How to sell my iPhone?

[bignateyk]

My wife currently has an iPhone 3G, and I have an iPhone 3Gs. The contract on the 3G is coming to an end, so I will be eligible to buy a 4G at discount when it comes out. I will plan to keep the 3G for my wife, and sell my 3Gs.

My question is, what do I need to do to sell it on ebay? Does it matter that the phone is still under contract for a year? Do I ship it without the SIM card in it and just sell it as a 16gig iPhone 3Gs that is carrier locked to ATT?

 

[Pliablemoose]

Just pull the sim card, the contract doesn't matter with ATT phones.

Have you considered selling it on Craigslist? Saves you a lot of fees...

 

[rudeguy]

Craigslist is great for selling phones.

Wipe the phone (or whatever Apple calls it) and sell it without the SIM. I've sold a few cell phones and bought my son's on CL. Way better than ebay. Have the person try it before you leave so that you both know everything is golden.

 

[pm]

I generally find that I can sell the phone for more money on Ebay than Craigslist - even after fees are taken out. I've sold about 6 iPhones over the years - for myself and for neighbors. Maybe Craigslist works better if you are in a large city though... here in northern Colorado most of the replies that I got from Craiglist were along the lines of "Why would I pay $300 for a used iPhone 3G when I can get it new For $99 from AT&T" and lots of other questions that were more a waste of my time than actively headed towards a sale.

On Ebay, you can get $100-150 more if the phone is jailbroken/unlocked and it's worth about $50-100 more if it's still under some form of warranty (Applecare, in particular). You can also usually sell the phone for more money if it's unlocked and you allow international shipping... but that opens up lots more possibilities for scams, so I don't ship internationally.

 

[Raduque]

Ebay can get you more because people get into bidding wars and are willing to bid things up past retail just to "win".

I have only sold a car on craigslist, but I've found that a lot of times phones on craigslist are priced above retail for some reason. Just the other day I saw somebody selling a locked T-Mobile HD2 for $560. It's only $450 retail from Tmo.

 

[rudeguy]

Ebay can get you more because people get into bidding wars and are willing to bid things up past retail just to "win".

I have only sold a car on craigslist, but I've found that a lot of times phones on craigslist are priced above retail for some reason. Just the other day I saw somebody selling a locked T-Mobile HD2 for $560. It's only $450 retail from Tmo.

Tmo can't get enough of them. When I was at their store getting my phone checked out, 2 people called looking to see if the UPS truck had come. Apparently even their customers knew not only that they were waiting on UPS but also what time UPS came to their store.

 

[CTrain]

Yeah people can charge a higher price on the HD2 cause its in such demand.
Serious, when was the last time you can get a super phone for $99 on a 2 yr plan ??
Just to compare, the iphone 3gs 8gb is $199 and the 16gb is $299.
$99 >>>>>>>>>>>>> $299

 

[ChAoTiCpInOy]

What software version/baseband version? Do you have installed on the 3G?

 

[QueBert]

Yeah people can charge a higher price on the HD2 cause its in such demand.
Serious, when was the last time you can get a super phone for $99 on a 2 yr plan ??
Just to compare, the iphone 3gs 8gb is $199 and the 16gb is $299.
$99 >>>>>>>>>>>>> $299

Resale value needs to be factored in. I sold my 1G iPhone fairly recently for $200, meanwhile I had a buddy sell his almost new Moto Droid for $249. I suspect if the Droid was as old as my iPhone was he couldn't have gotten more than $50 for it. In 2 years I guarantee that 3GS's will still be pulling a lot of money used. But the HD2 is the flavor of the month geek phone and in 2 years you might have trouble giving them away.

 

[rudeguy]

Resale value needs to be factored in. I sold my 1G iPhone fairly recently for $200, meanwhile I had a buddy sell his almost new Moto Droid for $249. I suspect if the Droid was as old as my iPhone was he couldn't have gotten more than $50 for it. In 2 years I guarantee that 3GS's will still be pulling a lot of money used. But the HD2 is the flavor of the month geek phone and in 2 years you might have trouble giving them away.

or your friend doesn't know how to market as well as Apple does.

 

[QueBert]

or your friend doesn't know how to market as well as Apple does.

As far as marketing, we both put ad's on CL, I got 5 responses the 1st day for an almost 4 year old phone and it was sold that night. Took him 4 days to sell his Droid and he only had a few people contact him total about it. I don't know shit about marketing but I know my phone sold with teh quickn3ss! The selling price for HD2's are no doubt very high right now, but once the hype dies down and all the nerds who want one have one. You'll see the prices on CL bottoming out. Where iPhones will always command top dollar. Love or hate Apple no other company has electronics that hold their value close to as well.

 

[notposting]

Also, why not sell the 3G and keep the 3GS? You = 4G, wife = 3GS, some sucker = 3G they paid you $300 for...

 

[ChAoTiCpInOy]

If you can jailbreak/unlock your iPhone, you can get more.

 

[boomhower]

Resale value needs to be factored in. I sold my 1G iPhone fairly recently for $200, meanwhile I had a buddy sell his almost new Moto Droid for $249. I suspect if the Droid was as old as my iPhone was he couldn't have gotten more than $50 for it. In 2 years I guarantee that 3GS's will still be pulling a lot of money used. But the HD2 is the flavor of the month geek phone and in 2 years you might have trouble giving them away.

Who figures resale value when buying a phone?

 

[QueBert]

Who figures resale value when buying a phone?

market demand, I sell handsets on CL all the time, BB's are a tough sell in my area even if they're the latest model, unless the price is real low. I don't know why but people have no problem paying as much for a 3 year old iPhone as they a phone that came out within the past 6 months. I would suspect it has something to do with demand and desirability. There's not a phone almost 4 years old besides my iPhone that could have gotten me anywhere near $200. I sold a WM6.1 phone which was about 1.5 years old and only managed to get $65 for it.

 

[ubercaffeinated]

i'd be surprised if i couldn't get at least 300 for my 16 gig 3gs. i sold my unjailbroken 3g last summer for 300 cash through craigslist - and that was well below market price because i just wanted a no bs quick sale.

 

[boomhower]

market demand, I sell handsets on CL all the time, BB's are a tough sell in my area even if they're the latest model, unless the price is real low. I don't know why but people have no problem paying as much for a 3 year old iPhone as they a phone that came out within the past 6 months. I would suspect it has something to do with demand and desirability. There's not a phone almost 4 years old besides my iPhone that could have gotten me anywhere near $200. I sold a WM6.1 phone which was about 1.5 years old and only managed to get $65 for it.

I guess I should have wordered it better. Who cares what resale value is when buying a phone? I usually go through a phone a year and could care less what the resale value is. I mean it's $200. Sure if you like Apple and AT&T then the iphone is a no brainer with the crazy resale being a nice bonus. But I wouldn't pick a phone over another because of better resale value. I guess I just don't get it for such a low value item. A car or house sure, a cell phone I just don't get.

 

[bignateyk]

What software version/baseband version? Do you have installed on the 3G?

Modem version 5.11.07, software version 3.1 on my 3Gs

 

[bignateyk]

Also, why not sell the 3G and keep the 3GS? You = 4G, wife = 3GS, some sucker = 3G they paid you $300 for...

I just figured I could get more for the 3Gs. There really isn't much of a noticeable difference between the 3G and 3Gs, at least for what my wife uses it for.

 

[notposting]

But she'll be able to multi-task soon with the 3GS! (3g isn't getting m/t right?)

then you can hear: "oh biiiig natey...my battery is dead again...why did you sell my old phooone???"

 

[basslover1]

i'd be surprised if i couldn't get at least 300 for my 16 gig 3gs. i sold my unjailbroken 3g last summer for 300 cash through craigslist - and that was well below market price because i just wanted a no bs quick sale.

I sold my 16GB 3GS for 450 this past Christmas.

If you're going to sell it, sell it before the new one comes out and the resale value takes a hit.

 

[rudeguy]

market demand, I sell handsets on CL all the time, BB's are a tough sell in my area even if they're the latest model, unless the price is real low. I don't know why but people have no problem paying as much for a 3 year old iPhone as they a phone that came out within the past 6 months. I would suspect it has something to do with demand and desirability. There's not a phone almost 4 years old besides my iPhone that could have gotten me anywhere near $200. I sold a WM6.1 phone which was about 1.5 years old and only managed to get $65 for it.

exactly how many phones have you sold on CL?

You keep talking about your ass Q. Quit making stuff up to try to prove a point that no one cares about.