cards off to a grading company but estimates in total he will earn £58K from the unit.
He has flipped around 2000 units since he went full-time, including one filled with £58K worth of Nike clothes and one with designer clothes worth £51k.
Wade, a content creator, from Portland, Oregon, said: "The Pokémon find was such a good unit, it was just five minutes away from my house.
"That was such an incredibly lucky find - I had no idea what was inside.
"The [Pokémon] cards are in fantastic shape. I have around 600 of these cards.
"I sold five percent of the unit yesterday on an auction platform called WhatNots - we made little over £4.3k.
"I think we are going to make around £58k on this container when it is all sold.
"Off a £1.4k investment, that is incredible."
I spent £136 to see if the lost luggage trend was worth it - I thought I'd nab designer goodies but it was a total flop
Wade has been bidding on containers for the last nine years - and reckons he has flipped 2000 - earning millions of dollars.
He became inspired by the popular show Storage Wars - a show where buyers bid on storage units - and quit his corporate job as a WHAT after 11 years to go full-time flipping storage containers.
Wade said: "I was obsessed with the show Storage Wars and thought it looked like fun.
"I was working a corporate job at the time on a £146k a year salary.
"Nine years ago, I quit my job to go full-time."
Wade said he hasn't had constant success, and the first container he bought was the worst one he ever purchased.
Where to find mystery boxes
MYSTERY boxes are becoming more and more popular, with people keen to take a gamble in buying one. But where can you get one from?
Charity shops
Lots of charity shops have started putting together mystery boxes as a way to get rid of stock that they've been otherwise unable to sell. While you can never guarantee what you're going to get, these boxes are usually cheaper than ones bought elsewhere.
eBay
Many retailers use eBay to sell their stock, with options on the auction site including unclaimed luggage or parcel returns, all put together in a mystery box. It's not like a normal 'auction' though - there will usually be a buy it now price so it's just like any other internet transaction.
Online retailers
As the popularity of mystery boxes increases, other retailers have started selling them in the hope that they will be a hit among customers. Have a look on sites such as Amazon, Etsy and Wowcher, and you'll often find the mystery boxes are listed by genre too.
If there's a particular niche mystery box you're looking for, it's always worth searching for it. There are so many websites out there selling mystery boxes, you'll undoubtedly find what you're after.
As with buying anything online, make sure you are purchasing from a trusted retailer and a secure website.
But he persisted and his third container, was filled with £58k of Nike merch.
He said: "After being inspired by Storage Wars, I was intrigued and really wanted to give it a go.
"You see them getting all sorts of treasure, but the first one I bought was a really bad unit.
"It was just full of metal, which you couldn't get any money for - it was the worst unit I have ever bought.
"I persisted, and my third unit was in Oregon; it was filled with vintage Nike, and I made £58k off it."
In total, Wade estimates he has bought 2,000 units, earning him millions of dollars.
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Wade said he hasn't had constant success, and the first container he bought was the worst one he ever purchased
Credit: SWNS
So far this year, he and his wife, Ashley, 38, who flips storage units with him, are on track to surpass a million dollars.
Wade said: "Last year we earned half a million — I have earned millions of dollars since I started.
"This year, we are on pace to do a million this year.
"You don't get home runs all the time, but containers like the Pokémon one are where we earn the most money."
The Pokémon unit contained around 1,000 vintage cards, over 60 game consoles and retro video games.
He said: "I'm not a complete Pokémon guy, but this unit was incredible.
"They had the first edition Pokémon cards - there were probably over 1,000 of them.
"We found boxes filled with game consoles - I reckon there were 60 of them in total."
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