Flagship calculator
Scrap Lot Deal Analyzer
Found a lot for sale? Break it into materials, weigh or estimate each one, and see the margin before you pay — not after.
Lot composition
Indicative default — enter your yard's price. Saved for next time.
Return on spend you want, e.g. 20% = earn back cost + 20% more.
Why estimate before you buy
Online scrap listings — Facebook Marketplace, Craigslist, auction lots — describe weight and contents in the seller's words, not a certified scale ticket. The Deal Analyzer turns "80 lbs of mixed wire and motors" into a number: break the lot into the materials you can identify from photos or a description, estimate each one's weight, and let your own local prices do the rest. It won't replace inspecting the lot in person, but it catches the two most common mistakes — paying scrap-copper prices for a lot that's mostly steel, and forgetting that "margin" has to cover more than just the math being right.
Reading margin and break-even
Margin here is return on the asking price: how much profit you'd clear as a percentage of what you paid, assuming your composition estimate holds. A thin margin — 10% or less — leaves no room for the estimate being wrong, for a yard grading something down, or for the hour it takes to sort and haul. The suggested offer works backward from your target margin: it's the most you should pay for this exact composition to still hit that return.
Composition estimates are the biggest source of error, not the prices. A rough split into 3–4 material categories, checked against a photo, beats an over-precise breakdown you can't actually verify from a listing.
After the deal
Once you've got the lot home and broken it down, the Wire Yield and Strip or Sell calculators handle the cable specifically — this tool is for sizing up the deal, not replacing the per-material math once you're sorting it on the bench.
Deal Analyzer questions
How do I estimate composition without weighing every piece?
Break the lot into 2–4 rough categories you can eyeball with confidence — 'mostly steel with some copper wire,' say — and estimate weight for each. You don't need per-item precision; you need a composition good enough to catch a badly overpriced lot.
What does "margin" mean here?
Return on the asking price: (estimated value − asking price) ÷ asking price. A 50% margin means the lot is worth about 1.5× what you’d pay for it — room for your estimate to be wrong and still come out ahead.
What target margin should I use?
Enough to absorb your composition guess being off, plus hauling and sorting time. Many scrappers look for at least 30–50% on lots bought sight-unseen from a listing; less if you can inspect the lot in person first.
Why does the material list share prices with other calculators?
Your price for #2 copper is the same yard, the same day, whether you’re running the Deal Analyzer or the Wire Yield calculator — so entering it once updates it everywhere on this site.
Buying scrap lots online?
Reading a listing like a pro means knowing what to ask the seller before you run the numbers.