GameStop trade-in strategy one customer used to walk away with $10,000

GameStop has been to shed the bad reputation it's accrued over the years for unsatisfactory trade-in valuations with a few recent campaigns, but nothing quite matches the reaction on social media after the store revealed how one customer earned more than $10,000 in store credit from 'broken' old consoles.

You're never going to get the best deal when trading items in at a store like GameStop as they'll always offer you a price well below market value in an attempt to make a profit — but the convenience is worth it for many.

That's especially true if you're looking to swap your console out for a PlayStation 5 Pro ahead of the release of GTA 6, and one gamer discovered that getting rid of his old broken gadgets could make up more than eleven times that cost.

Shared on the official GameStop X account, it was revealed that a customer at the gaming juggernaut's Clackamas, Oregon branch traded in hundreds of 'broken' old gaming consoles, exchanging his 'junk' for $10,680.06 when everything was all totalled up, as per Dexerto.

Gamer earns over $10,000 from 'broken' consoles

While a recent limited-time trade-in program saw GameStop offer the opportunity to swap out your 'busted' controller for a new one at no extra cost, this particular exchange appears to have been processed as normal, with the astronomical amount of money solely coming from the volume of consoles handed over.

In the photo shared by the GameStop account there appears to be at least eight lengthy receipts, each with dozens of consoles on them and exchange totals of beyond $900.

Looking at the receipts you can see that the customer has a GameStop Pro membership, giving them an extra 10% on top of the existing trade in value — which in this case likely works out to around $1,000.

It's difficult to see exactly how much they got for each individual item, but you can see several Xbox One consoles traded in for $40.40, PlayStation 3 consoles worth over $50, and more handheld devices from Nintendo and Sony to count.

The amount of credit granted for the trade-in was so much that it had to be spread across nine separate gift cards — and it means that the customer likely won't have to pay for another console or game for a very long time.

While GameStop does designate the consoles as both 'broken' and 'junk' in its post, they would be classed under the new 'defective' classification and therefore given a far lower trade-in value due to their current state — yet the company will seemingly still take pretty much anything you hand over at this point.

How have people reacted?

Despite the jaw-dropping amount of money this particular customer managed to earn himself, there are still plenty of people who believe that he could have got more elsewhere with GameStop 'ripping him off' in the process.

"GameScalp out scamming again," proclaimed one user in the replies to the post, with another arguing that he "could've went to a retro game stop for a few more bucks."

Some have also shared their frustration after not being able to trade in broken consoles of their own, although it's unclear whether they attempted this after GameStop relaxed its rules for defective items.

"This post seems like click bait," declared one frustrated gamer. "I have a few older consoles and controllers that don't work. Tried to bring in about a year ago and got turned away too."