Smartphones are expensive. Everyone who owns one knows that. For instance, the iPhone 6s could run you $549, or quite a bit more if you want more storage or the iPhone 6 Plus. While Android smartphone prices have been dropping a little, the average cost is still a couple hundred dollars. And, of course, there’s the hefty monthly fee for using the phone.
But it’s often when you upgrade or switch to a completely new cellphone that you suddenly become aware that you’re spending even more money than you bargained for.
There is a lot to consider, including whether you want a phone that’s unlocked (that is, without a contract) or one with restrictions but likely a lower monthly fee. And so if you’ve been thinking about making an upgrade or switch, before you do, these are just some of the many decisions you’ll want to mull over before you call upon the phone store.
Changing platforms? Are you OK with losing your apps? Many of the apps you put on your phone probably weren’t free.
“One mistake I’ve seen a lot of people make when upgrading to a new phone is forgetting that changing platforms often requires repurchasing apps,” says Anjuan Simmons, an IT executive in The Woodlands, Texas, who is also a freelance writer and public speaker specializing in all things technology.
By platforms, Simmons is referring to your phone’s operating system. Is it an iPhone or an Android?
So if you switch, for instance, from an iPhone to an Android, “any paid apps you’ve purchased from the Apple App Store will probably need to be purchased again from Google Play,” he says, adding: “I call this the smartphone platform switch tax.”
Have you done enough homework on your carrier? It isn’t only whether your phone is a good one; you need to think about the company providing the phone service. Mellissa Dahl, a marketing executive in Hudson, Wisconsin, admits she made that mistake. She switched from one carrier to another, falling for a splashy promotion.
“My bills are more than they were … and I’m stuck with poor coverage,” she says.
Of course, Dahl may be able to get out of her contract. Phone companies are making it easier to do that these days, says Erik Slaven, an executive who works for an infrastructure consulting firm in Los Angeles and a guy who freely admits to having a “phone obsession.”
“I recently switched from Verizon to T-Mobile, and they paid off my $330 early termination fee and gave me a new Samsung Galaxy S6 edge for no money down and around $20 a month, with the option to upgrade for free up to three times in 18 months,” Slaven says. “That kind of flexibility was unheard of only a couple of years ago.”
If you research phones and get to know a lot about them before you make the switch, you don’t have to go broke, according to Slaven.
“I rarely keep a smartphone for more than a few months and am always looking to buy the latest and greatest,” he says.
Think about your storage needs. If you buy a phone with too little storage, you may come to realize that you’re constantly dumping photos and apps, which means your phone isn’t going to be as fully functional as you would like.
And, of course, if you buy far too much storage and don’t use the phone for much more than calls and Internet searches, you could feel like a chump every time you pay your bill.
Consider going for at least a happy medium, according to Brian Rozycki, manager of the AT&T wireless department and buyer of small electronics at Abt Electronics.
Sure, you would expect Rozycki to say that. More memory means a more expensive phone. But “the reality is the software and pictures and videos and apps are consuming more and more space nowadays,” he says.
What’s more, he says most consumers tend to buy the lowest storage because, naturally, it’s cheaper. But if you live on your phone or expect to keep your phone until its last dying breath, you probably should give yourself generous storage capacity.
Consider selling your old phone. Mark Frost works for Wikimotive.com, a car-related website, but as the recent former editor-in-chief of a personal finance website for college students, he often researched and wrote about cellphones — and has plenty of real-life experience with them as well.
“I always sell the phone privately within a year or two of its release. Around this time, most phones are typically still in high demand,” Frost says.
He often sells his cellphones on Swappa.com, where you can buy and sell tablets. He says it allows buyers to avoid high fees on other selling sites and feels it’s a safer bet than selling on the classifieds.
But why not recycle? Well, you can, but you could get more money from selling, Frost says.
“There are a lot of companies online that offer to recycle your old phone and will pay you to send it to them or drop it off at a business,” Frost says. “This sounds great, but the offer they’ll make you is typically only 10 to 30 percent of the actual value.”
And a trade-in? “These situations are never advantageous for the consumer … You’ll only be offered about 25 to 40 percent of the actual value, depending on your phone,” Frost says. “It’s a quick way to get some cash, but you can easily lose out on hundreds depending on the actual value of your phone.”
On the other hand, you may not have the time or patience to sell anything now or you may have no problem not making back as much as you might otherwise. If that’s the case, you could check out the aforementioned Swappa.com or Gazelle.com, where you can sell and buy certified pre-owned cellphones.
On average, says spokesman Brian Kramer, consumers make $116 when they sell their iPhones and Androids on Gazelle.com.
Don’t upgrade in the first place. In addition to Gazelle.com, there are other sites that sell used phones as well. For instance, Glyde.com and ReplaceYourCell.com.
You may need a different phone, but maybe it doesn’t need to be the latest model, says Someshwar Chidurala, a digital marketing analyst with Orchestrate Technologies, a business process management organization headquartered in Dallas.
“Zero in on your needs and begin earnestly researching,” he suggests, likening the race for the next-best phone to that whole keeping-up-with-the-Joneses trap some consumers fall into.
If you look around for the phone you need, rather than the phone you may only think you want, Childurala says: “Chances are, you might end up with a phone that has all the features you aspired for but at half the price.”
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5 Money-Saving Tips When Upgrading Your Phone originally appeared on usnews.com
