College kid tries to sell his future on eBay

A student puts a percentage of his future income up for sale on eBay, hoping investors will cover his education costs.


(FSB Magazine) -- Stocks, bonds or Steen? That's a question that 19-year-old Ron Steen of Anaheim Hills,Calif., hopes investors will wrestle with.

In August, Steen put himself on eBay (Charts) to pay for his college education, offering 2 percent of all future earnings to the highest bidder, with a minimum $100,000 bid.

student_ebay_invest.03.jpg

"I am the real deal" and "a very intelligent guy," he wrote on eBay.

He says that he expects to earn "way more" than $125,000 a year until he turns 65, at which point his investor would break even on a $100,000 investment. (Steen would have to average more than $1.5 million a year to match an investment that yielded a 6 percent return, compounded annually over the same period.)

Not everyone is convinced. eBay removed Steen's auction after five days for violating the site's charity policy. Bloggers also pointed out spelling errors in his ad.

For now Steen's dad is helping pay the tuition at California State University at Fullerton. But the personable Steen (mr.steen@yahoo.com) says he's optimistic an investor will come through.

What do you think of Steen's stunt? Let us know at fsb_mail@timeinc.com.

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Most stock quote data provided by BATS. Market indices are shown in real time, except for the DJIA, which is delayed by two minutes. All times are ET. Disclaimer. Morningstar: © 2018 Morningstar, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Factset: FactSet Research Systems Inc. 2018. All rights reserved. Chicago Mercantile Association: Certain market data is the property of Chicago Mercantile Exchange Inc. and its licensors. All rights reserved. Dow Jones: The Dow Jones branded indices are proprietary to and are calculated, distributed and marketed by DJI Opco, a subsidiary of S&P Dow Jones Indices LLC and have been licensed for use to S&P Opco, LLC and CNN. Standard & Poor's and S&P are registered trademarks of Standard & Poor's Financial Services LLC and Dow Jones is a registered trademark of Dow Jones Trademark Holdings LLC. All content of the Dow Jones branded indices © S&P Dow Jones Indices LLC 2018 and/or its affiliates.