make out like a bandit
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To make a very large profit or be extremely successful. You can actually make out like a bandit if you know all the fees and expenses that you're entitled to. Sarah is making out like a bandit developing apps for government agencies. They made out like bandits when they're startup company was purchased by the global tech giant.
make out like a bandit
Rur. to make a large profit. Joe's making out like a bandit, selling expensive cameras. Mary made out like a bandit, playing twenty-one in Las Vegas.
make out like a bandit
Succeed extremely well, as in He invested in real estate and made out like a bandit. This expression likens other forms of success to that of a triumphant robber. It may, however, come from an intermediate source, that is, the use of bandit (or one-armed bandit) for a slot machine, which is far more profitable for the house than for gamblers. [Slang; c. 1970]
make out like a bandit
Slang To be highly successful in a given enterprise.
make out like a bandit
Operate very successfully. This slangy term refers not to an outlaw but to the one-armed bandit of gambling—that is, a slot machine. Since slot machines invariably win, making out like one is synonymous with success. Sometimes shortened to simply like a bandit, the phrase dates from the second half of the 1900s. Cartoonist Gary Trudeau used it in Doonesbury in 1985: “Unlike our farm belt cousins, Californians have been makin’ out like bandits.”