Julia McNeal’s Phone Flipping Academy Review – 3 Headaches with a Phone Flipping Business + An Alternative |Ippei: Why Local SEO Lead Generation is the #1 Online Business Opportunity in 2025

Julia McNeal’s Phone Flipping Academy is a course that teaches you how to make money flipping high-demand electronics. Phone flipping works by buying smartphones online or locally and reselling them to direct buyers who will pay you the same day. The course covers sourcing and screening, pricing and negotiation, direct-buyer lists, and the exact tips Julia used to build a six-figure flipping business. The aim is to make $100 profit per phone sale.

As a digital marketer, my opinion is that Phone Flipping Academy is like Stanley Sugerman (Adam Sandler) in the movie Hustle. He was constantly scouting, grinding, traveling, and managing real risk, where every win is earned one call and negotiation at a time. The phone flipping business requires a lot of hard work and involves risks. For one, you always have to source cheap phones, verify and price them, then resell them on the same day to make a profit. The moment you stop doing that, your income stops. It’s also risky as you spend money first, including on ads, with no promise of a buyer.

In this Phone Flipping Academy review, I go into detail about the pros and cons, what you’ll learn, who the creator is, what reviews are saying, and if it’s legit. I also go over the 3 headaches with the phone flipping business. Finally, I show you a more passive and less risky business model, called local lead generation.

What Are the Pros and Cons of Phone Flipping Academy?

Pros	Cons
Julia made over $500,000 in profit by flipping smart phones.	Flipping phones is not passive because you have to drive to meet buyers and sellers and negotiate on pricing on almost every deal. You're creating ads on Craigslist and other online marketplaces.
Everyone today is buying the newest phone and wanting to get rid of the one they own.	Sometimes Julia's direct buyers have enough inventory, which means you have to wait to get paid.
Julia trains you on how to negotiate pricing.
After you invest, Julia provides you with a list of the top direct buyers so you can have consistent sales.

Price	The Phone Flipping Academy costs $197.
Refund Policy	There is no refund policy.
Training	Training lessons along with Julia's proven scripts you can use when reaching out to buyers and sellers.
Group	Private Discord community for support called Mission University.
Origin	Julia started phone flipping in 2017 and started the Phone Flipping Academy in 2020.
Reputation	Julia has a good online reputation and many of her students are making thousands of dollars per month with her phone flipping training. The comments she receives on social media are positive and mostly from people interested in phone flipping. You won't find any negative comments on Reddit.

What Are the 3 Headaches With a Phone Flipping Business?

Pricing negotiations with potential buyers/sellers. Daily pricing negotiations with buyers and sellers can be a time-consuming headache. These negotiations can end up in a deal not getting done if all sides can’t come to an agreement on pricing. The constant back and forth with sellers trying to get the best deal can also ruin the business relationship if several deals don’t get done. Overtime, your buyers or sellers can choose to go with another supplier.
Electronic devices in worse condition than expected. Another headache you may encounter is electronic devices being in worse condition than they were presented before meeting your seller. This can happen often as people are looking to get to most for their damaged device. Some sellers may even lie about their device having water damage which can force you to go back to the drawing board and negotiate another price if the device is salvageable to a certain degree.
Driving all around your city to meet buyers and sellers. The fact you have to drive around and meet buyers and sellers is a hassle. It is better than working a 9-5 job but in the grand scheme of things, this doesn’t allow you to earn a passive income online if you’re reselling a handful of electronic devices per day. This will also cut into your profits because you have to pay for gas.

What Do You Learn in the Phone Flipping Academy?

In the Phone Flipping Academy, you learn:

Where to source new, used, and damaged electronics at prices you can profit from
How to determine what to pay for a device
How to negotiate the best price
How to get paid soon after closing the deal
Where to sell for top prices in the shortest amount of time
Julia’s phone flipping tricks for building her 6-figure phone flipping business

Who Is Julia McNeal?

Julia McNeal is a 6-figure phone flipper entrepreneur from Atlanta, Georgia. She worked multiple jobs as a nanny while being pregnant with her first child and was living paycheck to paycheck. In between her nanny jobs, she drove with Uber. Julia was always looking for ways to make money from home so she could provide for her child and not have to put him in day care.

December 17, 2017, was the first day she started flipping phones. She placed her ad on Craigslist and paid $60 for her first phone and flipped it for $214. Within her first 30 days, she profited around $5,000. After 4 months, she quit her job. Ever since, she hasn’t worked a 9-5 job and never looked back, making over half a million dollars in profit flipping cell phones.

In 2020, Julia started the Phone Flipping Academy and has helped hundreds of people make thousands of dollars per month. On her Julia_Aless Instagram account, she often posts content about phone flipping for her over 50.6K followers.

What Is Julia McNeal’s Net Worth?

Julia McNeal’s net worth is an estimate between $500,000 and $2 million when you consider she made over $500K in phone flipping sales and continues to make money with this business model. She has also sold her course to hundreds of students.

What Do Phone Flipping Academy Reviews Say?

Phone Flipping Academy reviews say that the course helped them earn a good profit. Julia has several students who have made thousands of dollars with this business model. One student shared that he made $160,000 in revenue flipping cell phones.

Damian Schuler is another one of Julia’s students. On Twitter, he shared that he bought 34 phones and 15 Nintendo Switch games. After flipping all the phones and games, he earned $4,000 in profit.

Is Phone Flipping Legal?

Yes, phone flipping is legal. This is because if you purchase a device, it is your property to do what you want. If you want to sell it to your friend for an agreed-upon price, even if it’s more than what you paid, you can. It makes no difference who you buy and sell phones from, and there are no legal repercussions for such business dealings.

Is Phone Flipping Profitable in 2025?

Phone flipping is profitable in 2025 because, according to Julia, there is no end to the demand for Apple and Samsung products. Apple generated over $394.3 billion in revenue in 2022, with over 52% coming from iPhone sales. Although Samsung had a poor Q4, they still generated $57.3 billion in 2022.

Another reason flipping cell phones is profitable is that so many people either damage or upgrade their devices and don’t know what to do after they’ve gotten their new one. Phone companies also won’t give you cash back. Instead, they’ll give you a credit you can use on another one of their newer devices. If you don’t mind negotiating prices daily and meeting with buyers and sellers, you can earn thousands of dollars every month.

Phone flipping can make you a living if you work as hard as Julia does and are always putting out ads on Craigslist and Facebook, promoting your service. If you grow your business and align yourself with a team like Julia’s, you may earn a living. Just expect to spend your days working hard, since you can only make around $100 per sale. If you’re looking for online business models that are more passive income, this isn’t for you.

What Are the Alternatives to Phone Flipping?

Website flipping. This involves buying undervalued content sites, doing your research, growing traffic/revenue, and then reselling them. It’s best for people who are comfortable with SEO, analytics, and valuations. If you’re interested, Mushfiq Sarker has a course on this flipping business called “ The Course on Website Flipping ”.
Flea-market/item flipping. Here, you source thrift/flea/marketplace deals, research competition, negotiate, and “buy low/sell high” on eBay/Facebook. It’s best for people who love spending time at flea markets and finding jackpots. Flipper University by Rob and Melissa Stephenson teaches you how to run this business model.
House flipping using OPM. This business model uses other people’s money to acquire, renovate, and resell homes. It has a larger upside and scope, but relies on funding, contractors, and execution. Jake Leicht’s The Flip Secrets is a good course that teaches you all about it.
Luxury watch flipping. You value/authenticate pre-owned timepieces, negotiate 10-15% off, list them professionally, and find a buyer. Reputation and verification are critical. To learn more, I wrote a blog on “ How To Flip Watches? Step-By-Step Process For Beginners ”.

Is Phone Flipping Academy Legit?

Phone Flipping Academy is legit because Julia shows her exact process of buying and reselling new, used, and even damaged electronics. She’s made over 6-figures in profits with this business model, and many of her students who follow her step-by-step guidance also become profitable and make their money back. If you look through her Testimonials Story Highlight on Instagram, you’ll see proof of her students’ success.

However, it takes a certain type of dedication to succeed with Phone Flipping Academy. You need to act fast on deals, have cash ready, check phones quickly, and keep a close track of your profits. Sure, Julia gives you great tips and a buyer’s list, but that doesn’t guarantee success. You need to work hard for it.

If you’re after passive income, you’ll be disappointed. This is why I always recommend local lead generation instead. It’s truly passive once set up, and it’s not risky at all.

Why Local Lead Generation Offers a More Passive and Long-Term Income Than Phone Flipping

Local lead generation offers a more passive and long-term income than phone flipping because it builds digital assets that generate leads consistently without ongoing effort. Here, you create websites, rank them with SEO to attract organic traffic, and sell the leads to local businesses for recurring monthly income.

Unlike phone flipping, you don’t need to meet people in person or manage physical products. Once your site ranks and the lead flow begins, you can step away for days (or even months) and still get paid. Your website becomes a digital property that sits between real customers and the business that serves them. That means steady, predictable cash flow, often paid monthly or weekly, with little hands-on management.

Local lead gen is also long-term because people constantly search for nearby services. And local businesses constantly need new customers. Once your website ranks and proves its value, the business owner has every reason to keep paying you. In fact, many won’t negotiate your price down. Some will even pay more over time.

Compare that to phone flipping, where you have to find buyers who trust a random seller over a known retailer like Apple or Samsung. In my opinion, that’s like letting people choose between Tom Ripley from The Talented Mr. Ripley and Atticus Finch from To Kill a Mockingbird. The smooth talker (you and your flipped phones) sets off alarms, while the principled counselor earns the deal every time (a known phone store).

Local Lead Generation Is My #1 Business Model

Local lead generation

Local lead generation is my #1 business model because of its passive nature. In my experience, I only work 15 to 25 hours on a website. And that site goes on to generate thousands of dollars a month for me. For example, my website, Anaheim Expert Painting, 2335 West Sequoia Avenue, Anaheim, CA 92801, (714) 515-6803, anaheimexpertpainting.com, makes $2,500 a month. It sells 5 exclusive leads to my client, a painting company in Anaheim. From these leads turned customers, my client earns $25,000, and gives me a 10% commission. Now that I have 50+ websites, my total monthly earnings come up to $52,000. And I hardly have to touch my websites!

If you want to learn how to do this business model, check out my local lead gen course. I teach you how to quickly create websites and rank them with SEO, and find a good niche and business to work with. You can also get started right away if you work with one of my roofing clients. He’ll pay you a commission (around 1-5%) for every site you set up for him.