Flipping Phones Until I Can Afford My DREAM CAR - [6]

Added: 2026-05-17

[00:00:00]I'm flipping phones to pay for my Škoda Citigo, and [music] so far I've made 668 bucks out of 4,000.

[00:00:08]Today, I'm starting with this iPad 9 256 GB version, and honestly, it's a pretty solid deal. I bought it just 470 bucks.

[00:00:19]For that price, I didn't get only the iPad itself, but it also came with an original Apple Pencil 1, a protective case, and the display has already a matte screen protector installed. Thanks to that, [music] the screen is completely scratch-free and still looks amazing. The battery [music] health is at 90% with only about 200 charge cycles, so it's still in very good condition overall. The only downside is the back housing. Since this is the darker color version of the iPad, you can clearly see the signs of use and few scuff marks on the aluminum body. Still, considering everything included [music] in the package, this was definitely a great purchase. The Apple Pencil first generation also charges and pairs in a really weird way.

[00:01:08]>> [music] >> You literally have to plug it directly in the bottom of the lighting port of the iPad, and honestly, this design is terrible. I'm planning to sell the Apple Pencil separately for around 50 bucks, and iPad itself for about 230 bucks.

[00:01:24]That means the total profit from this deal should end up being about 110 bucks.

[00:01:29]And the next phone of today is this iPhone 12 with 128 GB of storage that I bought for just 100 bucks. At first glance, the phone actually looks pretty decent. The display doesn't have a single scratch on it, mainly because it had tempered glass protector installed the whole time. Although the tempered glass itself was absolutely destroyed, so the first thing I did was peel it off. But the phone definitely isn't in perfect condition. The frame has multiple dents and a lot of scratches all around the edges, making [music] the housing look pretty rough overall. And, there is also two inconsistencies with this phone. The smaller issue is that the SIM card is in silver, even though the phone itself is in black. But, the bigger problem is with the rear camera.

[00:02:19]Whenever I take a photo on a bright background, there is a dark spot visible in image, [music] which means that the camera definitely needs to be replaced.

[00:02:27]Now, I could have simply swapped the camera and call it day, but instead I decided to take this repair a few steps [music] further. And, I am going to replace the entire housing with this blue one right here. And, unlike with the original housing, this one is in amazing condition. It already comes pre-assembled with some of the internal [music] components already installed, which will make the repair a lot easier.

[00:02:54]So, to replace the housing, I need [music] to remove the two bottom screws and place it on a heat plate. After a couple of minutes on the heat plate, I placed the phone into the Refox RS50 opener, applied some isopropyl alcohol around the edges of the display, and slowly started separating the screen from the frame. And, almost immediately, I noticed that the display adhesive was barely holding on, which is pretty clear sign that this phone had definitely been opened before. Thankfully though, that made the job so much easier, and the screen [music] came off without putting a much of a fight. With the phone finally opened up, it was now time to disconnect the display and continue with the teardown. After removing the display bracket, I immediately noticed that the battery was sitting in a really strange position, [music] and it was obvious that something wasn't right. I immediately noticed that the battery wasn't secure with any adhesive strips at all, and was basically just floating around insides of the phone. I honestly have no idea how this could have happened or who thought this was a good idea to leave phone assembled [music] like this. But, at least it made my job easier because I didn't have to deal with removing the battery adhesive tabs.

[00:04:10]After taking the battery out, I disconnected the display completely, removed the top shield, and disconnected the proximity sensor flex cable. My next step was to remove the motherboard from the phone and transfer it into the new blue housing. So, I started by disconnecting all the flex cables [music] connected to the motherboard and removing all the screws holding it in place. One of the screws was [music] actually hidden underneath the rear camera flex cable, and when rear camera is connected, the flex cables can completely cover the screw, making it [music] pretty easy to miss. After removing all the screws, I carefully lifted the motherboard out of the housing and moved on to the removing the front camera assembly. The front camera module is paired to the motherboard and is responsible for keeping the Face ID fully functional. So, I had to transfer it over to the new housing. Part of the assembly was glued down pretty firmly, so [music] I used isopropyl alcohol to loosen up the adhesive and safely remove it. Once the front camera was out, everything that needed to be transferred [music] had been finally removed from the original housing.

[00:05:19]Then, I took the new blue housing, but this one also had a motherboard and front camera assembly already installed.

[00:05:26]So, before I could start transferring my original parts over, I had to [music] go through the exact same process again. I disconnected all of the flex cables, removed the screws holding the motherboard in place, and carefully lifted it out of the housing. And after that, [music] I also removed the front camera assembly, since I needed the new housing to be ready for the original [music] motherboard and the Face ID component, and the housing was prepared.

[00:05:54]And [music] once again, the first thing I installed into the new housing was the original front camera assembly. Since this part is paired to the motherboard and is needed for Face ID, I made sure to move it over before installing the board itself. After that, I placed the original motherboard into the housing and started reconnecting all of the flex cables. Once everything was connected, I used the screws to secure the board [music] back into place. Next was the battery. I took a brand new battery adhesive [music] strip and applied it to the battery first. Then I removed the protective film from the adhesive, connected the battery [music] to the motherboard, and carefully placed it into the housing. Before sealing the phone, I connected display and powered it on to make sure that everything is working correctly. The phone turned on without any issues and to all the main functions seem to be working as they should. Since the camera was brand new, I started the pairing process to get rid of the important camera message. I put it into the repair assistant where the camera was recognized as genuine Apple part. After it finished configuration, I continued [music] with the final installation of the display. I started by disconnecting the battery again. Then I disconnected the display flex cable, but I left the proximity flex cable connected, so I could simply fold the display out of [music] the way instead of removing it completely. After that, I installed the display bracket and [music] moved onto the lower bracket. I reconnected the display and the new battery, placed the bracket back over the connectors, and screwed it down.

[00:07:34]Once everything was secured, I closed down the phone and just like that, it was almost finished. But there was still one small detail missing. Since the phone was originally black, it still had the black bottom screws. On the blue phone, the bottom screws are different color. They are silver. So, I installed a brand new pair of original silver screws, which I bought from Apple self-service repair for about [music] 10 cents a piece.

[00:08:02]After installing the screws, the phone was finally finished. So, how much did I actually make from this repair? I paid about 100 bucks for the phone. The blue housing had already been sitting at home [music] for about a year. So, let's say I paid around 40 bucks for the housing together with the camera. After the repair was finished, I sold the phone for about 220 [music] bucks. So, after subtracting the cost of the phone and the parts, I made about $90 profit from this repair. So, in today's episode, I've made a total of 200 bucks. And so far, we've saved up 868 bucks. And that's pretty much it for this video. Bye.