To sell silver well you need to know three things before anyone makes you an offer: what kind of silver it is, how much pure silver it holds, and what that silver is worth on the day. This page takes you through all three, then through judging an offer, so the figure you hear is one you can check.
Where Can I Sell Silver is an independent referral service, not a buyer, pawnshop or dealer. When you call or send the form, your details go to an independent buyer in New York who makes any offer, and you are free to refuse it.
What it takes to sell silver
Every silver sale, from a single bar to a house full of an estate, follows the same five steps. The rest of this page takes them one at a time.
- Sort the silver by kind, because each kind is bought differently.
- Find the purity mark on each piece.
- Weigh it, in troy ounces, not kitchen ounces.
- Work out the melt value with the day’s spot price.
- Ask for a written offer, compare it with your figure, and decide.
Sort your silver by kind
A buyer looks at bullion, sterling tableware, jewelry, scrap and coins in different ways, so mixing them in one bag makes the offer harder to check. Lay everything out on a table and make piles:
- Bullion: bars and rounds with a weight and a fineness stamped on them. See where to sell silver bars.
- Sterling tableware: flatware, tea and coffee sets, trays, bowls, candlesticks. See sell sterling silver.
- Jewelry and scrap: chains, rings, bracelets, single earrings, anything bent or broken. See where to sell scrap silver.
- Old US coins: dimes, quarters and half dollars made before the 1965 change were 90% silver; half dollars made under the 1965 Act were 40% silver.
- Possible plate: anything with no sterling mark, or a mark you do not recognize. Read is silver plated worth anything before counting it in.
Sorting also shows you which pieces might be worth more than their metal. A complete set of flatware in a known pattern, a signed piece of designer jewelry or a coin in unusually good condition belongs in its own pile, because a buyer who only buys by weight will not pay for what makes it special.
Find the purity mark
The mark tells a buyer how much of the piece is silver. Under the FTC’s jewelry guides, ‘Sterling’, ‘Ster.’, ‘Solid silver’ and ‘925’ may be used only for an item that is at least 925 parts per 1,000 silver. ‘Coin’ or ‘coin silver’ means at least 900 parts per 1,000. The plain word ‘silver’ should come with its fineness, as in ‘750 silver’. Bullion carries its fineness on its face, usually .999 for fine silver.
Silver plate is a thin surface layer of silver over another metal, and the National Stamping Act says plated pieces must not be stamped ‘sterling’ or ‘coin’. Plate is often marked differently from sterling, which is why a piece with a maker’s name and no sterling mark needs a closer look. The guide to sterling silver hallmarks shows where marks are usually struck and what each one means.
Weigh it in troy ounces
Precious metal is weighed in troy ounces. A troy ounce is 31.10348 grams, heavier than the 28.34952-gram ounce on a kitchen scale. Some buyers quote in grams or in pennyweights instead. Here is how the units line up (NIST Special Publication 811):
| Unit | Grams | In troy ounces |
|---|---|---|
| 1 troy ounce | 31.10348 | 1 |
| 1 pennyweight (dwt) | 1.555174 | 0.05 (one twentieth) |
| 1 kitchen (avoirdupois) ounce | 28.34952 | about 0.911 |
| 1 gram | 1 | about 0.0322 |
A kitchen scale that reads in grams is good enough to know roughly what you have. Weigh sterling without anything that is not silver where you can: a knife with a steel blade, a brush with a sterling back or a candlestick with a weighted base holds far less silver than it weighs. In New York City the buyer must weigh precious metal on a scale approved by the New York State Department of Agriculture and Markets, reading to 0.01 troy ounce or finer, and must tell you the troy weight.
Work out melt value before anyone names a figure
Melt value
Weight in troy ounces x fineness x spot price per troy ounce.
Suppose your sterling flatware weighs 622 grams once the steel knives are set aside. 622 divided by 31.10348 is about 20 troy ounces. Sterling is 0.925 fine, so it holds about 18.5 troy ounces of pure silver. If spot silver is X dollars per troy ounce that day, the melt value is about 18.5 times X dollars.
No price is printed here because the spot price changes daily, and a figure on a page would be wrong by the time you read it. Look up the day’s spot price yourself just before you ask for an offer, and ask the buyer which spot price their offer used.
Melt value is the value of the pure metal only. A buyer’s offer is usually below melt because the buyer pays to refine the metal and needs a margin. That gap varies by buyer, by kind of silver and by quantity. What matters is that you know your own figure, so you can see how far an offer sits from it and ask why. The silver melt value guide works through bars, sterling, coins and scrap in detail.
When silver is worth more than its melt value
Melt value is the floor of what silver is worth as metal, not always its worth. Three kinds of piece can be worth more:
- Collectible coins: a coin’s value to a collector depends on its date, mint mark and condition, and can be far above its silver content.
- Signed and designer pieces: sterling jewelry and tableware by a well-known house such as Tiffany & Co. or Georg Jensen may sell as jewelry or as design, not just as metal.
- Complete sets and wanted patterns: a full service of flatware in a pattern people collect can interest an estate or antique dealer more than a refiner.
If you think a piece falls into one of these groups, say so when you ask, and keep it apart from the pile you are selling by weight. An insurance appraisal is not an offer: it states what it would cost to replace a piece in a store, not what a buyer will pay for it.
Cash for silver: how payment should work
A search for cash for silver is usually a question about payment. Payment methods differ between buyers, so ask before you sell how you will be paid and when, and get the answer in plain words. Whatever the method, you should leave with a receipt that lists what you sold, its weight and the price.
In New York City the receipt from a licensed secondhand dealer should carry the dealer’s DCWP license number (6 RCNY 1-05), and the dealer must record the sale: the items, their marks, your name and address, the date and time. The paper record is kept for 3 years, electronic records with photos of precious metal items for 6, and both are open to city inspectors and the NYPD.
Compare offers safely
Selling silver goes wrong in a small number of predictable ways. Watch for these:
- No weight given. An offer for ‘the lot’ with no weight and fineness cannot be checked. Ask for both.
- Units that change. A price per gram, per pennyweight and per troy ounce are very different numbers. Ask which unit is meant.
- A scale you cannot see. In New York City the buyer must tell you the troy weight; anywhere, you can ask to watch the reading.
- Pressure to decide now. A fair offer survives you going home to think about it.
- Sterling and plate mixed together. Ask the buyer to show you which pieces they are counting as sterling and which they are not.
- Collectible pieces priced as scrap. Keep coins and signed pieces apart, and ask about them separately.
Get more than one offer for anything substantial. Written offers based on the same weight and fineness are easy to set side by side, and the comparison tells you more than any single number. The silver buyers page explains the kinds of buyer you can ask and what each is best suited to.
Selling silver in New York City
In the city, a business that buys used goods must hold a DCWP Secondhand Dealer General license, posted where customers can see it. You will be asked for official ID and to sign in front of the buyer; the buyer cannot buy from minors and cannot resell used items, jewelry included, within 15 days of buying them. Lending money against silver is a different business that needs a separate DCWP Pawnbroker license: selling and pawning are not the same thing. The sell silver NYC page covers the boroughs and the Diamond District.
On taxes, some larger sales of certain bullion coins and bars may be reported by the dealer to the IRS on Form 1099-B, while most small sales of jewelry, sterling and single coins are not. A profit on coins and other collectibles may be taxed at a maximum federal rate of 28% (IRS Topic 409). Ask a tax professional about your own sale.
Know what you have? Call, or describe it in the form, and an independent New York buyer can make you an offer.
Questions people ask
Is silver difficult to sell?
Not when it is marked and sorted. Bullion with its weight and fineness stamped on it is the easiest silver to sell; sterling is straightforward once steel and fillers are allowed for. Unmarked pieces take longer, because the metal has to be identified first.
How much will I get if I sell my silver?
No honest answer is possible without the weight, the fineness and the day’s spot price. Work out the melt value (troy ounces x fineness x spot) and expect an offer below it, because the buyer pays to refine the metal and needs a margin. Then compare written offers.
Is it worth selling old silver?
Often, yes: sterling and 90% coin silver hold a known share of silver whatever their age. The exceptions are silver plate, which holds very little silver, and pieces a collector would value more than a melter.
Should I clean silver before I sell it?
No. Tarnish is a thin surface layer and does not stop a sale. Every polish takes away a little silver, and a collector may prefer coins and antique pieces left as they are.
Can I sell silver for cash?
Payment methods vary between buyers. Ask how and when you will be paid before you agree to sell, and keep the receipt listing what you sold, its weight and the price.
Describe your silver