Posts Tagged ‘cash for gold’

Cash For Gold Scam – Company Cuts Out the Middleman and Takes Their Share Too!

Monday, September 6th, 2010

If you’ve ever seen one of these commercials, you may ask yourself, “I wonder what they pay, anyway…” A very common and curious thought since the ads so clearly say that they cut out the middleman so they can pay higher prices! Really? Seriously…. Honestly? If I’m gonna sell my gold jewelry online, I think I deserve to know what I’ll be paid for it- no? I mean, isn’t that fair? Cash for gold scams are on the rise, and the size of the company apparently means nothing when it comes to the company’s gold price. The following video exposes the embarrassing truth about one of the bigger players in the cash for gold industry, and the statements are allegedly straight from the mouth of the company’s attorney. Watch out for cash for gold scams, and when you’re looking for the best place to sell gold jewelry, always, always, always look for a company who is open and honest enough to share their prices with you up front.

For more information about gold scams by this company, check out: Cash for Gold Company Tried to Bribe Me!
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Get 3X as Much Cash for Gold! (part 1)

Sunday, July 11th, 2010

One of the greatest successes of Augustus Gold and Silver has been our mission from the beginning, which is to publish our prices, and pay significantly more than the largest competitors in the cash for gold industry. This has proven to be the most important factor to our success in our business online, and we have also determined that of our local competitors- most of whom turn their nose up at the idea of anyone sending in their gold to an online buyer,  many are just as deceitful as the online buyers we compete with every day.  They us a myriad of different practices to skim and scam on calculating a client’s payout, but the end result is always the same- less money for the client. We thought our clients deserved to know the truth about local buyers, so we did some investigating in May and June 2010 to see if our local comrades were friend or foe to the average person who wanted to sell gold jewelry.

The local gold buyer market has been heating up in Kansas City and everywhere, in towns large and small. There are over four times as many gold buyers in our city as there were when Augustus Gold and Silver entered the marketplace in July 2008.  Although many of our fraternal brothers in the business locally don’t care for us that much, we have definitely earned our place at the table by generating more business in the last two years than some of them have done in the past five.  And there is a place here in town where we congregate; talk shop, knock back a few free drinks, and discuss solutions to the world’s problems while national news stories clamor in the background. Here we run into men from all over, who have been in the business for a year, five years, perhaps some seventy-five years. And we all have a few things in common- things to sell. This is the side of the market that is supposed to be ‘cut-throat.’ Wholesale. Large quantities. Big money. But another thing that almost all these other gold buyers have in common- they all have shops that are open while they are away, and the people left in charge of running those shops don’t know Ray and Jerry from Adam, which presents the perfect opportunity for us to test the integrity of their business.

So back in May, Jerry and I decided that we should…. (continued in part 2)

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Get 3X as Much Cash for Gold! (part 2)

Sunday, July 11th, 2010

(Continued from part 1)

So back in May, Jerry and I decided that we should take a few days and sneak away from our market-maker friends to sneak around to some of the more prevalent shops in town to see what kinds of business practices made them moguls (and which ones are posers). We were surprised at several of our findings, giving us new respect for a few buyers, and renewing our distrust in others.  For our first round of tests, we took a small amount of jewelry from our Social Media Marketing Consultant, Anne Haynes.  Anne’s jewelry consisted of a small amount of scrap gold and silver- various jewelry items of varying karats- some with hallmarks, and some without. It was a small lot, but perfect for our purposes. Since some of the items were not marked, it presented an opportunity for our competitors to show us how honest they are. Augustus’ payout on the items to Anne was $120.15.

Our first stop took us by the shop of a family who has been in the business for over 50 years.  The clerk was nice and showed us around answering questions about their other inventory. We sat down for him to test our items, he pulled out an electronic tester and testing acids, and commenced to testing each piece individually.  He did not disclose what the percentages were that he used to calculate the payment, he did give us prices for the gold and silver separately, so we were able to calculate it ourselves.  And although the total price he quoted us was over $110, his quote for the sterling silver items was only about 30% of what Augustus pays.  When we asked him what price it was calculated on, he said that the price that day was about $14 per ounce, and it was actually almost $18 per ounce.

As he tested the gold items, they were separated into different piles- 8k, 9k, 10k, 12k, 14k, 16k, 18k, 20k, 21k, 22k. All the items we brought in should have been sorted into 10k, 14k, and 18k, but almost all were ‘downgraded’ as he put them into piles for the karat below what they actually were.  As gold buyers, we are quite familiar with the fact that almost no gold jewelry has an actual test assay as high as the karatage that it gets stamped with, however, usually the discrepancy is minor, such as a 14k gold chain, which should assay at 58.33% gold actually testing at 57.5%. The problem was that this fellow was putting ost of the 14k in the 12k pile, as if it were only 50% gold, etc, etc. One always has to wonder if this practice is what the clerks are taught to do, or if, in fact, they may be skimming while the boss is away. Either way, the first competitor in our test squeaked by with a C+ overall with footnotes that they lack integrity in their testing practices and don’t pay much AT ALL for silver.

Our second stop was only a couple of miles down the road from the first. The lady who owns the establishment was a hanger-on at our fraternal gatherings for a while before opening her store. She brought in bags of things for a long time that she’d bought from individuals that she tried to shop around among our colleagues- many of which were either not real gold or silver or that didn’t have the kind of antique or artistic value she thought she’d bought into. Many times Jerry and I had been annoyed by her peering over our shoulders or watching us from another room as we worked on deals with other dealers or tested large lots of gold and silver. She used the information she harvested from us and from other dealers to start a website that had no success because she only copied the parts of our business she thought would be useful. She opened her store several months later with the help of a few silent partners, and her new website had information posted on it that was almost verbatim from our site.  It was time to learn what selling gold to them was really like.

So we went into the store directly after leaving the first place. The place was nice, but not really set up to serve many clients. They had banners hung across the pillars out front claiming that they pay up to 300% more than other buyers!! The kid working at the counter was a punk who seemed to have a chip on his shoulder. I knew some of the items we were bringing in had some obvious marks on them from acid, where they had been tested at the last place. “That’s OK,” I thought, “at least that way he’ll know that we’ve already gotten one quote, so his better be good if he wants to buy it.” Wrong. The clerk used the same methods of testing- electronic tester and acid. He also used the ‘karat piles’ method for keeping track of it. Jerry punched me in the shoulder and whispered to me, “Can you believe this guy??” the SECOND time he had to call his boss on the phone because he had a question about what to do. In the end, the price he offered for our items was about $43. I do remember laughing a little and asking him if he was joking, but he didn’t see the humor in the situation at all. This one gets an F- for not knowing what he was doing, price integrity, and for generally being a punk and not having any customer service skills.

This experiment goes to show you- if you want to get the most cash for gold, call Augustus Gold and Silver- The Gold Buyer You Can Trust!!

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Gold Scams- What to Look Out For

Monday, April 19th, 2010

There are literally thousands of websites these days who say they want to buy your gold jewelry. In addition to internet companies, undoubtedly there are also dozens of places in your home town with a sign hung out front that say the same. So with all these buyers holding out their hands, how does one know what to look for? Who’s gonna give you the best deal, and which ones are honest? Here’s a good place to start…. which ones have a sign up in their shop or on their website with a sign that says how much they pay? How many of them have information available to you that explains the process, who are transparent about how their gold price is calculated and how your items will be evaluated? Will they tell you what they pay for gold over the phone? Will they even tell you in person? No- well, there are reasons…

It is obvious why most of these buyers don’t want to say how much they pay, and for some of them it is not only the risk of being chastised for how ridiculously little they pay. Because for some of them, the truth is that they don’t always pay the same- that there are several factors, and at least one of them has overriding influence in every deal they make. One factor takes into account some smaller, local shops who may be dealing with cashflow problems. Believe it or not, the price they offer you may be greatly influenced by how much money they have in their cash register (or wallet) at the time. If you do business with this guy, you might leave his shop feeling like you just went a few rounds with a heavyweight boxer.

Another con game that is frequently run by all kinds of jewelers and coin shops is initiated when someone calls to ask what they are paying for gold. The answer people will get about 90% of the time is, “Well, it just depends- we’ll have to look at it to see its condition, see if it has any resale value- you know?” This is an outright lie- period. If you want to push it further, you could insist on continuing the conversation by saying- “Wait- but what if it’s just total scrap- no jewelry value at all- then what’s your price?” And again, of the initial 90%, about 90% of them will say they just can’t say without looking at it, or some will be a little bit more honest and just say, “Sorry- we just can’t give prices over the phone.” And that just means that their prices are bad enough that they don’t want to be compared to anyone else. Another thing you can do if someone tells you they have to look at your items in person to evaluate them for their ‘resale value-’ go visit their store… and when you walk in, say, “I’d like to see your USED jewelry.” Obviously you shouldn’t be surprised when they tell you they don’t have any.

The jewelry stores and coin shops love to hear about internet cash for gold scams because it scares sellers into coming into their stores, and the unsuspecting sellers have no idea they are walking straight into a predator’s lair. It is really unbelievable how many of the oldest, most respected jewelers have allowed their ethics to be reduced to such levels in the name of competition- just because everyone else was doing it. They don’t want you to come into their store so they can see your jewelry- they want to see you. They want to see if you look like you know what you’re doing, and they think if they can make you drive to their location, then you’ll have a vested interest in going through with the transaction. They want to see if you look desperate enough to take whatever offer they’ll give you, and they want to keep the whole transaction private, just between the uneducated seller and them.

Augustus Gold took a stand against these kinds of practices when we opened our business. We opened up our process for everyone to see, disclosed the calculations the way we use them to arrive at our gold price, and we even put our prices live on our website for everyone to see. The largest cash for gold companies on the internet are paying 11-29% as documented by many investigative reports found on YouTube. Still wonder why they won’t publish their prices?? …That’s why.

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Cash for Gold: Calculating the Value of Gold Jewelry (How-to)

Thursday, March 25th, 2010

Trying to choose the best place to sell gold jewelry can be difficult. It can be like trying to find an attorney- you open up the phone book and there are 10 pages of law firms; some specializing in one thing or another, and many not saying at all what they do. You can get a recommendation for an attorney from just about anyone you know- but there only experience was “that one incident,” and they likely used a lawyer who was a family friend. Yes, gold buyers are not all created equal, either, and like attorneys, the general reputations of both lots are the reason we have jokes like, “What do you call 10,000 lawyers at the bottom of the ocean…?” Yes, so ‘a good start‘ to this article would be explaining what makes Augustus different from all the other hundreds of cash for gold businesses on the internet.

There are 3 differences that we feel differentiate us from our competitors- We Publish Prices! We Pay up to 3X More than THE GUYS ON TV! and, Receive Our Offer Within 24hrs!   …but there is one other difference that is critically important, and that is the proof! We teach our clients how to sell gold jewelry, showing them the way the values of items are calculated and exactly how we arrive at the price we offer.  You can use this How-To to estimate the value of your items before submitting your package. The equipment we use to melt and x-ray metal for purity is obviously a little more sophisticated than this, but if you follow the steps closely, this article will give you a good idea of how much value your items have.

Things you will need:gold jewelry selling gold for cash Cash for Gold: Calculating the Value of Gold Jewelry (How to)

Well-lighted, flat working surface, such as a kitchen table.

Pen and paper.

A calculator.

A magnifying glass or jeweler’s loupe.

Strongest household magnet you can find.

A kitchen scale- preferably one that measures in grams.

Gold and/or Silver Jewelry you want to evaluate.

Look at each piece of jewelry individually for its “Hallmark,” which denotes the karat value of that piece. As you identify the items by the hallmark, place them in separate piles- 10k, 14k, 18k, sterling, and make a pile for the stuff you can’t find any marks on. It is good to generate your estimate based on the things we know, and you can still throw in the other pieces at the end because they could be genuine and just not marked for whatever reason.

For gold jewelry, they will typically say 10k or 417, 14k or 585, and 18k or 750.  Almost all gold jewelry that is real has one of these more common markings on them. There are some exceptions, though. In the US, any gold jewelry must contain at least 41.7% gold (10k) to be eligible to receive a hallmark, but in handling some foreign jewelry, you may run across some that is marked 9k- usually very old. More commonly you may come across jewelry from the Middle East where higher karat gold and hand-made jewelry is much more common, and a large portion of these pieces have no markings on them at all.  Typically sterling silver items will be marked “Sterling” or “Ster” or 925 or sometimes 950.  Flatware that is marked “Silverplate” or “Deep Silver” or anything else, is most likely not real sterling silver. And for sterling silver butter knives, only the handles are sterling- the blades are typically made of stainless. And the handles are filled with cement, the silver portion usually being about the thickness of an aluminum drink can. These knives have to be destroyed to obtain their actual silver content, but it is usually about 15g per knife (about half  of a troy ounce).

During this step, you will also want to test each piece by holding it up to your magnet to see if there is any attraction. The clasps on chains will almost always stick to the magnet because they have a steel spring inside, but otherwise, there should be no attraction to the magnet. Gold and Silver are non-ferrous metals, and do not have any attraction to magnets. If an item sticks to the magnet (besides the clasps), throw it in a separate discard pile.  Important Note: If an item sticks to the magnet, it is not genuine gold or silver- but if it DOES NOT stick to the magnet, that does not mean that it IS GENUINE GOLD OR SILVER. More commonly, counterfeit gold items are gold-plated copper, which is also a non-ferrous metal, and is the primary alloy in karat gold. Rarely does one come across any actual counterfeit sterling silver, but we have seen some that is hallmarked coming from China in the last couple of years.

Once the items are all in piles for their respective karat values, weigh each pile individually on the scale and write down the number of grams in each pile.  Then obtain the most recent ‘spot price’ of gold and/or silver from the “What We Pay” page of our website. At the time of this writing, the prices for gold and silver are $1,086.60 and $16.60, respectively.  This page on our site actually shows the prices for each different karat of scrap gold and silver, in addition to many of the most popular gold and silver coins, bars and bullion rounds.  The prices listed are the net payable prices, which means that they already have the payout percentage of the scrap factored into the prices, and they are listed in grams, pennyweights, and troy ounces (one troy ounce = 31.1g).

cash for gold selling gold jewelry Cash for Gold: Calculating the Value of Gold Jewelry (How to)Here is how the math works: First you take the spot price per troy ounce and divide by 31.1 to get the Gram Price. $1086.60 / 31.1 = $34.93

Next you must determine how much “net gold” you have. This is done by multiplying the weight of each pile by its respective gold percentage, or karat value. Ex. 134g @ 10k = 134 x .417 = 55.87g Net Gold. Figure the amount of Net Gold for each pile, then add all the amounts of Net Gold together.

Then you multiply the total amount of Net Gold by the Gram Price: 55.87 x 34.93 = 1,951.53 Gross Price

Finally, you multiply the total Gross Price by the percentage your chosen gold buyer pays. Augustus Gold and Silver pays at least 55% for gold and 65% for silver.  1,951.93 x .55 = $1,073.34 Net Payout. If your math is correct up until this point, you may try to reconcile it with the amounts listed in the tables on our website.

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Welcome to Augustus Gold’s blog!

Friday, March 12th, 2010

Thank you for visiting our blog! Augustus Gold and Silver is a nationwide buyer of precious metals in the US- The Gold Buyer You Can Trust! Augustus has claimed its stake in the market by changing the paradigms of the industry. We are the first company to publish our prices and actually teach our clients how to evaluate scrap gold jewelry to estimate its value. Learning how to sell gold can be beneficial to you whether you choose to sell your items to Augustus or not! Satisfaction is guaranteed, and we pay up to 3X more cash for gold than the GUYS ON TV! From an open and transparent process to getting more cash for gold and silver- this is why Augustus is The Gold Buyer You Can Trust!

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