Gold traded at about $4,068 an ounce on Oct. 22.
That is more than $1,500 below the record set in late January, and still about 55% above where gold started 2025, near $2,624. Investors have kept buying through the slide, pushing gold fund holdings to a September record.
That price turns a broken chain, a single earring or an old class ring into real money. Unlike many inherited items that sell for little, gold has a posted price, but jewelry is not an ounce of pure gold. Any offer depends on how much gold a piece actually contains.
Start with the stamp
Solid gold jewelry usually carries a karat mark, often inside a ring band or on a clasp. The Federal Trade Commission’s jewelry guides treat 24 karat as fine gold, and anything lower is gold mixed with other metals. Each karat is 1/24th of the whole, so the gold content works out to:
- 24K: nearly pure gold
- 18K, sometimes stamped 750: 75% gold
- 14K, sometimes stamped 585: about 58% gold
- 10K, sometimes stamped 417: about 42% gold
Marks such as GF, RGP or HGE tell a different story. Under the same guidelines, gold-filled jewelry can have a gold layer as small as 1/20th of the metal’s weight, rolled gold plate as little as 1/40th, and heavy gold electroplate as little as 2.5 microns thick. Those pieces deliver only a fraction of what solid gold does.
Weigh it in grams
Gold is priced per troy ounce, which is about 31.1 grams and heavier than the ounce on a kitchen scale. A digital scale that reads to a tenth of a gram is enough for a working estimate. Some buyers quote in pennyweight, which is 1/20th of a troy ounce, or about 1.56 grams.
Weigh each karat separately. In a 2011 sweep of New York City gold buyers, inspectors found pieces of different karats being weighed together, which can let a buyer price an entire lot at the lowest purity in it.
Do the melt math
Divide the price per ounce by 31.1 to get the value of a gram of pure gold, then multiply by the gold content and the weight. At $4,068 an ounce, a gram of pure gold is worth about $131, which puts a gram of jewelry at roughly:
- 18K: $98
- 14K: $76
- 10K: $55
A 14K chain that weighs 12 grams holds about $915 worth of gold. That figure is the melt value, a ceiling, not an offer. Buyers must refine the metal and earn a margin, so expect to be paid less; use the melt number to judge how much less.
Signed designer pieces, antiques and jewelry set with valuable stones are a separate question. Some are worth more intact than melted, so have them appraised before you put them in the scrap pile.
Compare offers against your number
The New York inspectors advised sellers to visit several buyers, because offers for the same items vary widely, and to negotiate. Ask each buyer to weigh your pieces in front of you, tell you the karat and weight of each item, and put the offer in writing.
If you would rather not carry your jewelry from shop to shop, Unvault lets you start from home. Upload photos for a free estimate, ship your pieces with a free insured label, watch the evaluation on video, then sell only the items you choose. The estimate gives you one more number to compare with your melt math.
Know what you owe the IRS
Profits on gold jewelry are taxable. The IRS’ list of collectibles includes metals such as gold, and long-term gains on collectibles can be taxed at up to 28%, compared with a top rate of 20% on most long-term gains. A loss on jewelry you wore yourself is not deductible, because it counts as personal-use property.
Inherited pieces get a fresh start. The tax basis of inherited property is generally its fair market value on the date of death, so a necklace from a parent who died when gold was far cheaper is measured from that date, not from what the parent paid decades earlier. Keep a record of the date and that day’s gold price.
The price moves faster than the jewelry
The same 12-gram chain held more than $1,200 worth of gold at January’s peak and about $590 at the start of 2025. Check the spot price on the day you sell, rerun the math, and treat any offer far below your number as the start of a negotiation.
Add a Comment