Most people have a few questions about how to sell gold for cash. The most common question we hear is, “how much is my gold worth?”
Unfortunately there is no way any honest gold buyer can answer that question without personally evaluating your gold. It cannot be answered on a website, and it can’t be answered over the phone. After you read this page you will understand why that is.
Remember, it’s easy to sell gold for cash. Basically you bring it in to our local cash-for-gold locations, we’ll weight it up and make you a cash offer. If you like it, we fill out a receipt and you’re on your way with cold hard cash for gold. It only takes a few minutes.
No matter which local gold buyers you deal with, all gold buyers look at four factors when they buy your gold to determine what price to offer for your gold. Once you understand these four factors, and how the gold buying business really works, you can sell your gold like pro and get the maximum cash for gold.
WARNING!!! You don’t have to understand any of the information on this page, or be good with math to sell your gold. We will explain everything to you when you come in to sell your gold in our local cash for gold locations.
We like to be as transparent as possible so we provide this “insider” information to you here on our gold buyer websites in case you’re interested. Again, you do not need to know or understand any of this to sell your gold for cash! Just bring your old gold in and and we’ll pay you cash on the spot, easy as one, two three.
Without further delay, here’s the four factors that determine how much you’ll get for your gold.
FIRST: Purity of Your Gold
The Karat weight of your jewelry is a measurement of the percentage of gold the item contains. Pure gold is 24K gold. In the United States a lot of gold is 14K, which is actually only about 56.8% pure gold, the rest is an alloy of other non-gold metals, like brass and copper. When you sell your gold, the amount of cash for gold you receive from a gold buyer is always based on the physical “pure gold” weight. If you have exactly one ounce of 14K gold, you will receive a cash for gold offer based on .568 ounces of pure gold.
1oz of 14K gold = .583oz of 24K gold
Here’s a helpful gold karat conversion chart for you:
22K Gold vs. 24K Gold: 91.6% Pure Gold
18K Gold vs. 24K Gold: 75.0% Pure Gold
14k Gold vs. 24K Gold: 58.3% Pure Gold
10K Gold vs. 24K Gold: 41.7% Pure Gold
Remember, 24K Gold is pure (fine) gold.
Most gold jewelry is marked or stamped with the karat weight. If it isn’t there is a good chance it isn’t gold. But be careful, some gold isn’t stamped, and some gold is stamped incorrectly! When you bring your gold in we will separate it into piles based on karat weight. If we aren’t sure about the karat weight of your gold, or if a piece isn’t stamped, we’ll test it for you on the spot. Never throw out your old un-stamped gold jewelry without having it tested because you just never know!
SECOND: Physical Weight of Your Gold
The actual physical weight of your gold can be expressed in Ounces, Troy Ounces, Grams or Pennyweights (DWT). Most gold buyers will weigh your gold with a very sensitive electronic scale and use the pennyweight or DWT setting. There are 20 penny weights to an ounce of gold.
It’s very easy to understand, but here’s a simple penny weight DWT to OZ gold conversion chart so you can visualize it:
40 DWT = 2.0oz
20 DWT = 1.0oz
10 DWT = 0.5oz
Simply divide the pennyweight (DWT) of your gold by twenty (20) and you’ll see how many ounces of gold you have. But remember you still have to adjust for the percentage of pure gold based on your gold’s karat weight, as explained above. For example, if you have 20 pennyweights of 14K gold, you have only a little more than half an ounce of pure gold. That will still bring you a lot of cash though!
THIRD: Gold Buyers Prices
Most gold buyers publicly post or display their gold prices, the prices they buy gold at, on a daily basis. These are usually expressed in $x.xx (DWT) / xK. Meaning that they pay x amount of cash per pennyweight of gold based on the karat weight. The price a gold buyer is willing to pay takes into account many factors, such as the spot price of gold, their market exposure, the relationship they have with the precious metal gold refiners, how much their refiner charges, their business overhead expenses, and their profit margin and the amount of risk they are willing to take.
When a gold buyer pays you today for gold, they will not be able to sell your gold to a refiner and get cash for a few days, and if the gold market goes down, they could lose a lot of money. Also, refiners don’t buy gold the way retail gold buyers at jewelry stores buy gold from the public. They don’t pay their gold sellers until AFTER they melt it down and determine the ACTUAL purity. So when gold buyers make a mistake and say buy gold at the 14K rate when it’s really only 10K, the gold buyer takes a financial loss. And don’t forget, gold buyers have to pay the mortgage and feed the family too! So they have to make a profit even after all of the risk. Keep this in mind when you want to sell gold for cash!
You may be asking yourself,
Why can’t I just sell my gold to a refiner and cut out the middle man gold buyer?
Here’s why. Real gold refiners do not deal with the public. They usually have the following policy in place:
To sell us scrap metal, you must represent a company/business whose activity pertains to precious metals. Examples of such businesses include jewelers, pawn shops, antique dealers, manufacturers and dental laboratories.
Of course, some gold buyers will claim to be refiners, but it’s just B.S. because real precious metal gold refiners just don’t deal with small quantity public gold sellers.
That’s not really a problem though because gold buyer and refiners work on volume, meaning the price difference you would get between a gold buyer at a jewelry store verus an actual gold refiner is relatively minimal.
Not to mention, most individuals want cash fast for gold right then and there. Would you trust your gold with a refiner for three days while they melt and assay your gold before paying you cash for your gold? Most people who want to sell gold wouldn’t leave their gold like that, and nobody except professional gold buyers should!
FOURTH: Spot Prices for Gold
Gold is a commodity and trades on international over the counter (OTC) markets as opposed to an exchange. The spot price of gold is based on the trade of London Good Delivery Bars, which weigh approximately 400 ounces each. That’s about $640,000 per bar as of this writing.
That means even large refiners find it almost impossible to trade gold at the spot price because it’s only governments, large banks, central banks that have access to the gold market. That means there are at least three degrees of separation between your local gold buyer and the actual gold market.
When you read the Wall Street Journal’s headline says gold is trading at $1,600 a ounce, or you see the financial news anchors on CNBC getting all hot and bothered about gold’s latest move, don’t think that’s the price your local gold buyer, or even his refiner is able to sell gold at. It’s long distance between your local gold buyers, or main street USA, and the international spot gold delivery market!
Conclusion
Well, that’s the end of this short how to sell gold tutorial. I hope you found it helpful, but remember, you do not have to understand any of this to sell your gold for cash. Just bring your gold in and we’ll walk you through the gold selling process, and in just a few minutes you’ll have turned your gold into cash.
