14k scrap gold price per gram

A refiner buys in bulk and pays closest to melt, usually 90 to 95%, but most will not deal with a member of the public bringing in one ring. A high street gold buyer pays 70 to 85%. A pawn shop pays 50 to 70%, because metal is a sideline to its lending business and it has to hold, insure and eventually consolidate what it buys.

None of these are scams. Each is running a different business with different costs. The mistake is comparing a pawn shop offer against the melt value and concluding you are being robbed, rather than comparing it against what another pawn shop would pay.

A buyer will check the hallmark, then verify it. An acid test on a streak of the metal is standard and destroys nothing visible. Electronic conductivity testers are common now, and XRF machines, which read the exact alloy composition without marking the piece at all, are increasingly normal at larger operations.

Verification matters because plated and filled items are stamped in ways that look convincing. If your piece turns out to be gold filled rather than solid, the metal value collapses to almost nothing, and a buyer who spots that after quoting will withdraw the quote.

Watch the test rather than leaving the counter. This is normal and no reputable buyer will object. What you are checking is that your piece and not a reference sample is what gets tested, and that it comes back to you.

Melt value is the arithmetic: weight times purity times the spot price. It is a real number and it is what this page calculates. Nobody pays it, because it is the value of the gold after refining, and refining costs money.

Scrap value is what someone will hand you today, which is melt value minus the refining cost, the buyer's margin, and their risk that the lot assays lower than expected. Treat melt as the ceiling and the payout column as the realistic range. If a quote sits inside that range, it is a normal offer, not a lowball.

Separate by karat. A 10k chain and an 18k pendant in the same bag will be weighed together and priced near the lower karat, which costs you real money on the higher one. Sorting takes ten minutes with a loupe and the stamps.

Weigh everything yourself on a scale that reads to 0.01 g, and write it down. You are not trying to catch the buyer out; you are making sure you and they are discussing the same quantity, and a written figure is something a quote can be checked against.

Pull out anything that might be worth more intact than melted. Signed pieces, anything with a maker's mark, older watches, and gold coins all routinely sell above melt on the second hand market, and a scrap buyer will quote melt for all of them without mentioning it.

Remove stones where you can do it without damage, get two quotes, and refuse any offer given before your gold has been weighed in front of you. A buyer who quotes a price for a bag they have only looked at is not making a serious offer.

Do not accept a single blended price for a mixed bag. A shop quoting one rate for 10k and 14k together is quoting you the 10k rate on all of it.

A written quote from another buyer is the single most effective lever you have. Bring one and the counter offer usually moves. Without one you are negotiating against a number you have no way to check.