How To Get The Most Cash For Gold

The world is facing an economic crisis now. There are many people who find it hard to find the money necessary for everyday living. Many people need money to eat, pay their rent or mortgage and to live.  Whether they come from rich or poor families, there are people who need immediate cash and with the price of gold being at a near all time high many people are selling their unwanted, broken or out of style gold jewelry for cash.

I have been in the business of buying precious metals for just over  a decade.  When I started pretty much the only competition were the Pawn Shops who generally paid the very least they could, people who tend to use pawn shops tend to be of a desperate nature, when you want to sell gold jewelry for cash the worst time to do so is when you’re in hurry, if you’re in dire need of money unscrupulous gold buyers will sense this and try and low ball you as much as they can. During the last decade the price of gold has fluctuated greatly and recently hit an all time high of just over $1,275.00 U.S. per ounce.  This combined with the poor economy has led to a glut of start up scrap gold buyers, many of whom are trying to make a quick buck off of the poor circumstances of others.

I’ve been in this business a long time and come across people from all walks of life, rich, middle class and some lower class.  Surprisingly enough the majority of the people I buy from are just average people looking to sell gold for cash, I don’t deal with stolen merchandise, travel to skeptical or dangerous areas and in general have a pleasant clientele that simply want to get a fair price for their unwanted items.

The reason people sell their unwanted gold jewelry, silverware, coins etc. varies, some need the funds to pay off bills or live, some sell their items to go shopping, some are selling the items of deceased family members, many have accumulated a variety of items they no longer wear and could use the cash for other purposes that suit their present needs.  Of course many of my clients are women and usually have items from previous boyfriends or husbands they no longer need.

Finding A Gold Buyer

If you do a search online for ‘gold jewelry buyer’ ’sell my jewelry’ or ‘gold buyer’ etc you will see an onslaught of websites all offering you the supposed best price for your items.  I’m amazed, it seems like every week if not everyday there are new sites offering to buy your gold scrap, everyone’s a gold buyer these days.

Finding A Gold Buyer – Tips

Here’s some points to keep in mind when deciding to dealing with a company and avoiding the increasing number of cash for gold scams.

1.  Do they have a phone number so you can speak to a real person?  I’m often amazed at how many of these online dealers don’t even provide you with the ability to speak to them and they expect you to blindly send them your items. My company does offer a shipping service where you ship us your items for pricing but we always encourage you to give us a call ahead of time if for no other reason then your peace of mind.

2.  Do they have a physical location of office where you can meet them in person if you choose?  We offer our Mail in Service, Book an appointment at our office service and our We travel to you service.

3.  Do they list their prices on their website?  Again I’m amazed how many companies do not list their payment prices, they only say ‘we pay the most’, hmmm sounds a little fishy to me.  We list and update our prices daily so you know the exact price you can expect to get per gram for your things.

4.  Watch out for companies that will list their prices in DWT or Pennyweight, you see, 1 DWT or Pennyweight = 1.55 grams, some companies will list the payment prices in DWT or Pennyweight to make their prices seem high, we list our prices in both grams and DWT so you can easily compare.  Companies that list in only Dwt/Pennyweight will list this fact in very small print.

5. You can also do a search online for ‘ cash for gold reviews ‘ or ‘ sell gold jewelry ‘and see what others experience’s have been for companies you’re thinking of dealing with.

Jewelry Stores

10 years ago very few jewelry stores purchased used or old gold jewelry, today it’s the norm, this can be good or bad depending on who you go to see.  Like any business there are reputable and not so reputable owners, this applies to jewelry stores as well, if you have a good relationship with a jeweler he may offer you a fair price for your things, still, it’s best to shop around for prices.

How Does It Work When Selling Gold Jewelry?

When you sell your jewelry your price will be determined by two factors, it weight (usually measured in grams).  So if you have a 10 gram 10 karat gold chain and the gold buyer is paying $9.05 per gram for 10k you will receive $90.50 for your chain.

As the karat goes up so does the price, for example here is a list of what we’re currently paying for gold jewelry: (Remember: 1 Dwt or Pennyweight = 1.55 grams)

9 karat $8.10/gram or $12.56/dwt
10 karat $9.05 /gram or $14.02/dwt
14 karat $12.70 /gram or $19.65/dwt
Dental Gold $14.05/gram or $21.77dwt
18 karat $17.45/gram or $27.05/dwt
22 karat $22.05 /gram or $35.10/dwt
24 karat $23.25 /gram or $37.12/dwt

Selling Gold Bullion: We pay 92.5% of spot price, so if gold’s spot price is $1,000.00 we would pay you $925.00 for your 1 ounce bar, .999 fine coin, wafer etc.

Different Kinds Of Gold You Can Sell For Cash

There are many kinds of precious metals that people want to sell for cash.  They want to  cash for their gold. These items include:

  • Gold Jewelry

  • Gold Chains

  • Gold Necklaces

  • Gold Rings

  • Gold Wedding Bands

  • Old Class Rings

  • Gold Earrings ( pairs or singles )

  • Gold Pendants

  • Dental Gold

  • Solid Gold Watches

  • Gold Bracelets

  • Tangled Chains

  • Gold Bangles

  • Scrap Gold (gold jewelry in any condition, referred to as broken gold)

  • Gold Coins

  • Gold Bars , all sizes.

You can sell any kind of gold, platinum or silver for cash.  Depending on your needs you may want to sell the items outright or if it’s a temporary cash bridge you may want to borrow against their value in the form of a loan through a pawn broker.

When you use a pawn broker your item acts as collateral for the loan, you need to keep up your payments or the broker has the right to sell your item outright.

Reasons People Sell Their Things:

They are in dire need of the money. They want immediate cash.  The gold jewelry may no longer have sentimental value as in the case of divorce. Dental gold normally comes from elderly people who are getting dental replacements.

A lot of gold jewelry is sold when given as gifts, usually when a boyfriend/girlfriend break up.  Estate jewelry is sold in the event of a death and the inheritance holds no sentiment instead the family member would prefer cash.  A lot of gold jewelry goes out of style, is broken, there may only be one odd earring etc. In these cases people would prefer to sell the jewelry for cash, perhaps pay off some bills, take a trip or purchase something for themselves or their home.

Conclusion:

Whatever your reason for wanting cash for your gold make sure you’re dealing with a reputable company or dealer, speak to them on the phone first, ask their payment rates per gram I.e What do you pay for 10k, 14k, 18k etc.

Many people in this business are pushy and disrespectful, these people are out for a quick buck and usually are not paying you a very good rate.  Deal with someone who is friendly and will openly tell you his/her rates.

Good luck in selling your unwanted gold.

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Silver FAQ

I often get many questions on silver, be it on jewelry, coins, silverware, electrical contacts and more so I decided to compile a listed of the questions and my answers here on what we’ll call the silver faq page.  With the recent increase in the price of silver more and more people are looking into liquidating their unwanted material and getting a  bit of cash for it.  Silver is a funny thing, many people starting out buying scrap avoid it as they think there’s no money in it which is good for me, it can be quite profitable if you’re buying it in bulk but even bits and pieces add up over the course of a year or so.  We also run gold parties and most of our competitors don’t purchase silver but we do, you don’t get a great deal from one party but it adds up to kilograms over  a month or two.  The only problem is that most older ladies bring in their ’silverware sets’ which tend to be silver plated and not something we purchase.

I have listed some of the more common questions below, if you an inquiry about your items, be it silver, gold or platinum feel free to use our contact form and I’ll try to give you some advice if I can.

Silverware:

Q: I have 52 piece set of 1847 Rogers “Eternally Your’s silverware that I am looking to sell, is this something you would purchase?  If yes would you be able to provide an approximate purchase price. Thank you.

A: We purchase sterling silverware, unfortunately 99.9% of the Rogers Bros flatware is silver plated, unless is it stamped/hallmarked with one of the following:  925, Ster, Sterling, Sterling Silver or Stg
… it is not something we would purchase.  Rogers Bros flatware is copper or brass with a silver plate.  Good luck with your items.

Q:   I have most of a 12 serving sterling flatware service, as well as several sterling personal grooming items (mirror, brush, nail file, comb) and some silver rings that I am interested in selling. Are these items that your firm would likely be interested in purchasing?

Understanding that you can’t possibly know the weight/value of my items, what might be a typical payment for, say, a sterling silver dinner fork or knife?

A: The weight/value of sterling silverware varies greatly from maker to maker.  I purchased 2 sets yesterday from a lady and paid her just over $1,700.00.  They were fairly heavy sets totaling over 5000 grams. Most sets are not that heavy.

Having said that a fork can be anywhere from 25 to 45 grams, larger spoons the same, smaller spoon around 20 grams.  Knives are different and are usually ‘loaded’ with resin or stainless steel with only the cover of the handle being sterling silver at approximately 15 grams.

A sterling silverware set can fetch anywhere from $200.00 to $1,200.00 depending on the number of items and weight.  Hope that helps, yes we would purchase your items if you’re looking to sell.

Q: How do we find out what you would pay for sterling 950 tea pots and a large platter?

A: We do purchase sterling and higher grade silver, price is determined by weight so it’s difficult to give you a price without knowing the items weight and if it is loaded with another material.  We are currently paying .33 cents per gram for 950 silver.  You need to be certain that it is 950 silver and not silver plated as we do not purchase silver plated items.

Silver Bullion:

Q: Do you buy silver bullion at market value?

A: We purchase all bullion and pay 93.5% of spot price.

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sterling-silver-mirror

Sterling Silverware Learn What To Look For

I get many questions regarding sterling silverware and silver in general.  Most of the questions I get concern tea sets, flatware, grooming items etc.  In the past I would book many appointments when people would either call or fill out our contact form stating that they had an old set of ’sterling’ silverware that they’d like to sell, unfortunately the bulk of these sets turned out to be silver plated and not something I would purchase.

I buy sterling silver in any form be it flatware, jewelry, old mirrors etc. The problem is that with the recent spike in the silver spot price and all the companies advertising to buy your old gold jewelry, silver jewelry, coins etc many people believe they are sitting on a nice chunk of change with their mother’s old ’silverware’.  Most of these people believe that since it’s in a silverware chest and have assumed that it is real sterlingware worth some money.  The problem is most of these flatware sets are silver plated and worth next to nothing as far and precious metals go.

In the last year I’ve taken to screening these prospective clients more carefully thus not wasting their time or mine.  I’m very specific in having them verify that their items have one of the following markings/hallmarks before I agree to price their set:

925, Ster, Sterling, Sterling Silver or Stg.  As you are likely aware sterling silver contains 92.5% actual silver, the remaining 7.5% can be made up of copper, nickel or other metals.

If they don’t have one of the  hallmarks listed above 99.5% of the time it is not an item that has any monetary value to me and is usually silver plated and not something I would buy.   I have purchased silverware sets both small and large and have paid as much as $1,750.00 for one set and as little as $200.00 for others.  The price your set will fetch depends on it’s weight in grams, you must also take into account that knives, candlesticks, hand mirrors, large brushes and other larger items are usually ‘loaded’ which means they are partially filled with another substance other than sterling silver.  An example of this are knives, the only portion of the knife in a sterling silverware set that is actually sterling silver is the outer sleeve of the handle, the blade will be stainless steel and the inside of the handle will be stainless steel or sometime a concrete type mixture in older sets.

Below I’ve listed some photos to illustrate my points further so you can see what is really inside different items:

Loaded Sterling Silver Knives:

As mentioned above sterling silver knives are loaded with different materials, in the images below you can get a good idea on the amount of silver to filler ratio. As you can see we’ve cut off the stainless steel blade revealing a concrete type mixture inside with only the outside skin of the handle being actual sterling silver.  On this particular knife, the knife intact weighed in at 67 grams,  after we cut off the blade the weight was 39.7 grams and after we removed the inside loading mixture the actual weight of the sterling silver was 16.7 grams.  When I price knives I actually pay 25% of  the total weight of the knife to allow for variations which do occur.

Sterling Silver Knife Inside

Sterling Silver Knife Inside

This picture is of the exact same knife, you will see we have an intact knife on the left, in the middle we have cut off the stainless steel blade, and on the right you see that the sterling silver is the outer part of the handle , inside it is filled with a concrete type mixture.

sterling silver knives revealed

sterling silver knives revealed

Sterling Silver Candlesticks

Candlesticks are another thing to be mindful of if you are purchasing them for scrap value, in the picture below you will see a sterling silver candlestick we’ve dismantled, beforehand it weighed in at 525 grams, after the loaded material was removed the weight of the sterling silver was 233 grams.  As you can see again we have a grey concrete type filler inside the candlestick which makes up more than half of it’s total weight.

Sterling Silver Candlestick

Sterling Silver Candlestick

Sterling Silver Mirrors

Sterling silver mirrors are something else you will run into, the picture below was taken after the actual glass/mirror was removed, the weight of the original items intact was 575 grams, after we removed the glass/mirror the actual weight of the sterling silver was129 grams.

Sterling Silver Mirror

Sterling Silver Mirror

If you have more questions about sterling silver, jewelry, coins or silverware etc visit our Silver FAQ page devoted to just that.

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