How to cash in on your old gadgets

There's a land grab for your gadgets! According to the latest stats released by Gazelle, an online marketplace that buys and sells old electronics, the company's snatching up a used iPhone every six seconds right now. Target's version of this service, NextWorth, reports it's also seeing an unprecedented volume of trades — up 64 times the normal — that it attributes to people getting rid of older gadgets just in time to "tech the halls" with new digital goodies this holiday season.

The bottom line is this: Before you fork over a fistful of cash for the newest, shiniest, most brag-worthy new version of the latest iWhatever, you should know that someone out there is likely to hand over a pretty penny for your old one.

Where to start
It's hard enough just figuring out which new gadget to buy, without having to comparison shop for the best price for your old one. It used to be that if you wanted to get cash for your gadgets, you had to spend a lot of time and effort going through eBay or Craigslist. You can still do that. If you have an established account, great reputation, and the time it takes to sell old items that way, you might do quite well.

But these days, it's a whole lot faster to go through a reputable trade-in or buy-back program online.

Your gadget-selling guinea pig
I have a pile o' gadgets, old smartphones, laptops, and even a Wii console, that I want to get rid of before I buy anything new. My goals are, in this order:

1. Get the largest amount cash for the gadgets that I can for the least amount of time and effort.
2. Donate or recycle what's not going to generate a lot of dough or trade-in value.

Keeping those goals in mind, note that I'm not going physically going into stores to make this exchange. Although you can get good trade-in values for your gadgets at retail stores such as Apple, Best Buy, and Target, I don't want to deal with traffic or temptation. The last thing I need is to get a little money back for my old digital camera, then walk out of the store with a new HDTV. For some reason, I can control myself better in the virtual world. If you're the opposite, then go ahead and invest the time, energy, and gas money to haul your gadgets into the stores. Be sure to let me know how that goes!

Get smart about smartphones
Recently, Tecca posted a great article on how to get cash for your smartphones, so I started with the research already done right here. I took the top sites from the list plus a few others I've shopped around on recently and entered in some information about my 16GB iPhone 3GS. Here's what I found among the top sites.

Mint Condition iPhone 3GS  
1. Gazelle: $137
2. eBay Instant Sale: $97  
3. NextWorth: $115
4. Apple Reuse and Recycling Program: $90  
5. BuyBackWorld: $92

And the winner is... Gazelle. It's hard to believe that a phone you can now get for free with a two-year contract is worth that much. This is great!

Don't forget to back up all of your data and reset your phone to factory settings before you mail it in. While many of the sites will wipe it clean for you, don't take the risk! If you have an Android phone to swap, try Swappa as a potential buy-back site as well.

A new laptop
Okay, I've got some dinosaurs cluttering up my office. I'm going to start with an HP 17.3" laptop with an Intel Pentium processor, Blu-ray, and 5-in-1 digital media reader. (All these sites will ask you to enter specific information about your computer. You can find it on your laptop by going to the "My Computer" icon or into your start menu. )

HP 17.3" laptop
1. Gazelle: $94
2. eBay Instant Sale: $50
3. NextWorth: $123.75
4. Yourenew: $54
5. Best Buy trade-in: $37

Nextworth comes out a clear winner by $40! 

Wii gaming console
I can't believe that just a few short years ago, a Wii Fit was all my little family wanted for Christmas. Now, it just sits around taking up space and collecting dust. You can take old consoles and video games directly into stores like GameStop to sell or trade. But remember my goal of least effort? Again, that means no dealing with traffic. So going back online, here's what I come up with.
                                                   
Wii Console with Balance Board
1. Gazelle: $2
2. eBay Instant Sale: $40
3. NextWorth: $45
4. Yourenew: $0
5. Buymytronics: $30

I'm going with NextWorth here again.

So let's tally up the totals for three old gadgets:

iPhone 3GS: $137.00
HP laptop: $123.75
Wii console: $45.00

Total: $305.75!

Cha-ching! That's not bad for less than a half hour of my time!

Wait! We're not done yet!
There are several more buy-back programs on the internet today, but not all of them are legit. Use common sense before you wrap up and ship off your potentially valuable electronics. Take a picture of your particular gadget, make a few notes, and write down the serial number. If an offer sounds too good to be true, it probably is. All of the sites listed in this article have a clean record with the Better Business Bureau, and several have been given the nod by Consumer Reports as well. It never hurts to check out that information yourself, too.

Last but not least, save all of your information and wipe your old device clean before you send it away. A lot of companies offer to do this for you, but it's always best to do it yourself if you can. The more backups, the better!

[Disclaimer: Tecca is in part funded by Best Buy.]

[Image credit: Global X]

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