Sell your gold bars online with clarity

There is no single venue that is always the best. Bullion dealers and online buyers price against the live spot price. Pawn shops and local jewelers usually price lower because they are pricing for quick resale, and some will not distinguish an investment bar from scrap gold. A private sale can reach a higher number but you absorb the authentication and payment risk yourself.

What decides your outcome is not the venue but what comes off the top: the spread against spot, the fees, who pays for shipping and insurance, and how long you wait for funds. If you are not sure how your bar will be assessed, what we value sets out the basis. Coins are a different calculation and belong on gold coins.

Get two or three quotes on the same day, each with a timestamp, and compare net proceeds rather than headline figures. Quotes struck on different days are not comparable, because spot will have moved in between.

It should be below spot because every buyer works on a spread. How far below will depend on the refiner, the size of the bar, the state of the market and how quickly that particular product resells. Small bars carry higher production and handling costs per gram than large ones, and a widely traded refiner's bar moves more easily than an obscure one.

Be wary of anyone quoting a fixed percentage of spot before seeing the bar, and equally wary of a number far above what the rest of the market is offering.

Ask for the offer broken down: pure gold content, the spot price used, the timestamp it was struck at, and every deduction. Unvault does not publish a fixed percentage of the spot price, because the figure depends on the bar and the moment. What is published is the fee, which is shown in the itemized breakdown before you accept.

Yes. The bar itself is the evidence. The refiner marks, weight, fineness, serial number and dimensions are all verified physically, and a bar that checks out is sellable with no paperwork at all.

An assay card and the original receipt do help. They widen the buyer pool and speed verification up. Their absence is not a barrier.

Photograph the front, back and edge plus the serial number, and send the bar as it is. Without packaging, more of the verification happens in hand, so a preliminary estimate carries slightly more uncertainty until the bar arrives.

No. Leave it sealed. An intact assay seal with a serial that matches the bar is part of what makes it straightforward to verify and straightforward for the next buyer to accept. Once the seal is broken that assurance is gone and cannot be restored, and some buyers will pay less for a de-carded bar.

Photograph through the packaging. If the serial or markings are hard to read through the plastic, change the angle of the light rather than opening it. If the packaging is already open or damaged, say so at the start. It does not make the bar unsellable, it just changes what verification has to cover.

Non-destructively, in layers. Weight and dimensions come first, checked against the refiner's published specification, because most cheaper substitutes cannot match gold's density and its dimensions at the same time. Tungsten is the awkward exception, since its density sits very close to gold's, which is why the checks do not stop there. XRF analysis reads surface composition, ultrasonic or conductivity testing looks through the body of the bar for internal irregularities, and the refiner marks, serial and any security features are examined directly. The full sequence is explained on how Unvault works.Ask any buyer which tests they run and whether you get to see the results. Surface-only testing can miss a plated or filled core, which is why density and through-body checks matter alongside XRF.

Speed and cash, usually at a wider spread. A pawn shop prices for fast resale and may not treat a recognized investment bar any differently from scrap gold. A specialist coin or bullion dealer will normally do better on a bar, though offers move with whatever they are already holding that week.

Four questions before you hand anything over.

1. What spot price are you using, and at what time?
2. What pure gold content did you calculate?
3. What is your spread or fee?
4. When exactly do I get paid?

A verbal quote is not an offer. Get it in writing, with the timestamp, before you agree to anything.

This is the question that decides whether a quote means anything. Gold moves while your bar is in transit, so what matters is when the price is fixed and for how long it stands. Some buyers strike the price when you accept; others price on arrival, which leaves you carrying the market risk for the days the bar is in the post.

Unvault's terms are that prices update daily and your offer holds for 30 days. The first estimate is preliminary; the final offer follows verification of the bar.

Before shipping to anyone, ask in writing when the price is struck, how long it holds, and what happens if the spot moves before you accept. No estimate survives verification unchanged if the bar turns out to differ from what the photographs showed.

Use a carrier and a policy that genuinely covers bullion. Many standard shipping insurance policies exclude precious metals outright or cap them well below the value of a bar, and that is the trap most sellers fall into. Declare the value accurately, use a tracked service, photograph the bar and the sealed parcel before it goes, and keep the tracking and receipts until you have been paid. There is more on whether it is safe to ship and on selling online without getting scammed.With Unvault you get a free prepaid, fully insured FedEx label. If you decline the final offer, the bar is returned to you free with insured return shipping. Payment goes out one business day after you accept.Confirm in writing who insures the parcel, up to what value, and from what moment the cover begins. Return shipping insurance is limited to the authenticated value of the item, so the declared and authenticated values need to line up.