Selling your gold and silver.

For whatever reason, there comes a point for many of us when we have to turn part, or all, of our hard won gold and silver into cash. To some this may seem a sacrilege and the memories associated with a particular item would far outweigh any monetary value but not everyone can hoard their treasures and let’s face it a bit of extra cash to pay for a holiday, buy a new detector or even just pay a bill never goes astray.

So how do you go about turning a gold ring or a pile of silver coins into actual folding type money? In this article I will relate some of my experiences in the selling of some of the gold and silver I have found over the years and hopefully highlight some of the pitfalls you may encounter. I will primarily be dealing with your average type finds. Those exceptional pieces of jewellery or rarer coins require a different approach and won’t be covered here. Firstly though, I would like to add a disclaimer in that these are my experiences and what has worked for me may not necessarily give you the same returns. I make no recommendations to any particular method of selling and acknowledge that there are other options other than the ones I have mentioned.

Ok, as our starting point you should work out what the current precious metal value of your items are. We can use this figure to get an approximate value on our likely returns depending on which selling method we use. To get this estimate we need to accurately weight the items as even a small difference in weight can mean several dollars in returns or an accusation of being a rip-off merchant if your weight differs from that of the buyer. Small electronic scales can be purchased, relatively cheaply through detecting shops or on eBay, and are a worthwhile investment.

Having determined the weight, you then can work out the value using a calculator based on the purity and the current gold or silver prices or you can simply go the this site (http://www.dendritics.com/scales/metal-calc.asp) and punch in the numbers and get an accurate price in Australian dollars or the currency of your choice.

We now have what the current precious metal value of our items are so let’s look at some options for selling.

Pawn Shops:

Although they go by many names practically every city and major town in Australia will have a pawn shop. These places will buy your gold and silver but at a price way below the market value of the metal. To give you an idea, as research for this article, I rang a couple of places in my home city recently, one a small shop and one a large national company that advertises on TV, saying that I had a small quantity of scrap gold that I wished to sell. The small shop offered me $2 a gram for 9ct and $4 a gram for 18ct scrap gold, the national company offered a flat $2 a gram not differentiating between 9ct or 18ct. The current gold value at the time was approximately $10 a gram for 9ct and $20 a gram for 18ct. You don’t have to be a maths wiz to see that you are only getting between 10 to 20% of the gold value. However even though you are getting a relatively poor return the advantage is you do get your money on the spot and if you can’t be bothered trying other options then this is one that can be considered.

Sunday Markets/Trash & Treasure Markets:

Every weekend throughout the country these types of markets are run and it gives you the opportunity to present your items for sale to the public with very little hassle. You can pay your fee and put up your own stall or, if you know some-one who regularly who has a stall ask if you can put a small display on their table. Have all your items priced before opening and be prepared for haggling because people usually come to these markets looking for a bargain. In terms of pricing I generally double the metal value of the item or perhaps a bit more if it is an unusual item. I’m fortunate in that I have relatives who are regular stall holders and let me put a small box of rings and such on their table. I do, however, only put up silver and costume jewellery, no gold. The reason for this is that I do not think it is fair for them to have the responsibility of having to watch over my gold. If a couple of silver rings go missing it is no great loss but they would feel guilty if a couple of gold rings went missing, and let’s face it there are people at these places with sticky fingers.

The advantage of these markets is that you can get a better than metal price on your items but the disadvantage is that you may have to wait a while before getting a return.

Along similar line there is the option of having a garage sale but I personally am not keen on letting people know that I have a stash of gold and silver inside my house.

On-line Auctions:

With the spread of the internet the opportunity opened up to present your items to a world market rather than just the locals on a Sunday. There are a number of on-line auctions sites the largest, of course, being eBay.

Selling on eBay can be quite simple and hassle free if all goes well but can be a pain if things don’t. A few things to remember when selling to help reduce the hassles are:

• Describe your item accurately: If there are small marks or the ring is slightly out of round say so, better to not have a sale rather than an upset buyer.
• Use a clear photo: Why people insist on using blurry photo which tell you nothing is beyond me.
• Only send items by registered or insured post: Include this in your postage costs to the buyer. I have had items go missing in the post and it offers security for both parties.
• Don’t send the item till you have the money in your bank account: Even if the money lands in your account, if it looks suspicious, hold off sending the item for a couple of days because scammers are out there.

Like all auctions it’s a bit of a gamble as to what the final price may be. I have had some good returns but likewise I have had some pretty disappointing ones. In the beginning I used to start my gold items at a very low price to encourage bidders, trouble was if there was only one bidder I would have been better off throwing the item back out to sea, at least that way I would get the thrill of finding it again. Nowadays I work out the starting price at roughly 10% below the metal value and even if there is only one bidder the drop in value is not that great. At this point I should mention that you are very unlikely to get anything like the value of what a similar item would be advertised in a jewellery shop window, sometimes reality sucks.

Another thing that you need to be aware of is that there are fees associated with selling on eBay, or any on-line auction site for that matter, which include the listing fee, the final sale fee and if you use a payment method such as PayPal there are fees there as well. All of this needs to be taken into consideration when determining whether it is worth your while using an on-line auction site.

If you do make a successful sale, generally most people will pay up within a few days but sometimes it can drag out for weeks. Every now and then you will get a fake bidder who has no intention of paying but I have found nearly everyone I have dealt with to be honest and the whole transaction usually goes very smoothly.

Refineries:

Like all metals gold and silver can easily be recycled and there are refineries that specialize in the handling of precious metals.

The good thing about these places is that they take everything no matter what it looks like. They don’t care if a ring is bent or a chain broken or that your silver coins are black from having come out of the sea, it’s all metal which can be once more made into the raw material from which beautiful objects are fashioned, and, it’s terrible to say, lost again for us to find.

The fees involved vary a bit depending on the refinery but the one I have used the last couple of times charged a set fee of $150 up to 660 grams of material or over the 660 grams the fee is a $50 refining fee plus 15 cents per gram of material. So if you put in say 200 grams of mixed gold and 800 grams of silver jewellery and coins then the charge would be $50 plus $150 (15 cents by 1000 grams) which equals $200 plus an additional $20 for GST, yes the government get their share as well.

The final payment is based on the gold and silver price on the day of settlement less 5%. The whole refining process takes 3 – 4 days and the money is paid directly into your bank account. If you declare at the start that you are a hobbyist then, apart from the GST, the whole thing is tax free.

Obviously the more gold you put in the better the return but be aware that if you are putting in a lot of 1946 to 1964 pre-decimal silver the fees will erode a fair amount of your returns. For example if you put in 1 kilogram of these coins then the fee is $200 but because they are only 50% silver then the silver content is only 500 grams and as silver is worth roughly 50 cents per gram at the moment that means you will only get back $250 minus your $200 fee giving you a net return of only $50.

Well I hope I’ve given you a few ideas about how to go about selling your finds and getting the best possible returns. The one good thing about this hobby is that even if you do sell it you can always go out and find some more.

Happy Hunting

Treasureseeker99