Born to Sell Review – Is This a Good Tool for Options Taders?

About Born to Sell

BornToSell.com is a software that helps users generate income by finding covered calls to sell. Covered calls require you to own the underlying stock and sell call options. You capture the premium, and there’s no cost if the option isn’t executed. It’s a little like collecting rent for holding stock positions.

In our Born To Sell review, we’ll explain how this platform helps you find covered calls to sell and help you decide if it’s right for you.

Trading Style

Born to Sell focuses on covered call options.

Covered call options require that you first buy the stock, then sell the call options to a buyer in exchange for a premium. The options contract enables the holder to buy the underlying stock from you at a set price, known as the strike price. Since 75% of all options expire worthless, there is an inherent advantage to options sellers.

Selling covered calls is a strategy that’s primarily used by swing traders and investors. It’s best suited for traders who have a portfolio and seek to generate passive income. Of course, there’s a risk of having the shares taken from them at the option’s strike price if the shares become in-the-money (ITM), meaning the price surpasses the strike price before or at the expiration date.

Born to Sell Trading Strategies

Writing a call is the same as selling or shorting the call, but it’s covered since you already own the stock. A naked write is much riskier since you don’t own the stock yet, but are still obligated to buy the stock if it surpasses the strike price. So, you could be forced to buy the stock at a much higher price later. Strategies in Born To Sell can be played naked, but that’s best suited for more seasoned traders since the downside risk potential is technically unlimited.

Born To Sell offers several covered call search tools.

Covered Calls/Buy-Writes: Buy-writes are positions taken specifically for writing covered calls simultaneously in a single transaction. The software provides basic and advanced settings that you can use to scan through over 424,000 potential covered calls. Born To Sell also conveniently provides additional details like time premium, net debit, rate of return if flat, and downside protection for potential covered call trades.

Top 10 Covered Calls: The software updates the top 10 most popular covered calls amongst users throughout the day. This feature lets you see where in the market the action is right now for trading covered calls. From there you can explore other strikes and expirations within the same options chain. Born To Sell shows earnings dates and how much downside protection you get from the trade, which takes care of some of the legwork you’d normally have to perform if searching for trades manually.

Dividend Capture: This strategy seeks to collect both the dividend and covered call premium for the underlying stock, by executing a buy-write just before the ex-dividend date to collect the dividend and then close the trade at or near the expiration date. The covered call screener provides a list of stocks with ex-dividend dates just before the chosen expiration date. It also allows users to select the minimum dividend payments and stock price range. To avert potentially extreme volatility, users can bypass ex-dividend dates that coincide too closely with earnings dates.

Additional Features

The more you tinker with the software, the more features you discover. For example, you can enter your income goals and it will scan for trade candidates automatically. You can also track your covered call portfolio in real-time throughout the day. A personal calendar notifies you of upcoming ex-dividend and earnings dates for your positions. E-mail alerts can be set for watchlist and dividend triggers.

Born to Sell Training Content

The site has quite an extensive library of tutorials and content about the covered calls strategy and how to use the software (services like Investopedia Academy can also be used to learn more about covered calls). The learning curve is relatively mild for anyone who has basic options trading experience. For total newbies with no options experience, the tutorials are full of examples and help simplify the whole sequence.

Born to Sell Pricing

Born To Sell offers a single subscription that costs $59.95 per month, $149.95 per quarter, or $499.95 per year. You can try out the software with a two-week free trial (credit card required).

What Type of Trader is BornToSell.com Best For?

While the concept of covered-call trading appears simple, the outcomes are not always as predictable. They work best in rising or flat markets. However, falling and bear markets can turn the strategy upside down. For this reason, users should have a solid underlying trading methodology that they can rely on to forecast potential market turns and identify trends.

With that in mind, Born To Sell is best suited for experienced swing traders that are efficient with options and hedging strategies to handle down markets. It’s also good for long-term investors with a buy-and-hold strategy who want to generate extra income and aren’t concerned about a bear market in the near future.

Traders and investors should be well-capitalized since stocks must first be purchased to write the calls. Using overnight margin will entail more expenses, so leverage must be managed carefully. I’d recommend a minimum account size of at least $30,000 to use Born To Sell to its full potential.

If you are looking for a more diversified options trading strategy, check out our Motley Fool Options review.

Is Born to Sell Worth the Money?

For capitalized traders with expertise in options trading, Born To Sell offers great value. It eliminates much of the legwork involved in executing a covered call strategy. I especially like that it offers additional details like downside risk, returns, and ex-dividend and earnings dates. The free two-week trial gives a good idea of the value the service provides. For those with large portfolios, Born To Sell provides an opportunity to earn somewhat passive income using existing stock holdings.

Pros:

• Simple yet powerful real-time scans for covered call candidates
• Easy-to-understand settings and user configurations
• Efficient training and instructional tutorials and videos to cut the learning curve
• Convenient dashboard for portfolio management of covered call strategies
• User-friendly and intuitive interface

Cons:

• Covered call strategies are less effective in falling markets
• Buy-writes are capital intensive