Most experienced gold and silver buyers know what the value of gold and silver is on a day-to-day basis. That’s how they make their money. I have seen hundreds of sales where sellers practically give away gold and silver because they simply don’t know what they have, or what it’s worth. I have also seen hundreds of sales where buyers pay way to much for “solid gold” items.
Let’s start with gold. The gold content of marked jewelry and gold items should be common knowledge for anyone who buys, or wants to buy gold and silver jewelry and other items. The gold marks such as 9k, 10k, 14k, 16k, 18k, 22k and 24k, all tell you what percentage of gold is contained in the piece. Solid Gold does not mean pure gold.
Here is a chart that tells the actual percentage of gold for the various “k” marks:
9k or 9 karat gold contains 38% gold – 10k or 10 karat gold contains 42% gold
12k or 12 karat gold contains 50% gold – 14k or 14 karat gold contains 58% gold
16k or 16 karat gold contains 67% gold – 18k or 18 karat gold contains 75% gold
22k or 22 karat gold contains 92% – 24k or 24 karat gold is 100% pure gold.
The mark .999 or .999 fine also means pure gold (100%).
When a seller tells you the piece is “solid 14k gold” that does not mean it is pure gold. The 14k piece contains 58% gold and the rest of the metal in the piece is different metal like copper, nickel, etc. The other metal is mixed in with the gold to give the piece hardness so it lasts longer. Pure gold is very soft and will wear quickly and isn’t very strong, especially for jewelry pieces that are worn.
Silver is also marked. The most typical marks on silver items are Sterling, .925, 800 and 999 fine which is pure silver. Some older silver items may be marked “Coin Silver” which is the same thing as 800.
Here is a chart that tells the actual percentage of silver for the various silver marks:
Sterling is 92.5% silver – .925 is 92.5% silver (same as sterling)
800 or Coin Silver is 80% silver – .999 is pure silver (100%)
Gold and silver weight is measured in Troy Ounces, not the same as the ounces one would use to weigh a postage letter or content for baking a cake. A troy ounce contains 31.1 grams and there are only 12 troy ounces in a Troy Pound, not 16 ounces. This is important. A regular pound contains 16 ounces and a regular ounce contains 29 grams. Over the years, I have seen many people confused by this and taken advantage of.
Let’s assume you are wanting to bid on a 14k ring that weighs 7 grams. First of all you should know the ring contains only 58% gold, so it’s not pure gold. Okay now you need to know the spot price (market price) of gold at the time you bid on the ring. There are many good reliable websites where you can obtain the daily spot price of gold. One good one is kitco.com. Now the formula assuming the current spot price of pure gold is $1050.00 per troy ounce (31.1 grams).
Divide $1050 by 31.1 – This is $33.76 per gram for pure .999 gold.
Multiply $33.76 X 7 (the ring weight) and that equals $236.32 for pure .999 gold.
Now multiply $236.32 X .58% and that equals $137.06 which is the actual value of the gold contained in the 7 gram, 14k ring that you want to bid on.
Apply this formula for any marked jewelry or item and you will be able to deterimine the gold value of just about any piece of jewelry or gold and silver item. When a piece of jewely contains precious, semi-precious or non-precious stones, sometimes it’s difficult to get an accurate gold value so for the most part you need to use common sense and become a good estimator. Generally for a quick assesment of jewelry with common stones a 10% to 25% deduction is taken for stone weight before doing the precious metal calculation. Bear in mind, this is for common stones and not high quality diamonds, emeralds, rubies, etc. It’s just a guide for more common, not so expensive stones. Precious stones are another subject altogether.
Popularity: 4% [?]
Leave a Reply