Crossword Genius

Overly-excited drunk reported lift salesman (5)

Ross

I believe the answer is:

hyper

'overly-excited' is the definition.

'reported lift salesman' is the wordplay.
'reported' becomes 'hy' (I can't explain this - if you can you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'lift' shows that the letters should be reversed in order (I've seen 'lifting' mean this).
'salesman' becomes 'rep' (I've seen this before).
'rep' back-to-front is 'per'.
'hy'+'per'='HYPER'

'drunk' is the link.
This may not be correct. It may belong to another bit of the clue.

(Other definitions for hyper that I've seen before include "Prefix meaning 'Excessive'" , "Unable to sit still" , "Slang adjective for over-active or highly-strung" , "Abnormally active" , "Overexcited" .)

I've seen this clue in The Independent.
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