Selling ships in Starfield isn’t the most lucrative business in the game; in fact, it’s downright pitiful. That’s like half the reason to be a space pirate! Well, we’re sick of being ripped off by ship technicians. If you are too, then we’re happy to teach you how to make selling ships far more profitable in the long run.
How to Sell Ships for a Tidy Profit in Starfield
Before we begin, you’ll need two skills: Commerce and Targeting Control Systems. Commerce is located under the Social tree and Targeting Control Systems under Piloting. Both are on the first tier in Starfield, so if you have two points to spend, you can get them right away.
- Steal a ship.
It doesn’t matter from who, but if you’d like to avoid getting a bounty, then pick up a bounty mission from a mission board. Target the engines, then board to take out the remaining crew.
- Register your (stolen) ship.
Do not register your ship with a ship technician. Open your inventory, into the ship menu, and switch over to your new ship. You’ll see the option to register in the bottom-right.
- Now sell your ship.
You can now safely sell your ship to a ship technician, like the one at New Atlantis.
The trick here is that registering ships yourself only takes into account the ship’s original value, regardless of your Commerce skill. On the other hand, a technician’s registration fee increases as the value of your ship goes up, which it does naturally with the Commerce skill.
For example, I stole a ship valued at 9034 credits—without Commerce. Ship services charged me 7597 credits for registration. After spending a point in Commerce, the same ship was now worth 9936 credits, but cost 8356 credits to register. However, registering the same ship by myself, with Commerce, only cost me 7597 credits. I made 2339 credits as opposed to 1437.
See the disparity? That’s how you make selling ships more profitable in Starfield. As you invest more points into your Commerce skill, a ship’s value increases, but the registration fee stays the same, so long as you do it yourself. It still feels a tad low, but this trick at least makes being a space pirate more rewarding.
