Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire buying & sellin' used lawnmowers?

we see a lot of ads on the local buy/sell/swap lists that include lawnmowers of all kinds, types, and sorts: push behinds, self=propelled walk behinds, riders of all colors.

lot of folks throw the dog out when it fails to crank and sits it by the curb. the trashman will come sooner or later.

all kinds of strange things going on. during the grass season can money be made resuscitating used lawnmowers? there's plenty of them out there.

Sure...if ya know what you're doing.

something about buy low & sell high, isn't it? or maybe get the dog to running, and add=value?

during the summer here, the grass=growing enterprise is so important. it allows a huge part of the sub=economy to thrive.

I’m too lazy to do that.

funny thing about the residential/commercial grass mowing enterprise. back in the day the household kid did the mowing. then later, the neighborhood kid agreed to mow, with his own mower or yours.

nowadays, find yourself a contractor who makes a living depending upon a list of homeowners/commercial that he & his helpers service.

we use to have a few illegal aliens in the business. probably a few left, mowing grass, trimming shrubbery, spreading south ga. pine straw.

but, still loews, home depot, ace, and many others sell a ton of homeowner style lawnmowers. and sometimes they belly up, due in part to ethanol gasoline that clogs the carb. off to the street side they go. it's just the way it is in suburban america.

so, can they be resuscitated profitably or just shipped to the landfill (less gasoline & oil in the engine)?

There is a guy here that has a nice sideline business refurbishing the lawn and garden tractors that come in as trade ins or returns. The walk behinds are so cheap that it wouldn't pay to put much into those. The population is getting older and we like to ride a lawn tractor with a leaf bagger instead of a walk behind.

usually easy to fix. but really, unless half a days work and 20 bucks in parts is worth 75 bucks to you, then no, its not worth it. but its something to do.

A quote from one of my best buds from several years ago when he was in a disastrous marriage:

"You remember when we were kids and there were those old guys around town that had a garage or workshop out back of their house.....one always had a row of bicycles for sale in his front yard, that other one had lawn mowers. I never understood. I would look at that junk and think man, you can't make any money doing that. Now I understand; it's not about lawn mowers or making money - it's a place to get away from the wife."

Same here. But yea, you won't get rich but can make money at it. Most of the time is't a simple problem.

A couple years ago, I was trying to buy a used tractor at an equipment dealer. Son was there with me, and noticed a Grasshopper lawnmower on the lot. He asked the salesman about it, and was told that it had been there a long time, and they wanted to sell it bad. We shot him a price for both pieces, and son bought it at a good price. It needed a lot of work, and he spent several hundred dollars on it, and then didn't care for the way it mowed. Advertised it at a $1000 over what he had in it, and sold it to a guy who drove 4 hours one way to get it. If it had been me, I'd lost a $1000 on it. Some people have all the luck with selling stuff.

Funny story, I was out about 4:30am on my morning bike ride and I saw a Honda mower by the curb with a new grass bag on top of it. I turned around and took a look at it, I thought it may be locked up so I pulled it and it pulled find and didn't sound like anything was broke so I drug the prize about 3 miles on my single speed beach cruiser. That afternoon after returning from work, I filled it up with gas and gave it a tug, fire right up and started spewing oil about 2' out of the exhaust pipe. I shut it off and parked it at the curb for heavy trash pickup.

Only if you are handy on small motors.

I have a friend who fixes up and sells mowers and weedeaters. He gets chinese knockoff parts off ebay. I guess he makes a little money but likely it is just something for him to do.

There is money to be made on the right stuff. I have bought and sold mowers and Snowblowers. A big part of it is your market on timing. You work on mowers in the winter to sell in the spring and Snowblowers in the summer to sell in the fall. It helps to have contacts who can alert you to potential castaways that don't need much work so you can flip them quick. I figure that normally I end up making 20-40% depending on the year and how productive I am. Its something to do and I find it rewarding to get stuff going again after it has been left for dead.

Most Americans are of the throw away mentality...lawn mowers weed eaters and chainsaws are just that now days throwaways...
Butt many times its somthing as simple as a pull rope or spark plug or just bad gas...
I run JD mowers a 265 and 425. Both were cheap the 265 was 250 buck not running at auction...needed a clutch switch...
The 425 was given to me with a bad engine...I had it bored .20 over and with the new hood and side panels and seat I had over 2 grand in it....but worth every penny....JD doesn't make a mower of this quality anymore...

that sounds like something I'd do!

Sycamore

There's probably a few bucks to be made if you want to supplement retirement or just like tinkering on small engines but i wouldn't plan on raising a family with the proceeds.

I keep my old stuff running. Pay a retired guy to do whatever is necessary when within reason.
18YO Craftsman 42"
15YO White mower 48" w/hydrostatic
12YO LawnBoy 2 stroke selfprop

The low end riders these days all appear to be cheaply made and I just can't see dropping $3-4K on a mower.
I'll just keep fixin these as needed.

Gus.....you had to think long and hard to come up with this one!

yeah, i did. what tripped my switch was my model 3400 poulan chain saw which needs parts no longer obtainable. then i thought about my older honda garden tiller, with no parts available. rather than talking about chainsaws and tillers, i'd thought i'd do a change-up and ask about repairing lawn mowers that people throw away.