Value/selling silver jewelry purchased from yard sales?

Paper

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I've bought a few pieces of silver from yard sales over the past few years and I'm ready to sell it. I paid probably around melt for everything and at the time it was entertainment value of shopping a yard sale and buying something more than anything else. However, now I'm not so interested in it and am trying to sell but while I have plenty of experience flipping things I don't have any with jewelry. The weight is 42.4g for everything which as of right now is $32.558 in melt. I put it up on craigslist for $50 and have gotten a few offers of $40. Should I just take the $40? I also have 18g of actual scrap jewelry I've found on the ground broken over the years, not metal detecting... how do I actually get money out of it?

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How are you coming up with 42.4 grams, is that minus the stones? Maybe you could try selling on this forum.
 
How are you coming up with 42.4 grams, is that minus the stones? Maybe you could try selling on this forum.

Nah, that's a good point because I'm sure the stones added a lot of weight. I ended up selling locally for $45. I still have the scrap silver I might just hold onto.
 
For future reference, I use Midwest Refineries, because it is hassle free. Drop it in the mail, and back comes a check.

The costs are the postage + 17.5% of the weight net the stones. 10% is their margin (they pay 90% of pure spot), and 7.5% is for the fact that sterling is not pure silver. If your silver is other than sterling, then that would be wherever it assays out as.

It is just a value judgment; you know what you are going to get to within about 50 cents (in my experience), so you decide what you get selling locally (if more), is worth the time and energy.

Another refiner is ARA in Dallas, but they are reportedly less friendly to us since an ownership change. I have had no luck with them. One advantage of them over Midwest is that they return the stones (or at least used to). In any case, if you have a valuable stone, I would pop it out before sending it anywhere.
 
For future reference, I use Midwest Refineries, because it is hassle free. Drop it in the mail, and back comes a check.

The costs are the postage + 17.5% of the weight net the stones. 10% is their margin (they pay 90% of pure spot), and 7.5% is for the fact that sterling is not pure silver. If your silver is other than sterling, then that would be wherever it assays out as.

It is just a value judgment; you know what you are going to get to within about 50 cents (in my experience), so you decide what you get selling locally (if more), is worth the time and energy.

Another refiner is ARA in Dallas, but they are reportedly less friendly to us since an ownership change. I have had no luck with them. One advantage of them over Midwest is that they return the stones (or at least used to). In any case, if you have a valuable stone, I would pop it out before sending it anywhere.

Thank you for the info! I definitely came out ahead selling locally because with the stones, shipping, and the premium I don't think I would have cleared $20. Another benefit is that I like the idea that the jewelry has a chance of actually being used... I'm sure the guy I sold to is going to resell it. I might try the refinery just to see what it's like for my 18g scrap but I definitely have a few stones in there. I expect I'd end up with about $10; do they have minimums and do they require any sort of ID? At that price just the stamp for sending out the check would be a profit loss of 5% so I wouldn't expect them to be interested.
 
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