Diamonds are some of the most adored gemstones on the planet, but do they appreciate or depreciate?
According to experts, it’s extremely rare for diamonds to appreciate. It’s the exact opposite, with most diamonds falling dramatically in value as soon as they’re purchased from a jeweler, just like a car. It’s only the rarest and colored diamonds that appreciate.
Read on to learn more about diamonds and the prices they can command on the open market.
Diamonds Are Forever, Their Prices Aren’t
When people think of diamonds, they imagine a sparkling, crystal-clear gemstone, glittering under the lights. They picture a jewel sitting atop a gold ring, or inlaid among dozens on a stylish necklace, or bracelet.
They also tend to generate a vision of something dramatically expensive and rare. While diamonds might command a considerable price, they’re by no means rare.
When put in perspective, standard diamonds are consistently and readily available all-year-round. They’re not difficult to obtain, and there are countless gem-quality examples on the market.
Of course, they’re famed for their beauty, their sparkle, and their durability. Diamonds are some of the hardest materials in the world, scoring the highest on the Mohs scale, a spectrum used to gauge the hardness of a material.
They’re tougher than a sapphire, emerald, or ruby, but nowhere near as rare. However, they can still be given a price-per-carat higher than some of these colored stones when they themselves are colored.
Unfortunately, it’s only these colored examples that will appreciate – if you buy them right, that is. The stock-standard clear diamonds, regardless of cut, origin, or mount, will depreciate considerably in value.
If you were to buy a diamond ring from a jeweler, they’ve almost certainly boosted the price to make a profit. Therefore, you’re immediately at a loss if you come to sell it on – you can’t make that boost yourself, and you lose your profit margin right from the get-go.
There are numerous factors taken into account when selling a diamond. You’ll need to get it certified, and where it came from, where you bought it, and how old it is all impacts the value.
Ruling the Market
As we’ve said, it’s the colored diamonds that command the highest price on the jewelry market. They’re infinitely rarer than standard diamonds, and they’re guaranteed to turn heads at any gemstone auction, anywhere in the world.
There have been some legendary gemstones scattered throughout history, many of them diamonds. It’s these examples that have appreciate massively as the years have worn on.
While your typical diamond engagement ring depreciates from the moment it leaves the store, a blue or pink diamond will grow in value. One website, smartasset.com, estimates that there’s quite often a one- to two-hundred percent markup on retail prices.
This could mean that a two-thousand dollar, half-carat diamond ring will warrant a later resale value of around six-hundred dollars. There are many other examples of this scenario online, further supporting the depreciation fact.
For example, a British newspaper called The Guardian suggested that a diamond ring was one of the fastest depreciating possessions on the planet. In an article in 2015, they told the story of a one-thousand pound diamond ring that was worth just fifty pounds when the owner tried to sell it back to a jeweler.
These colored diamonds though – they’re definitely special. We’ve spent plenty of time discussing gemstones recently, from the toughness of gems, to the rarity of particular stones.
In 2017, a single diamond broke records and commanded a never-before-seen value at auction in Hong Kong. This super-rare pink diamond, The Pink Star, sold for an incredible seventy-one million dollars.
The flawless stone weighed around 132.5 carats when it was discovered in Africa in 1999. However, two years later it would have been cut and polished to the point of weighing less than half that – 59.60 carats.
And it still warranted a value of more than seventy million dollars.
There are only a few colorless diamonds that make the listings of the most valuable gems in history. Their lack of color is often made up for by their enormous size, or legacy.
For example, there’s the Koh-i-Noor, an Indian diamond that was discovered eight hundred years ago. It’s been part of the British crown jewels for decades and is allegedly worth over a billion dollars.
However, that example is far from the 1-carat stone that sits atop your average engagement ring.