I've Got a Diamond Ring, What's it Worth?

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Traditional Diamond Solitaire Ring But What's it Worth?

Free or Fee?
For the past 35 years, we have been getting callers asking the same question, and we're getting quite used to it by now. If you wish to pay and receive a professional service, we will be delighted to help. Our charges start at just 1.5 %, with a £5 minimum, plus VAT.

Free Advice
However, most people want our expert advice for free! The amazing thing is, that we go along with it, and do actually give out lots of friendly helpful advice for nothing. You might think to ask why we do something for nothing, after all if you wanted advice from your solicitor or accountant, he would charge you plenty. We also like to make a livelihood. We provide our free advice service out of goodwill, we hope you will go away happy, and recommend us to your friends and relations. Perhaps you will also come back to us if you decide to sell your diamond ring, or some other jewellery, scrap gold, etc. As we also sell coins and jewellery, we also hope you might be a future customer.

We don't mind playing the game, but we have a few rules which we like to see observed, otherwise we take our ball away:

• For personal callers to our showroom, we are quite happy to make an offer to buy.
• As we're usually doing this for free, we expect courtesy and respect on both sides, now that we mention it, we expect this even if we are being paid!
• What we provide for free is not really a valuation, it's usually an offer to buy. You want as much as you can get, we want to buy for as little as possible. Caveat emptor! Actually, we don't try to buy for as little as possible, because we value our reputation, and we do get repeat and recommendation business from vendors, so perhaps our policy works. Just remember, though that most other traders don't work for nothing, so most free valuations are just offers to buy.
• Once we give a price, we don't expect to haggle. We will always listen to what you have to say, but we prefer you to say it first! Tell us what you know first.
• If you have an existing valuation, receipt, or any other knowledge, please tell us before we start work on your ring, as this can often help us to arrive at a result more quickly, and help you to get a faster and better price.
• Identifying and valuing a ring over the telephone or e-mail is more difficult and time-consuming than doing it first-hand with the advantage of being able to see the ring. What can take 2 minutes to do live, can take 2 hours by telephone. We can't afford to give this amount of time free! If you can't bring it to us, the best starting point is your local dealer or jeweller.
• Help yourself as much as possible first. Do you have an existing valuation? An original receipt? Do you know the diamond weight? Is the diamond certificated? Any of this will help.
• If we tell you a fact or express an expert opinion, please don't argue with us. If you know better than we do, then why are you asking us in the first place?
• We regret that we cannot give you a free valuation by e-mail. Some days we receive several hundred e-mails, many of which are requests for free valuations. We struggle to reply promptly to everybody who wants to buy something, let alone those who want something for nothing.

You Won't Get What You Paid
Unless you bought your diamond ring many, many years ago, you are unlikely to get back what it originally cost.

Not Even Half
Compared with a price paid or valuation received within the past 5 or 10 years, you should not even expect to get half what you paid. Why Not? consider the following:-

• High Retail Markups
  Profit margins on jewellery are high. Don't blame jewellers too much for this, blame the customers for paying it in the first place. There is more information about this on our How We Do It page, which explains how we can manage to sell our diamond ring production at 30 to 40% below retail price. Most jewellery is sold at double, or even treble, its cost price, ignoring VAT.
• VAT
  When you buy new jewellery, there is 17.5% VAT to pay on it. You will not get this back when you sell second-hand jewellery. If you bought it overseas and didn't pay VAT on it, then you are asking us to buy smuggled goods!
• Wear and Tear
  Most second-hand jewellery will have been worn, subjecting it to wear, tear, and possible damage. This will reduce its value.
• Fashion
  If fashions have changed, your piece of jewellery may now be harder to sell.
• Credit Cards
  Part of the price you pay in the High Street is charges for the cost of accepting credit cards.
• No Guarantee
  When you sell a second-hand diamond ring, you are unlikely to give the dealer a guarantee with it, yet when you bought the ring, you will have benefitted from a guarantee. Guarantees cost money, and this gets loaded into the retail price.
• Competition
  Although most people think that competition tends to lower prices, it does not always work as you might predict. There is competition between jewellery retailers to occupy the best located site on any town. This usually means the best corner site near to Marks & Spencer, rents for such properties are very high, and usually get grabbed by multiple retailers rather than independents (landlords prefer big companies because of "strength of covenant"). This works to push prices up. Most people buying jewellery want to buy it from a "prestige" store. The jewellers who make the biggest profits can afford to carry to biggest selection of stock giving them more chance of making sales.
• Second-hand Taboo
  Many people would avoid buying a second-hand ring or other piece of jewellery for sentimental reasons. How many women for example would be happy with a second-hand engagement ring?
• Manufacturers Profit
  The manufacturer also needs to make a profit, although it is usually much less than the retail profit.

Work This Out
Taking what you know from the above, and starting with a retail price of say £100.
First take off the VAT, leaving about £85, then take off the retailers profit, leaving between say £28 and £42. Next take off the manufacturers profit, leaving perhaps £21 to £38. Make an allowance for wear, tear or damage, also for changing fashions. Finally take a percentage off to tempt a cash-buyer second-hand dealer. How much does that leave?
Although we have assumed a retail price of £100, it's quite simple to work out a similar calculation for a ring at any other price.

Rule of Thumb
After reading the above, you will not be surprised to hear that we have a quick "rule of thumb" which will give you a rough and ready guide as to how much to expect. We used to reckon about 25% to 33% of the valuation, or retail, price. Please don't use this as an absolute figure, it is only a guideline. In many cases, the second-hand selling price may be less than 25%. As retail mark-ups seem to have increased in the past few years, the retained value percentages have slipped closer to 10 to 15%.

Now for the Good News
We are always happy to buy better quality diamond rings at competitive prices.
If you have a diamond ring which you want to sell, and you know how much you want for it, you can contact us, although it is usually best to phone us or visit.

Selling Diamond Rings to Us
You may also find it useful to read our "Selling Diamond Rings to Us" page.

Jewellery as an Investment
If you are surprised or dismayed by any of our comments or reckonings about diamond rings, and you were labouring under the misapprehension that diamond rings were an investment, then you may also wish to read our page on that topic as well.

Buying Jewellery From Overseas
A page of advice for those tempted by jewellery bargains while they are in a holiday spending mood.