Got Unwanted Gift Cards? Sell Them For Cash

Millions of Americans received gift cards over the holiday season, but they don’t know what to do with them. The National Retail Federation reported that the average shopper would spend $173 on gift cards for the holidays in 2014, which is up 83 percent over the past decade. People who receive gift cards have no interest shopping at the store that issued it. The hardest part about receiving gift cards is figuring out what to do with it. There are several ways you can turn your gift cards into cash.

One option to get rid of your unwanted gift cards is to offer them for sale or auction at an online marketplace like eBay, according to The Motley Fool. You’ll be able to find bidders that are willing to buy your gift cards, although it depends on the store that issued the cards. Stores that have a lot of demand will give you 80 to 80 percent of the face value of your gift cards at auction, and in some circumstances with most popular stores, you may even get them at full face value.

Alyssa Loring had several gift cards lying around her house that she never used. She didn’t shop at stores like Urban Outfitters or Tiffany. The gift cards she found while cleaning out her office last month were worth almost $200, according to the Boston Globe. Alyssa then searched for ways on how to sell her gift cards.

Loring was able to swap the gift cards for a digital gift certificate at Amazon.com, a store she frequents constantly. She received 80 percent of the remaining value of her gift cards back.

“For something that’s just sitting in the drawer that I’m never going to use, it was easy,” Loring said.

Alyssa was able to do it through Gift Card Granny. This website from Fort Collins, Colorado, is focused on an industry that’s limited to people having to sell their gift cards on eBay. The site currently sells more than 100,000 gift cards for sale. Gift Card Granny doesn’t buy and sell the cards directly. The site is patched into other websites that have 90 to 95 percent of the gift card reselling market.

According to a recent report on the Inquisitr, Starbucks announced that one in seven Americans received a Starbucks gift cards over the 2014 holiday season. Starbucks has become one of the most popular choices for gift card purchases due to its widespread popularity. If you ever received Starbucks gift cards over the holiday season, you now know you can sell them for cash.

[Image: frankieleon/Flickr]