Where to Sell (or Buy) Gold, Silver & Platinum in New Mexico

New Mexico has no statewide law for businesses that buy gold, silver or jewelry outright. The one state law that touches these sales, the Pawnbrokers Act, covers pawn transactions only and is built around a local shop: each pawnbroker needs a permit from "his local government," displayed "in the pawnbroker's place of business" (NMSA 56-12-4), and a pawnshop is "the location or premises at which a pawnbroker regularly conducts his business" (NMSA 56-12-2). Nothing in it addresses a buyer outside New Mexico who buys by mail. We have no New Mexico premises; your items travel to our refinery in Oregon and the purchase happens there.

After you accept, you complete a simple online verification before we pay. Send only items that are yours to sell.

You get an itemized offer listing each piece with its weight and purity. Turn it down and we mail everything back with free return postage.* Accept and payment goes out the same day.**

New Mexico has never passed a statewide precious-metal or secondhand dealer law. Bills to create one, the Precious Metal Buyers Act in 2013 and the Precious Metal Transactions Act in 2017, both died in committee. The state scrap law, the Sale of Recycled Metals Act, covers scrap yards buying copper, aluminum, steel and similar metals and does not list gold, silver or platinum. So state law sets no ID rule, holding period or payment limit for a coin shop or jeweler that simply buys your gold.

Pawnshops are the exception. Under the Pawnbrokers Act (NMSA Chapter 56, Article 12), a pawn transaction is a loan against your item or a sale you can buy back. The pawnbroker must see your driver's license or other photo ID, write up each item with any serial number or identifying marks along with your name, address, date of birth and ID number, and get that report to local police within three days. A pawnbroker cannot knowingly deal with anyone under 18 or anyone intoxicated, and cannot take an item whose serial number or identification mark has been obviously defaced. Pledged items cannot be sold until 90 days after the loan comes due, unless you redeem them.

New Mexico taxes the business rather than the buyer: its gross receipts tax is imposed on the seller for doing business in the state, and the seller may pass it on as a separate line on your receipt. The state portion has been 4.875% since July 2023, and county and city add-ons push the total as high as 9.4375%. The legislature's fiscal analysts list New Mexico among the few states that still tax bullion and coins. Senate Bill 174 (2026), which would have let dealers deduct sales of gold and silver coins and bullion, was postponed indefinitely, as was a similar 2025 bill.

When you sell: the tax lands on the business making the sale, so you owe no New Mexico tax when you sell your gold, silver or platinum, whether to a local shop or to us by mail.

New Mexico's graduated income tax, topping out at 5.9%, reaches gains on gold, silver and platinum the same as other capital gains. There is no carve-out for coins or bullion, but every taxpayer can deduct their net capital gain up to 2,500 dollars a year (the larger 40% deduction is reserved for selling a New Mexico business). That cap took effect for tax years starting in 2025 (NMSA 7-2-34, as amended in 2024).

Federal rules still apply: the IRS taxes physical precious metals as collectibles, with gains on metal held more than a year capped at 28% and gains on metal held a year or less taxed as ordinary income. Inherited pieces generally use their value on the date of death as their cost basis. We are not tax advisers, so check with yours before you file.

New Mexico has no sound-money statute making gold or silver coin legal tender, and it has not exempted precious metals from its gross receipts tax. Neither affects what you are paid when you sell: buyers price metal off the live spot market, not a coin's face value.