Bottom Line: I ended up netting $199.19 selling my iPhone 4 on eBay.

Around the time that the iPhone 5 was release, I made a post discussing a few options for selling one’s used iPhone. I essentially concluded that selling one’s iPhone on eBay would likely be more profitable than selling to Gazelle. Feel free to take a look at that post for how I came up with these numbers, but at the time I estimated my iPhone 4 32GB to be worth about $338 (gross) on eBay, at which time the Gazelle offer was $173.

As you can imagine, my phone devalued a bit over the next few months (again, right after the iP5 was released). I ended up selling it for $247.50 (gross) on Nov 18, 2012, at which time the Gazelle offer was $149. However, I spent $16.20 on shipping, $24.63 on eBay fees (listing and seller fees combined), and $7.48 on PayPal fees, for a net of $199.19.

Was that extra $50 above the Gazelle offer worth the extra effort of photographing, listing, boxing, shipping, and risking being scammed or my eBay feedback rating harmed by a malicious buyer? Tough question. Especially if I had taken the original Gazelle offer at $173, it’s hard to argue that it’s not worthwhile. Then again, if I had just listed my phone sooner on eBay, perhaps I could have gotten closer to the $338. Who knows?