Many people have fantasized about finding riches by striking oil in their backyards or stumbling across a diamond as they stroll through exotic rock formations. Those situations are not likely to occur, but you can find at least modest riches in your own home if you take the time to look. Almost everyone has some sellable gold hiding in their dressers, junk drawers, and old electronics that dealers will be happy to purchase. You simply need to become a gold detector.

Gold Jewelry

Searching your jewelry box is the obvious place to begin. Simply set aside broken or unwanted gold chains, rings, and bracelets. Then check them for their gold content. If they are marked 10K or higher, they will be worth something to a dealer. Of course, 18k and 24k items are worth the most. If you have gold-filled jewelry, it is worth little unless you have a great deal of it. All that junk jewelry you kept from your youth may have some value. Anything marked gold plate has no melt value, so don’t bother presenting it to a dealer. All that glitters isn’t sellable gold. Fortunately, broken chains, old charms, and rings from failed romances can bring you a nice profit that will help you overcome the sad memories.

Circuit Boards

Jewelry is simple to find, but other gold in your home takes a little digging. For instance, all those old remotes you have lying around have a bit of gold in their circuit boards, so check the sides of your sofas and look under the coffee table. If you have some stereo equipment from the last few decades stored in your attic, you should also take them apart. They too have circuit boards containing bits of gold. You can also volunteer to take old VCRs and DVD players off the hands of your friends and family in order to get even more gold-containing circuit boards. Also, do not forget your old cell phones. They too contain gold, so if they are too broken to sell as a phone, you can still recoup some money from their golden innards. Experts suggest that collecting these items can be lucrative for you personally or helpful if you are raising money for a charity or some other cause.

You can find dealers who will take your circuit boards and extract the gold, or you can remove the circuit boards and carefully remove the gold yourself. This step requires some basic chemistry and a great deal of caution, so make sure you follow the procedure to the letter. You will need protective clothing such as rubber gloves and goggles and Methyl Hydrate plus hydrogen peroxide. If you are uncomfortable with this idea or just klutzy around chemicals, let the professionals do the extraction. The intact circuit boards will still be worth some money.

Plant Life

Surprisingly, you may be able to find gold in your backyard. It won’t be lying on top of the lawn in convenient piles of coins but beneath the surface. Some plants indicate the presence of minerals under the ground, including gold. So if you have Desert Trumpet on your property, you might want to take a look beneath the roots to see if gold lies there. Known as geobotanical prospecting, this method may be of limited effectiveness for most people, but if you have horsetail in the backyard, you might as well take a look. You could be one of the lucky ones and be sitting on your own pile of gold.

Odds and Ends

Don’t overlook the gold odds and ends that may be lying around your home. For instance, you may find a valuable gold crown or two thrown in with the coins you inherited from your grandparents. If you ever lose a gold tooth yourself, don’t let the dentist keep it. Selling it can go a long way toward paying for future fillings. Tucked away in your kitchen cabinets, you may have some glassware that is decorated with gold leaf, an extremely thin layer of gold. Some older houses contain gold leaf in their interior design that you can remove and sell. You won’t get rich quickly by selling gold leaf, but larger items decorated in this way will put some cash into your bank account.

Auctions and Yard Sales

You can take your gold mining out of the home and to local sales. Now that you know what to look for, auctions and yard sales can yield a decent haul of gold for you. Frequently at these events, you can find boxes of metal items sold in lots. If you are willing to do a little digging, you may well find enough ore to sell to your gold buyer. Don’t forget to bid on those old VCRs and cell phones as well. Those circuit boards sales can produce a nice profit for you.

Gold Dealer

Once you have begun mining for gold around your home, you will soon see potential profit everywhere. Establish a good relationship with a reputable gold buyer, and you will spend less time shopping around for the best prices. You will also learn how many gold teeth or 10k earrings it takes to make a reasonable amount of money. Gold buyers also have certain standards for the items that they buy, so you need to be well versed on their guidelines.

Your home and neighborhood can truly be gold mines, but you will need to work a bit to uncover that precious ore. Search your closets and junk drawers, take a peek in the attic, and clean out the garage. You may have a (small) nugget’s worth of gold in your old jewelry box alone. Volunteer to clean out your mother-in-law’s garage as well. She may have half a dozen broken VCRs just waiting for you to dismantle as well as some items decorated with gold leaf. Gold is literally everywhere, so start prospecting today and improve your financial situation.