Ewaste?? Was it the next big thing?

Seems Ewaste has dropped off alot in value.......I am glad I got into it as I now have dedicated my whole garage to ebay and computer repair......I bought 65 units from scrap yard last week and pulled all usable parts and just stacked rest in storage......Didn't excite me to much to break them down due to prices.........Was Ewaste the "The Next Big Thing" that has kind of lost it's steam?..........I still do send stuff to Ewasted and a few other buyers but it seems alot of those that popped up when things were going well have fizzled out..........I know this has been discussed before but what do other ewaste guys see as the future........SO far the future for me is re-selling usable items (another form of recycling)........Oh well just my thoughts today as I was trying to break down some scrap I had laying around the back yard

when you see the precious metal rally after the first of the year, it will take back off. that's why i am hoarding, shipping only small loads off to different buyers... to test the waters with each of them and see who i plan on using later on. the last time it took off was when gold went from 600 to 1800. all of a sudden people were popping up trying to buy precious metals in any form possible. now that it's slipped back down to the 1200 range, a lot of the guys that weren't truly sustainable businesses lost their a$$ because they were trying to ride another upswing that hasn't come yet and they couldn't withstand the wait, sold off for a loss and disappeared back to the 9-5 schedule trying to pay off their new debt. That's not the case for the true businesses that buy and sell according to the market flux. But anyone that is sitting on a stockpile that they are placing a bet on using a credit card... is going to either win big, lose big... or run out of time to find out.

Ewaste has lost its steam due to decline in the metals market. As far as newer buyers who come and go, i think they realize its not as easy as it looks. I dont resell but I am refining as much as I can. I can process fingers to the point where I can make alot more than selling them. Looking into turning that into a small business in the near future, so I guess for me that is the next big thing.

Well, I’m new to scrapping in general and even more new to eWaste. That said, I don’t think we’ve seen the end of it.

The precious metals market can be a bit of a roller coaster. As we saw back in…I think it was 2010 or 2011, everything spiked (I bought my first few ounces of silver back then) and then it crashed and burned. We are seeing the lowest prices in a long while. Catalytic converter prices are dropping as well due to the same reasons. Are cats the Next Big Thing as well? I think we’ve seen that they aren’t.

If you want to talk about Next Big Things, take a look at Bitcoin (and other cryptocurrencies). It spiked when everyone was excited about it, then it fell, and now it’s back on a slow but steady rise. Yet, people are still making money off of it and either buying or building miners. Hell, I almost wish my yard paid in Bitcoin!

But back to eWaste. Precious metals have driven our economies since almost the dawn of human civilization. And the fact that their chemical compositions actually help our growing and more complex technologies as opposed to just looking shiny, to me, ensures that it will all have a place in our business for a long while. If there is a demand, and there is supply, there will be money to be made.

If this is the time when the opportunists or the folks that want to “get rich quick” bow out, I say let them! It gives us a chance to get our foot into more doors than before, secure those contracts, make the customers and clients happy and become “the big guys.” I forget who it is on this forum, but someone has the quote in their signature “profit begins when you buy, not when you sell.” This is the time to buy and make your name known. Seize the day.

If your sitting on ewaste i hope its material that you paid very little for or nothing at all. Guessing on when the market will go up is a losing bet. If you get it and can sell at a profit always take the money. I think the days of 1800 an ounce and 3.50 for small socket mobos are long gone. If you can process it or know someone who can its an investment for the future.

Originally Posted by BRASSCATCHER

If your sitting on ewaste i hope its material that you paid very little for or nothing at all. Guessing on when the market will go up is a losing bet. If you get it and can sell at a profit always take the money. I think the days of 1800 an ounce and 3.50 for small socket mobos are long gone. If you can process it or know someone who can its an investment for the future.

I'll sit on "the good stuff" as long as I need to. Mobos and the other big, bulky stuff will get shipped out just to save space

Originally Posted by BRASSCATCHER

If your sitting on ewaste i hope its material that you paid very little for or nothing at all. Guessing on when the market will go up is a losing bet. If you get it and can sell at a profit always take the money. I think the days of 1800 an ounce and 3.50 for small socket mobos are long gone. If you can process it or know someone who can its an investment for the future.

oh no worries my man i know what im doing. i buy and sell still the same, i just hang on to the stuff that i can store easily and have no money tied up into.

I'll buy a pallet of towers, usually P4 XP, that's what are being replaced the most frequently right now. Optiplex's everywhere. and I'll pick them up for about $3 ea. I go through them all, decide which ones i am going to refurb and sell on CL. I might have to even buy a part or two, but I'll wind up with about 10 functional machines out of 20-25 of them. I sell off the functional towers usually around $70-$80 ea. Usually sell 2-3/week.

I take all of the ferrous scrap to the yard immediately, which 10-15 optiplex shells usually wins up yielding about $9-$12. I don't even count that as anything. I put it in the gas tank on the way back from that 2 mile drive. And as soon as I sell 1 tower on CL, I have made my money back. I make profit on these deals usually before I even touch the scrap portion. So anything I decide to sit on, has been paid for for weeks. I have another 3 scrappers in the area that brings me any PCs or Laptops that they find and I pay them by the lb. - double what the yard gives for them (local yard gives shred price for PCs .09/lb. so I pay them $.18 and everyone wins). These I process seperately, I hoard the CPU HD boards, CD boards and RAM, and ship off the MB and Fingercards to forum buyers. Just tried out my 4th one this past week. This way that cashflow doesn't lose steam and stays with the current market. If I pay out $50 i usually have about 12 desktops and a couple laptops, and assuming none of them are refurb worthy and i break them all down, within a week I have a check back for about $30-40 for the MB & FC, scrapped the shells, power supplies, copper and ali to recoup the rest of my investment, and and I kept all of the parts I wanted to keep. Total amount risked in hoarding these parts? $0

Originally Posted by phred59

oh no worries my man i know what im doing. i buy and sell still the same, i just hang on to the stuff that i can store easily and have no money tied up into.

I'll buy a pallet of towers, usually P4 XP, that's what are being replaced the most frequently right now. Optiplex's everywhere. and I'll pick them up for about $3 ea. I go through them all, decide which ones i am going to refurb and sell on CL. I might have to even buy a part or two, but I'll wind up with about 10 functional machines out of 20-25 of them. I sell off the functional towers usually around $70-$80 ea. Usually sell 2-3/week.

I take all of the ferrous scrap to the yard immediately, which 10-15 optiplex shells usually wins up yielding about $9-$12. I don't even count that as anything. I put it in the gas tank on the way back from that 2 mile drive. And as soon as I sell 1 tower on CL, I have made my money back. I make profit on these deals usually before I even touch the scrap portion. So anything I decide to sit on, has been paid for for weeks. I have another 3 scrappers in the area that brings me any PCs or Laptops that they find and I pay them by the lb. - double what the yard gives for them (local yard gives shred price for PCs .09/lb. so I pay them $.18 and everyone wins). These I process seperately, I hoard the CPU HD boards, CD boards and RAM, and ship off the MB and Fingercards to forum buyers. Just tried out my 4th one this past week. This way that cashflow doesn't lose steam and stays with the current market. If I pay out $50 i usually have about 12 desktops and a couple laptops, and assuming none of them are refurb worthy and i break them all down, within a week I have a check back for about $30-40 for the MB & FC, scrapped the shells, power supplies, copper and ali to recoup the rest of my investment, and and I kept all of the parts I wanted to keep. Total amount risked in hoarding these parts? $0

Agreed......Trust me I have made plenty and saved every penny.......I do the same thing.....If I sell a couple of computers out of a lot then the scrap is free.......I to am sending small loads off just to keep a few bucks rolling in..........Ewaste was my primary source of income there for a little while but now has become secondary and almost like a 3rd stream of income.........Oh well when someone figures out what "THE NEXT BIG THING" is will you let me know before it happens!!

SIR SCRAPS I think your right......I have not stopped buying and I am by no means desperate or going out of biz........I bought over 100 towers this week alone!!...LOL...I know that may be small taters for some of you guys but I'm averaging several 100 per month either resale, wholesale, or scrap......As long as I make more than what I paid I'm happy!!!

Originally Posted by mikeinreco

Agreed......Trust me I have made plenty and saved every penny.......I do the same thing.....If I sell a couple of computers out of a lot then the scrap is free.......I to am sending small loads off just to keep a few bucks rolling in..........Ewaste was my primary source of income there for a little while but now has become secondary and almost like a 3rd stream of income.........Oh well when someone figures out what "THE NEXT BIG THING" is will you let me know before it happens!!

I'm never really looking for the next big thing. I just roll along with it. I agree with a lot of what SirS said too. I am more of a part timer/hobbyist and do not rely on scrap to pay my bills. If I were, I would look at it completely differently. I understand how it all works, and that is the main reason why i got in with some of the full timers in the area as their ewaste buyer. I don't have to hunt it down, it comes to my door after a phone call, and they make twice as much.

I guess at the end of the day, I am trusting my hoarded ewaste as my savings account more than I trust my savings account as my savings account. I couldn't operate the same if I were scrutinizing my checking account instead.

Interesting topic. I'm able to sit on ewaste because I don't need the income and selling the other componets supports my ewaste expenses. I have a long term goal for the small horde of ewaste that is several years into the future. Even with the long time line I feel very uncertain if this has any wisdom to it at all. Perhaps I should be selling my ewaste and learning how to hold onto money instead.

As far as my future I will continue to process ewaste but since picking up a new accout my focus has changed. Mostly I am getting audio, video and lab equipment. Not as sexy and much more difficult ot dismantle than computers but the returns are quicker and I still get ewaste from the material I am now getting. Much of the lab equipment has enclosures made of Al and has SS and Brass componets. Also many include small ewaste boards, some even have large boards. I hope to see others contribute to this thread. Mike

Ok, dumb question. Will people actually buy old XP machines? I didn't think they'd be resellable. I may have thrown some cash into the scrap pile again...

Originally Posted by MattyNoNeck

Ok, dumb question. Will people actually buy old XP machines? I didn't think they'd be resellable. I may have thrown some cash into the scrap pile again...

depends on your area

and I couldn't resist this...sorry for anyone who's ears bleed, you have no taste in music lol

I only ship out circuit boards when I get one Gaylord full, minimum. Concentrating on commercial customers.

As for the next thing in ewaste I have been wondering what new ewaste now will be worth in the future when there is lots of it to scrap. I was thinking the other day that I have never scrapped a tablet and I wonder if that would be around the same price as a cell phone/lb for scrap?

Here in California there is a "Mattress Recovery and Recycling Act", which is similar to the TV recycling program in California. I am not sure if I can be a handler like with TVs but, Mattress recycling sounds pretty lucrative because there will be old dirty mattresses for a long time. Maybe Mattress recycling is the next big thing?