Sell like a Gazelle
I discovered something interesting this past weekend. I had convinced my wife to allow me the upgrade from my old diehard Blackberry to the new iPhone 4. Trust me when I tell you that it was a process. You see, I had argued that by carrying a blackberry and an iPod touch, I was wasting space, buying and keeping track of extra cables and so on… When I travelled, this tedium slowed me down… It’s true – none of this was brilliant rhetoric, but I guess she gave in mostly to shut me up. I was allowed to buy the iPhone…
After all that, I was utterly stupefied to learn that I had missed the biggest, humdinger of an argument for the upgrade. I went on Gazelle.com to try to sell my old Blackberry and iPod and discovered that Blackberry + iPod really does equal an iPhone. I had known this would be true functionally (phone + music player = iPhone), but I had never really thought that selling my old hardware would cover the cost of my new stuff!  As a thank you to Gazelle, I thought I’d give them a bit of a shout out.  You will get more money if you try to sell your stuff with Craigslist, but the added convenience of this service is worth checking out.
Using the site is very easy, head over to Gazelle.com and enter your product in the search field. In the example below, you can see when you start typing, the products that match appear. Make sure you select the right “generation” or model of your phone or gadget because the price given will be based on this information.
Once you’ve found your gadget, choose Search and you’ll see some questions that will help Gazelle refine their offer. Obviously, a gadget with the original cables and one in good condition are going to better than those which are broken and missing accessories.
If you like the price, click on Add to Basket and the site will ask you for your address so that they can send you a prepaid box!  They’ll also allow you to select how you want to get paid.  If you choose Amazon gift card, you get an extra 5% back…
The trick to making this site work for you (as I see it) is to clean house. Â Do all of your electronics in a big batch and you might be surprised by how much cash you get back. Â It beats the heck out of random meetings at Starbucks so that you can sell someone your iPod from college :)
Good luck selling your gadgets. Know of a better place to sell your stuff? Shout it out in the comments.
~ab
