Man trades red paperclip for a $50,000 house after years of being broke
Blogger Kyle MacDonald pulled off a stunt where he traded a paperclip for increasingly valuable items, until he got a house
Kit Roberts
A man once successfully managed to trade a red paperclip for a house worth $50,000.
Kyle MacDonald, from Canada, was inspired by a game called Bigger and Better, where you are given a starting object and have to trade it for something better.
You then repeat this process as many times as you can to see what you end up when the time runs out.
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In Kyle's case this ended up being his very own house worth $50,000.
Now anyone reading this now and wondering what kind of mould-infested burnt out wreck of a barely-habitable hovel you could get for $50,000 in 2024, don't worry.
The succession of swaps happened between 2005 and 2006, back when house prices were still within the realms of affordability, and the house itself looked rather lovely.
Kyle carried out the series of swaps over a period of around one year, with each taking him a little bit closer.
Speaking to the BBC, he said: "I knew it was possible. You can do anything if you put your mind to it."
The blogger revealed that he had wanted to own his own house and decided to attempt the unusual scheme to attain it.
Speaking to AFP in 2006, he said: "My girlfriend and I paid rent for an apartment in Montreal and I'd always wanted to own my own house and this is how I decided to go about it. I think I may be the first to try it online."
As for the swaps themselves, he started with a red paperclip.
This then went up to a novelty pen, which he then traded up to a ceramic doorknob.
From there he traded it up for a camping stove, with gas, then a 1,000 watt generator.
After it was briefly confiscated by the fire department, Kyle then managed to swap the generator for a beer keg with a neon sign and an IOU for it to be filled with beer.
The keg was then switched to a snowmobile, then a trip to Yakh in British Colombia.
From there it was a box truck, then a recording contract at recording studio Metalworks studio.
This then went to a year's rent in Phoenix, Arizona, before swapping that for an afternoon with rock musician Alice Cooper.
In an apparently shocking twist however, he traded an afternoon with Alice Cooper for... a snow globe?
But fear not, for this was not just any snow globe - it was a collectors' item that he swapped with director Corbin Bernsen for a role in a movie.
Finally, in July 2006 he swapped the movie part for a two-storey house in Kipling, Saskatchewan. Phew!
The house itself was since turned into a cafe called Paperclip Cottage in honor of the trades.
The stunt was praised by the BBC at the time as it 'demonstrated the power of the internet'.
Among the fans who left a comment on Kyle's website were Heather and Dan, who wrote: "Hey, what a neat planet. We're thinking of staying to see what happens next."
What a time, back when the internet was actually cool, quirky, and optimistic place.