# buying computers from scrap yard



## Rbright1721 (Mar 8, 2012)

ya i was contacted by a scrap yard tring to get get rid of a large amount of computer towers, servers and a small amout of random green board . he wants .45/lbs from my research its little high. with the average tower weighs 30 pounds thats 13.50 a tower. he has about 20 gaylords full. if anyone has any experance and help me out see if theres any money to make.


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## Claudie (Mar 8, 2012)

I think he is trying to see how much you are willing to pay. Some people have the notion that junk electronics are a Gold mine. I don't think you will make any money at that price, I would even go so far as to say you would lose money. Once he figures out that no one will pay that price, he will come down on it. It may take a while for him to realize that they aren't worth that much. If there are any CRT monitors in the mix, it could get real expensive for the buyer. :|


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## Geo (Mar 8, 2012)

that may be what he has in them and is trying to recoup some of his expense. steel mills will not buy contaminated shredder steel, and computers are about as contaminated as it comes. .45¢ is what i pay for electric motors. IF you can reclaim all the PM's and non-ferrous metals from a PC, it might scrap out between $20 to $25 depending on vintage. add in cost of time,effort and chemicals i think you would lose heavily. if you can haggle him down to at least half the price he is asking you may make a profit from the non-PM metals. explain that you understand why he still has them and hasn't sent them to the mill (it will cost him to haul them to the dump). tell him you will split the difference and give him .22¢ a pound or he can send it to the dump, his decision.


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## Claudie (Mar 8, 2012)

$20 - $25 from one computer would be pushing the roof a little I would think. Silver, Palladium, Copper, Gold, and all the other metals might total that IF they were complete computers which they probably aren't. By the time you figure in refining expenses I still don't think it would show a profit. Even if you could break even at that price, why do it? I don't think a person could even break even but maybe I just have low paying buyers. :|


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## jack_burton (Mar 8, 2012)

I try to explain to sellers of scrap- even with all the gold in the world (that you think is in there), unless you are willing to completely dismantle and separate- it's just not worth that much to me. It takes a lot of labor to stripdown a gaylord full of servers/PCs and such. People just don't realize how much labor it takes so they think thier fully assembled, worthless and broken down computer, is actually worth something. :roll:


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## Rbright1721 (Mar 8, 2012)

he said he has .15/Lbs in to them, and the greedy bastard wouldnt take .35/lbs, which is what i offered him. i first said .20 and he came at me with .45/lbs. i left and contacted him the next day asking if he would take .35 lbs and he said"thats ok ill hold. i think hell come down to reality. ill call him in a week and see if hes changed his mind. but my offer now is .30lbs.


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## Smack (Mar 8, 2012)

Offer him ten cents per pound if he didn't like your first offer. Better to make some good money for your time then it is to bust your butt just to break even. Don't waste your time. Or tell him you will buy all the PCB's and drives for x per pound and he can have the rest.


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## jack_burton (Mar 8, 2012)

Yeah, just have a set price in mind and don't negotiate, give him a business card and tell him to call when he's ready to make cash. 8) 

He's going to make more selling locally to you at .20 than he would paying shipping and selling at .35, would be my guess.


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## Claudie (Mar 8, 2012)

I wouldn't want to pay 35 cents a pound for it. I think he is one of those guys that have in their head that everyone is trying to beat them out of something, when in reality, there is nothing there to get beat out of. I would leave him a lone with them, he will probably end up getting 15 - 20 cents for them after he holds out a couple of years. Those junk yard guys are very hard to deal with sometimes.


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## joem (Mar 8, 2012)

tell him 8 cents a pound for all shredded steel items, and 1 $ a pound for ANY green boards inside.


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## jack_burton (Mar 8, 2012)

joem said:


> tell him 8 cents a pound for all shredded steel items, and 1 $ a pound for ANY green boards inside.



:arrow: Second this idea. :arrow:


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## ericrm (Mar 8, 2012)

Rbright1721 said:


> ya i was contacted by a scrap yard tring to get get rid of a large amount of computer towers, servers and a small amout of random green board . he wants .45/lbs from my research its little high. with the average tower weighs 30 pounds thats 13.50 a tower. he has about 20 gaylords full. if anyone has any experance and help me out see if theres any money to make.


go check the material first
at 0.45$lbs it is kind of hard for guy like us with not automated line...
BUT what are the board? mobo or smelter
does the computer are all old white flat tower or funky delic desing?
he probably offer you 0.45$ because he already have that price hopping to save on the time and truck...
go look and choose you will not have a lot of chance to deal with scrap yard... dont let a possibly good deal get away.


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## qst42know (Mar 8, 2012)

Save your money and seek scrap jewelery instead. No fork truck required. :mrgreen:


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## Rbright1721 (Mar 9, 2012)

ya there's all kinds of computers, alot of old bulky white ones. it sucks he also said they had a local guy that bought the catalytic converters and he could lead me that way also....oh well. prolly wouldnt be able to work out a deal anyways.


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## Claudie (Mar 9, 2012)

Not working out a deal is better than working out a bad deal. :|


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## bigscrap84 (Mar 10, 2012)

Lol listen I know first hand about scrap yards 8¢ for shredded steal seriously. He's probably selling his light iron for 20¢ a lb steel at like 23¢ so if you get stupid with numbers its a good way to get kicked out and miss a possible good connection once the bugs are worked out. Even the green boards mix in with light iron. Tell him you'll take a 1/4 each time at a reasonable price try and work with him. $$$ talks my friend if the job is too big or your overwhelmed by the amount of work don't waste your or his time its clearly not the job for you. Let a big dog come in and buy the material.


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## Harold_V (Mar 11, 2012)

I am of the opinion that you should not badger this guy. The more you try to buy for a reasonable price, the more he'll think his *gold mine* contains ("this guy wants them pretty bad. I wonder how much they're *really* worth?"). Going back repeatedly will simply bolster his thoughts. Ignore him completely. When others don't come through with his expected price, he'll slowly come to understand that he's wrong about the value he expects. Better you don't get them than to pay more than they're worth. 

Harold


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## patnor1011 (Mar 12, 2012)

Rbright1721 said:


> ya i was contacted by a scrap yard tring to get get rid of a large amount of computer towers, servers and a small amout of random green board . he wants .45/lbs from my research its little high.* with the average tower weighs 30 pounds* thats 13.50 a tower. he has about 20 gaylords full. if anyone has any experance and help me out see if theres any money to make.



I am bit confused with this. If we talk about very very old computers that may be the case but normal tower (last 10-15years) will not weight more than half of what you said.


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## jack_burton (Mar 12, 2012)

Yeah, if someone told me the average tower weighted 30 pounds, I'd assume he was talking about servers not personal computers.


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## jlipson (Jun 12, 2012)

I hope you did not buy this lot. $0.45 or even $0.20 is risky if you do not know what you are doing. First of all, if these are servers that means there is a lot of steel, it is very likely there are no hard drives in them, who knows if the machines were tampered then the memory is also gone or at times they would replace 1 GIG sticks with 512 meg or 512 meg stick with 256 Meg, anything lower than 1 GIG is worth less at present unless you are extracting PM out of them. 

Why don't you grab a small lot of similar equipment as a trial and try to sell to the same yard or his competition in town, I bet that would be your eye opener.


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## GotTheBug (Oct 11, 2012)

A wise man once told me, "It's easier to stay out of a bad situation than to get out of one."


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