Selling gold jewelry can be a good way to make some extra money in times of financial need. Buyers will look for gold pieces, such as coins, or broken jewelry that can then be melted, turned into ingots, and sold on the open market. Before finding a scrap gold buyer, you should learn what buyers look for, how to find a rough estimate of your jewelry’s worth, and what buyers will actually pay. Once you have done the groundwork, you can then find a good company that will take your jewelry off your hands.
Buyers will accept many types of items, some obvious and some not. Gold dealers and refiners generally look for gold rings, coins, necklaces (broken or in good repair), and bracelets. You may also be able to sell dental gold, which ranges from 18 to 24 karats. Less obvious sources of gold include cellphones, circuit boards, and motherboards. Of course, jewelry will be worth more, and old, heavy jewelry in great condition will fetch a high price. Signed antiques by well-known designers may be worth six times as much as their scrap value.
The scrap value of your jewelry will depend on the current price of gold, the weight, and the karats of your items, in addition to the factors mentioned above. Using these measurements, you can work out an estimate of your jewelry’s worth. First, separate jewelry items into groups based on their karat fineness, then weigh each group on a jeweler’s gram scale. Next, look up the price of gold per troy ounce. Since a troy ounce is always 31 grams, divide the price of gold by 31 to get the price per gram. Multiply the price per gram by the karat fineness by dividing the karat number by 24 (so for 10K, multiply by 1024), and multiply that number by the weight of your items in grams. That number is the rough worth of your items. Please note that you may receive anywhere from 30-98 of that figure depending upon where you sell your gold.