How to keep your phone worth more
Almost everything that protects resale value costs nothing and happens years before you sell.
Resale value is mostly decided long before anyone asks for a quote. Six things, none of them expensive.
1. A case and a screen protector
The two most expensive deductions on any quote are a damaged panel and a cracked screen, and both are what a case and a protector are for. A protector takes the scratches instead of the glass and costs almost nothing to replace; a case takes the corner drop that bends a frame. The detail is here.
2. Charge it like you intend to keep it
Heat and constant full charges are what age a battery, and the battery is one of the questions in every quote. Nothing extreme is required — ordinary habits are enough.
3. Repair inside the manufacturer's network
If something does break, an authorised repair keeps the parts original. A third-party screen or battery is priced as a non-original part whether or not anybody mentions it, so the cheaper repair can cost more at sale time.
4. Keep the bill where you can find it
The bill is what proves the warranty, and an in-warranty phone with the bill prices higher. It is almost certainly a PDF in your email — put it somewhere you will look. Keep the box on a shelf if you have one; it adds a little.
5. Keep the charger, and the original one
The original charger adds. On fast-charging phones it also does something a generic one cannot, which is part of why the next owner values it.
6. Do not store it
The habit that costs people the most is not damage — it is delay. A phone in a drawer is losing value every month while doing nothing at all, and the first year is the steepest part of the fall.
The best-kept phone in the world is worth less next year than it is today. Sell it when you stop using it, and everything above will have been worth doing.
See what your phone is worth
A price in about a minute, free doorstep pickup in a two-hour slot, and paid — cash or bank transfer — before our agent leaves.
Questions people ask
- Does using a case actually improve resale value?
- It prevents the damage that causes deductions — cracked glass, dented corners, a scratched back. That is not a bonus for having a case; it is the absence of the faults that cost the most.
- Do screen protectors matter?
- A protector takes the scratches the glass would otherwise take, and it is replaceable for very little. It is the cheapest protection for the most expensive surface.
- Is it worth keeping the box for two years?
- It adds a little at sale. It costs a shelf. That is a reasonable trade if you have the shelf.