Renovating an Apartment Building? Don’t Discard Precious Metals
Last month my wife and I visited a friend who had just moved into a freshly renovated apartment building in New York. The real estate developer had bought the building and renovated all the vacant apartments – about 20 units in all. Plus, there were plans in place to renew all the occupied apartments when they became vacant, before renting them out again.
I looked at our friend’s beautiful new kitchen and asked what the building’s owner had done with the fridges, electric ranges, microwaves, and other kitchen appliances that had been removed from the apartments that were undergoing renovation.
When you're renovating an apartment building like the one in this photo, call Specialty Metals to find out about recovering precious metals from major appliances like refrigerators and ovens and recyclING them profitably.
“As far as I know, everything got tossed,” he replied. Then he added, “I did see a large pile of microwaves and stoves in the alleyway in back of the building.”
Were Precious Metals Recovered in the Process?
Hopefully the developer didn’t just allow the old appliances to be hauled away by a scrap metal company. If that is what happened, you can be pretty sure that the scrap metal recycling company went through the discarded appliances and recouped the precious metals that they contained, then recycled the base metals.
If that was the case, the developer literally handed a bundle of money to the scrap metal recycler. The lesson for real estate developers is to make sure to recover precious metals from appliances – or at the very least, to work out a deal with the scrap metal recycling company to share the value of precious metals.
And there is a lesson for you too. If you come to own a quantity of older kitchen appliances, call Specialty Metals Smelters and Refiners so we can help you identify sources of precious metals and then recycle them for maximum value.
Where Are Precious Metals Found in Kitchen Appliances?
Here are some sources that you might not know about . . .
- Microwave ovens contain printed circuit boards that contain small quantities of gold that can be recouped and recycled by our qualified gold refinery.
- Electric and gas ranges contain thermocouples that can contain platinum, rhodium and other valuable metals. Plus, most ranges today contain printed circuit boards that contain quantities of recyclable gold.
- Refrigerators also contain thermocouples. And newer models also contain printed circuit boards that are made with quantities of gold.
Smaller Appliances Contain Precious Metals Too . . .
And don’t forget that smaller appliances like toaster ovens and coffee makers can contain quantities of gold and other precious metals that can be profitably refined, provided that you have a sufficient number of units.
If you find yourself in possession of quantities of the appliances we mention above, be sure to call us at 800-426-2344 to find out more.
Related Posts:
A Commercial Real Estate Agent’s Guide to Finding Precious Metals in Buildings
Recycling Gold-Plated Plumbing Fixtures: All That Glitters Could Be Gold
Why Recycling Large Quantities of Small Appliances Offers You a Big Payback
How Business Brokers Can Make Windfall Profits in Gold and other Precious Metals