How to sell Cartier Jewelry
Make sure you get the best price when you resell your Cartier Jewelry
Considered by many to be the finest jewelry house in the world, Cartier has consistently produced exquisite jewelry since being founded back in 1847.
But tastes and circumstances change, and we don’t need to hold on to our Cartier jewelry forever.
If you are looking to sell Cartier jewelry and want to make sure that you get the best price, this blog will show you how.
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The bottom line when selling your Cartier:
The key to getting the best price when you are reselling your Cartier jewelry is to work with someone who knows the true value of the jewelry and eliminate as many layers as possible between you and the buyer.
Auction houses, online marketplaces, etc act as middlemen and take a cut, reducing the amount they will pay you.
Our recommendation is Alon at The Diamond Oak – a fine jewelry specialist who will give you the best price possible, avoiding middlemen and fees. Get in touch with Alon here.
What type of Cartier jewelry can be sold?
Over its history, Cartier has produced a variety of types and styles of jewelry, from its one-off ‘high jewelry’ collections to more accessible rings and bracelets.
If you’re looking to sell your Cartier jewelry though, then that’s good news for you. No matter what piece you may own, you will be able to find an interested buyer.
One thing to know though, is that the price you receive for your Cartier jewelry when selling is that can be dependant on a couple of factors:
- Condition
- Provenance
Condition
All jewelry bears a history; no matter how it is cared for, if it’s worn at all, it will necessarily pick up some nicks and scratches.
Some commonly used terms to describe pre-owned jewelry are as follows:
- mint condition
- excellent condition
- good condition
- fair condition
- poor condition
When selling to a jewelry professional, it is likely that they will be intending to sell the piece on after improving its condition. That said, the better the condition of the piece, the less work will be required of the buyer; therefore, pieces in better condition should command a higher price.
Provenance
Provenance can be defined as the history of ownership of a valued object or work of art or literature.
There are multiple reasons why it is important to be able to demonstrate the provenance of your Cartier jewelry:
- It proves ownership over the piece, and that it is therefore legally yours to sell.
- It proves that the piece is genuine.
Possessing items such as your receipt, the box, jewelry bag, and other appropriate accoutrements that were included with your Cartier jewelry purchase will raise your buyer’s confidence in the provenance of the piece:
Your options when thinking about where to sell your Cartier jewelry
Once you’ve made the decision to sell, it’s understandable that you would want to get the best price possible for your Cartier jewelry.
When selling your Cartier jewelry, there are a few things to consider:
- What you are selling
- What is more important for you – price or speed of sale
- How much you value certainty
In this section, we’ll look at the different options for where you can sell, and a few things to take into consideration when deciding which is the best fit for you.
The Diamond Oak is a business founded by a third generation dealer and operating out of the heart of New York's Diamond District.
Specializing in buying and selling pre-owned and vintage designer jewelry allows them to offer more as they always know they will be able to find an interested buyer.
In mystery shopping tests, we have consistently found that The Diamond Oak offers more for designer jewelry, plus the personalized experience of dealing directly with Alon, the business's founder, is second to none.
- Designer jewelry specialist means high prices can be offered
- Highest prices paid in mystery shops
- Direct communication with the founder results in a smooth process
- Doesn't have the reach of an online marketplace
- Smaller company so may not be able to make as many offers as a large marketplace
Worthy.com is a marketplace which connects jewelry seller directly to a network of nearly 1,000 professional jewelry buyers across the US who bid on their items.
The huge benefit of this is that the competition that is created can result in higher prices paid. What does need to be considered though is that Worthy's commission needs to be taken into account. This varies depending on the value of your item.
It's definitely worth clicking through to see recent purchases to understand how much the final sale price is likely to be.
- Reach can result in higher prices paid
- Easy to see previous purchase prices
- Great reviews and smooth process
- Need to allow for Worthy's fees when understanding how much you will actually get
- Don't always accept low value items
- Some reports that Worthy encourages buyers to set a low reserve price
Have You Seen The Ring
- Marketplace which puts sellers directly in touch with individual buyers
- Jewelry sold through auction process
Have You Seen The Ring is another marketplace which matches jewelry sellers with potential customers.
Commission varies from a very steep 30% for items up to $1,500 to 10% for sales over $10,000.
While the concept is a good one, auctions aren't a defined limit, unlike some competitors, which means that sellers need to hope that a buyer looking for their exact ring sees the auction, which could take a while.
- Links sellers directly with end buyers, rather than a jewelry trade buyers means cutting out a middle man
- Good reviews and smooth user experience
- Smaller platform means that rings seem to take longer to sell
- Steep commissions for smaller transactions
Louped
- Used to be called 'I do now I don't'
- Marketplace which puts sellers directly in touch with individual buyers
Louped is a marketplace that allows people to list their diamond rings for sale.
Sellers are charged a commission, depending on the value of the item they’re selling - this varies from 20% for items under $5,000 to 10% for items over $50,000.
Unlike Worthy, where the people buying the rings are jewelry professionals, buyers on louped.com are regular consumers.
While the idea is a good one and they do appear to have happy customers, there is an extremely high % of people who have graded 'I do now I don’t' as 1 star – nearly a third of all people who have left reviews on TrustPilot, while the BBB rating is currently 'F'. While it’s always a good idea to take online reviews with a pinch of salt, this is higher than I would be comfortable with for such a significant transaction as selling high value jewelry.
While there are also a number of good reviews, common complaints are of poor communication from the team there, and delays in sending payment.
- Appears to have good reach with reasonably quick sell-through
- Dealing directly with end customers cuts out one layer
- Commissions are reasonable
- Currently scores an F on the Better Business Bureau website
- Signifcant number of unhappy reviews on Trustpilot, although some of these are older
Understanding how much your Cartier jewelry is worth
One of the first things to understand is how much your jewelry is likely to be worth when selling it.
You may have a jewelry appraisal stored away with a value attached to it, which you have used for insurance purposes.
While there are a few types of appraisals, it’s likely that yours will list the price that it would cost to replace the item with a new, or equivalent, piece.
Unfortunately, the value on your appraisal isn’t the same as the amount that someone would actually be willing to buy the jewelry from you for. The reason being, that anyone who would buy it from you now, would then be looking to sell it as ‘used’ for lower than the price of a ‘new’ replacement item and still make a profit.
The amount that someone is actually willing to pay for an item is known as the ‘fair market value’.
Determining the fair market value of something can be tricky, and many people looking to sell jewelry online will look at recent sale prices to understand how much their Cartier jewelry might now be going for, which can be a good indicator.
If you have an extremely high end or one-off piece, prices are more difficult to predict
Cartier has produced a wide range of jewelry over the designer’s lifetime, from high jewelry pieces containing one-of-a-kind gems, to more attainable rings and necklaces which can be purchased in their boutiques worldwide.
If you are selling an extremely rare or high-end piece, then it may make sense to use an auction house, as they can result in a higher price achieved due to the competitive nature of several bidders pushing the price up.
Two of the most well-known auction houses for jewelry are Sotheby’s and Christies:
When considering whether a traditional auction house is the right choice for you, it’s important to understand that the final ‘hammer price’ you see for past sales is not the amount that the sellers actually received.
- Sotheby’s commission for the seller is typically 20% of the final sale price
- Christies commission for a seller is also 17% of the final sale price, with an additional 2% ‘performance commission fee’ if it goes over the agreed ‘high estimate
These high-end auction houses also charge the sellers an additional 10-15% of the final sales price, which can mean that they are less willing to bid high amounts.
The other thing to consider with auction houses is the length of time that these organisations will take to sell your item.
As the snippet from an email below shows, it can take around a month for them to assess the value of an item, and you would then have to wait for a suitable auction to be held, which could be an additional one or two months.
The other potential wait could be if you list your item and it doesn’t reach your desired price, in which case it will be passed in and returned to you. This uncertainty can put off some buyers who are more comfortable with a fixed price.
But, if you are willing to wait, you have an item that fits their high requirements and you are happy with the commission % that the auction houses charge then they could be the best solution to get a great price if your item is subject to a bidding war that drives the price up.
Resale price if you are looking to sell Cartier earrings
First we’ll look at the price that can be recouped if you are selling some Cartier diamond earrings.
These 0.26 carat earrings are currently on the Cartier website for $3,050:
Looking on Worthy.com, we can find similar 0.3 carat diamond stud earrings which were sold for $2,003:
The resale value of these Cartier earrings are therefore 65%:
| Original price of Cartier earrings: | $3,050 |
| Resale price: | $2,003 |
| Resale % | 65% |
The advantage of Worthy is that the number of people bidding on a ring can push the price up.
The disadvantage is that as a marketplace, Worthy takes a % of every sale made:
As this sale was up to $5,000, an 18% commission would have been charged. On the $6,500 sale price, this works out at $360. The seller of this ring would therefore have received $1,64.
You can check Worthy’s recent sales out here – it’s definitely worth looking at.
Resale price if you are looking to sell a Cartier bracelet
Next we’ll look at the resell price of a Cartier Love bracelet. This 4 diamond Love bracelet is currently priced at $11,100 on the Cartier website:
Looking at Worthy’s recent auctions, we can see that an identical bracelet was sold for $6,027:
The resale value of this Cartier Love bracelet was therefore 54%:
| Original price of Cartier earrings: | $11,100 |
| Resale price: | $6,027 |
| Resale % | 54% |
Resale price if you are looking to sell a Cartier necklace
Finally, we’ll look at a Cartier Love necklace, which is currently priced at $,4,650:
It’s a beautiful piece, containing 18 diamonds set into one of the bands, and we can find the same necklace was recently sold for : $1,873:
The resale value of this Tiffany necklace is therefore 40% of the original sale price:
| Original price of Tiffany necklace | $4,650 |
| Resale price | $1,873 |
| Resale % | 40% |
We can see from these three examples that there can be a significant variation in how much of the original selling price can be recouped when selling Cartier jewelry. The best way to understand how much you are likely to receive is to find an item similar to yours:
Selling Cartier direct to a jewelry dealer
If you want to avoid the middleman fee, a good way to get the most money for your Cartier jewelry is to eliminate as many layers between you and the person buying it as possible.
In essence, to talk directly to the type of people who are buying through worthy.com, but without having to pay Worthy the commission and reduce the amount you make.
Our recommendation here is The Diamond Oak.
The Diamond Oak is a family run business with multiple generations in the diamond industry, based out of the Diamond District in New York. We’ve seen hundreds of people successfully sell their jewelry to The Diamond Oak and feel that they currently offer the best balance of best price and service quality.
Best of all, working with Alon you will get a fair price extremely quickly, instead of having to wait for an auction to run its course and then pay the fees out of the sales price. Alon’s process is:
- Complete a form on The Diamond Oak’s website
- Alon will get back to you with an estimate, usually the next business day
- If you like the estimate, Alon will provide a pre-paid and insured shipping label
- Once he’s received it, Alon will check that all looks OK, and then pay straight away.
The Diamond Oak is a family run business with multiple generations in the diamond industry, based out of the Diamond District in New York.
We’ve seen hundreds of people successfully sell their jewelry to The Diamond Oak and feel that they currently offer the best balance of best price and service quality.
- Attentive, personalised service
- Great prices paid
- Smooth transaction