Why sell gold at a pawnshop

If you have physical gold, there are several ways to sell it. It should be noted that there are several reasons why a pawnshop is a good place to sell gold. An expert at the shop can offer an appraisal in person and on the spot. The expert can also explain your options to you in plain English.

Online gold buyers

Many gold buyers that operate online are not as great as they may first seem. One should read the fine print

carefully before mailing away precious gold. Many online companies offer free shipping to their warehouse. However, what happens if you reject their offer? The site will ship the gold back to you. However, as some fine print indicates, the return shipping will be extremely costly. Also, what happens if the gold is lost in transit or by the company itself? Does the website offer full liability coverage? If not, then you might not receive compensation for your lost gold. Therefore, selling gold to an Internet entity may not be the best option for you.

Gold parties

One company sets up and runs gold Tupperware parties. At these house parties, the participants sell gold. The participants may not get a great price because the company as well as the host takes a portion of the sales. Additionally, the party hosts can weigh all of one person’s gold together, even if they are of different karats, and pay out at the price for the lowest karat. If someone has gold of different purities, which is measured in karats, then each piece could be sold at different prices per unit gold.

“Rogue” buyers

Some gold buyers travel. These often result in scams in which people sell the company gold at a hotel and the company leaves town before paying everyone.

The pawnshop experience

None of these situations would ever arise at a pawnshop. The professionals who work at a pawnshop are there to help their customers. They use correctly calibrated scales and understand the differences between different karats.

Source consulted: http://abcnews.go.com/Business/selling-gold-scams-beware-tips/story?id=14309128&singlePage=true#.UYF2zkpuolQ