I once spent a solid 20 minutes stalking a perfect deer thru the Heartlands, carefully lined up the shot, and took it with my go-to shotgun out of pure habit, only to watch the pelt come back completely ruined. All that patience. Wasted. Because I hadn’t bothered to learn that certain weapons destroy pelt quality on smaller game. I remember actually groaning out loud at my TV.
That mistake lead me to a real rabbit hole of actually understanding how money works in this game, rather than just robbing random strangers on the road and hoping for the best, which, spoiler, is a genuinely terrible long-term strategy. Arthur Morgan’s economy goes way deeper than it looks at first glance, and once I actually learned the systems properly, I went from constantly broke to comfortably funding every gun upgrade and outfit I wanted. This is what actually worked for me.
Why Random Robbery Isn’t the Answer You Think It Is
Tho robbing strangers on the road feels like the obvious move early on. I get it. You point a gun, they give you money, end of story. The issue is, the payout is really small most of the time, a few dollars here and there, and there’s real risk: bounties, witnesses, and the law showing up right when you’re mid-robbery with nowhere to run.
I did this way too much early on in my play through and stayed broke the entire time for it. The real money in this game is in systems that take a little more setup but pay off dramatically better.
1. Loot Absolutely Everything, Every Time
This pretty much seems like a no brainer, but for the first few hours of my play through I actually avoided looting bodies because it felt tedious. It was a mistake. Every enemy you kill, every cabinet you find in an abandoned building, every strongbox you come across, it all adds up quickly over the course of a play through.
Step by step: Hold the loot button on any downed body or interactable container. Don’t skip cabinets and drawers in buildings you’re already exploring for a mission. It takes seconds and the total cash and valuables really matter.
2. Learn the Difference Between Fences and General Stores
That was the biggest change in my personal economy. You can’t sell jewelry or stolen goods to general stores, only some basic items and certain crafting materials. Fences buy stolen jewelry, valuables, and other high-value loot, and they appear later in the story as you progress further into Chapter 2.
You’ll find fences at places like Emerald Ranch, Rhodes, Van Horn Trading Post, and later in Saint Denis. I carried useless jewelry around for too long expecting general stores to buy it. As soon as I found my first fence, my available cash doubled overnight just from offloading stuff I was hoarding.
3. Hunt Properly, Not Just for Fun
Back to the story of the ruined pelt. Hunting is actually one of the best sources of steady income in the game, but only if you’re doing it right.
Core rule: weapon size must match animal size. Small game animals require a varmint rifle or a bow with small game arrows. Using a shotgun or bigger rifle on small game messes up the pelt quality. You turn a perfect pelt into a poor pelt that is worth way less to sell.
Step-by-step for actually profitable hunting:
- Study the Compendium (accessible through your satchel) to learn which weapon is recommended for each animal.
- Aim for clean kills, ideally headshots on larger animals, to preserve pelt quality.
- Skin the animal immediately after the kill and carry the pelt to a trapper or butcher rather than letting it degrade over time.
- Sell perfect pelts specifically to trappers, since they pay significantly more than general stores for high-quality pelts, and some perfect pelts unlock crafting recipes for better gear.
4. Chase Down Treasure Maps
There are tons of treasure hunts scattered throughout the story and they are truly some of the best lump sum payouts in the whole game. Some, like the Jack Hall Gang treasure line, span multiple maps that build on each other at different points in the story.
Some of these clues present cryptic, rough drawings and vague landmarks instead of precise coordinates. Most players check out dedicated treasure map guide sites when they get stuck, and that’s totally normal because a few of these hunts deliberately obscure enough that figuring them out blind could take up an entire evening.
5. Take Up Bounty Hunting
Once you unlock bounty boards via the appropriate stranger mission line, bounty hunting is actually a really solid, repeatable source of income. You track down wanted men, bring them in dead or alive, for a cash reward that increases with the danger of the target.
Practical tip: In most cases, bringing targets in alive pays more than dead, but it’s riskier and takes longer as you have to restrain them and often fight your way out without simply gunning everybody down. Balance the risk against how much time you really have for that particular session.
6. Gamble, But Know Your Limits
You can play poker , blackjack , dominoes etc anywhere in the world . I would not say gambling is a primary income strategy , but if you are reasonably good at reading opponents and folding bad hands instead of chasing losses a good poker session can actually pad your wallet meaningfully .
Early on I made the mistake of thinking poker was a guarantyd money printer and lost more than I made a few times before I actually got a feel for when to fold. View it as a fun bonus, not your primary financial strategy.
7. Don’t Carry Everything You Own at Once
I have paid for this lesson more than once. If Arthur gets knocked out or killed, say during a mission or a random encounter gone south, you can lose a significant portion of the cash you’re physically carrying. I got ambushed once, carrying a really big amount of cash after a big treasure haul, went down in the fight, and woke up considerably poorer than I’d been 10 minutes earlier.
What I do now is regularly deposit larger sums in the communal funds of the camp, rather than being a mobile bank vault. It also helps with the overall upgrades and morale of your camp, so it’s not like the money is just gone, it’s just no longer a liability you are physically carrying around.
8. Complete the Money Lending Side Missions
There is a stranger mission line about a camp member that loans money at interest and needs help collecting from people who haven’t paid up. It’s a really fun questline with some dark comedy of its own, but it also goes a long way to funding the camp and unlocking some nice discounts later on.
9. Rob Trains, But Plan It Properly
Train robberies can be very profitable, mail cars are often full of cash and valuables, but attempting it without a plan usually ends up in a chaotic shootout that costs more in tonics and ammo than you actually make. If you’re going to rob a train, do it deliberately: board quietly if you can, hit the mail car specifically, and have an escape route planned rather than improvising once alarms start going off.
10. Don’t Ignore Legendary Animal Hunts
Legendary animals are scattered around the map, and they drop unique pelts that cannot be obtained any other way, and selling or crafting from them gives you legitimately powerful rewards in both cash and unique crafted gear. These are a bit more involved than regular hunts, considering that legendary animals tend to have particular locations and habits but they’re certainly worth hunting down throughout the course of a play through, rather than avoiding entirely.
Common Mistakes to Avoid
Here are a few things I’d flag based on my own painful trial and error:
- Using the wrong weapon on small game. This ruins pelt quality and tanks your hunting income for no reason.
- Selling jewelry and stolen goods to general stores instead of fences. They simply won’t buy it, and you’ll waste time thinking you’re stuck with worthless inventory.
- Carrying too much cash without depositing to camp. One bad encounter can wipe out a chunk of what you’ve earned.
- Treating gambling as a reliable income source. It’s fun and occasionally profitable, but inconsistent enough that you shouldn’t depend on it.
- Skipping treasure maps because the clues seem too vague. The payouts are genuinely worth the extra effort of looking up a guide if you’re stuck.
- Robbing random strangers as a primary strategy. The payout-to-risk ratio is bad compared to almost everything else on this list.
Final Thoughts
Reflecting on that ruined pelt moment, I feel grateful it happened early on because it forced me to learn how this game’s economy works instead of coasting on bad habits throughout the playthrough. When I combined hunting, fencing, treasure hunting, and bounty work, money stopped being a constant stressor and began to feel like a natural byproduct of playing the game as it was meant to be played. Learn these systems right, and your gun collection, and Arthur’s wallet, will thank you for it.
Official Red Dead Redemption Links
Official Rockstar Games: https://www.rockstargames.com/reddeadredemption
Rockstar Official Support: https://support.rockstargames.com/
These are good choices because they’re official Rockstar sources, than random third-party websites.
Experience the epic Western adventures that defined a generation
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