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So whats the deal with scrap metal?

L

Lanse

Well-known Member
I just built this super high dollar luxury material hauler and I've been wanting to take it on her maiden voyage, but it seems scrap metal prices are still pretty far down the drain.

When I was in high school I used to haul tons and tons of scrap metal, and I remember that 10 cents/lb was a really bad day... 12-14CPLB was normal and I even got 15-16 CPLB a few times.

Now its like 4 cents a pound :-I

What happened? Furthermore, when will we see this trend turn around? I know you guys have watched prices rise and fall over the decades and I was wondering what usually triggers a rise or fall in the value of old junk?

What are we waiting to see, before scrap is worth hauling again?

What prices is your area seeing? I understand they vary quite a bit throughout the country...
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scrapyard by me said maybe late next year prices will be better.(3 cents a pond right now) But he said if he could predict the future he should be living on a private island somewhere. Bill
 
The last I checked you had to pay $2CWT to get the salvage yard to take it.
The price of scrap metal closely follows oil. Also the dollar is stronger and that drives down the price of nearly all commodities.
 
Shoot, I remember when $5/hundred was considered good. The highest it got in this area was around 12-13/hundred for short iron and that was around 2010.

The problem is a drop in demand for steel that was helped considerably by the inevitable slowdown in China's economy. Too, we see more things made out of other materials such as aluminum for car bodies and plastic for appliances. A few years ago I bought a dishwasher and the whole body of it was one piece of plastic.

Who really got hosed is the iron ore mining operations.

When it will turn around is a good question! I guess when people start buying again!

Nice tongue on that trailer.
 
Well, Lance, welcome to the real world. Corn used to be $8 bucks a Bu. Now it's $3.37!!! Sucks don't it.
Plan your budget for the lows, and reap the profits during the highs, when and if they come along.
Loren
 
The yard owner I deal with says maybe next summer before it goes up. Today $30.00 a ton mixed.
 
Eh, luckily this isnt my main source of income now. I work less than I did then and make more :D But it sure would be nice to go to the trouble of loading up the truck and offloading it for more than $20 :-I
 
Used oil is the same way . I heat shop with it . Used oil would bring good money . Buck a gallon at times . I would have to buy some from other shops . This years some oil recyclers are charging 25 cents a gal to pick it up . I can say this year I have no worry about running out. Especially when its 60 degrees in November .
 
Wow, that makes a lot of sense. Yeah, those were the good years, I started hauling in about July of 2010 and majorly slowed down at the end of 2011, hardly took anything in 2012 and 2013...

It was fun! I'd work with 3-4 other guys from school. We'de meet at someones junk pile that they didnt want to look at anymore, load down all of our trucks, and I'd take some off the top for sawzall blades and torch gas, then we'de split the money between us. We could usually make $60-$110, sometimes more, each per day, which is pretty sweet money especially in high school. No wonder my back is messed up D:
 
Eh, all I know is I'd rather get $150 for a load of metal then buy $3 gas on the way home, then get $37 and buy $2 gas :-I
 
As a scrapyard owner I know always says "my bank account sets out in the rain"! He, like most, buys when the price is cheap, stockpiles it, picking through it as time allows for the valuable bits that can be sold for higher than scrap price, and sells off the rest when the price goes up. Fine if you have another source of income (he does--several, in fact, depending on the weather and the time of year) and the room to pile it, but not exactly a quick ticket to riches!
 
Used to be everything followed supply and demand.
Now days seems everything follows the futures market and every time there is a tiny glitch in one market all the others wiggle up and down awhile before they settle back down.
I recall growing up in the 70's when a used car battery would fetch $12 -$15.
As a kid riding a bicycle down an alley if you found a battery someone had put out with the trash you would drop your bicycle on the ground and carry the battery home then come back later for your bike, if it wasn't there anymore it was no big deal as you were money ahead after a trip to the scrap yard.
 
Just couple of days ago talked with friend that is scrap yard owner and he said he hears next year will be worse than this year. Said some yards have already gone broke. Thinking that might happen to him, also said he thinks might have a buyer for things and if things happen it will be that he has lifetime use of the house that the yard is next to. He is 3 years older than me with me being 72 and him at 75 and neither of us having any kids. His wife at 7 years younger has the dreaded alshimer (?) diease and is loosing her mind. I lost my wife 8 months ago. And I think I am in better situation than he is now as when I lost my wife it was fast and no pain.
 
Yeah, IIRC the prices started climbing around 2008. There were several guys around here that made a decent sideline of cleaning up estates and "junkin'".
Sounds like you made the most of the opportunity while it lasted.

I have enough to make a load but it can just sit there.
 
That's why I said hit the junk yards when you were looking for fork's for your tractor. There are lots of guy's out there who use to scrap a lot that are crying the blues now because of the low prices. At least some of the remaining equipment might be safe for awhile. I know you like to use all new but now is the time to take advantage of the low prices and buy some cut off stuff and hold on to it for future use. I noticed the other day at one scrap yard I was at there was a lot of new cut off stuff laying around that I could pick threw and got what I wanted for $.30 a pound so I got 200 lbs of cut off's so I was happy. I do know one guy that is buying all he can now and holding on to it, He said he can make good money when the price goes back up in a year or 2. Bandit
 
Ya china just quite buying not just iron but also corn driving prices down in america it's not funny but china is controlling the supply an demand putting everything in a slump
 
Hi Bandit
The guys round here want top $ for stuff going out when in prices are high, then like now the prices are down they still want top$ going out the gate,just like good scrap price days still. I figured years ago it was just as cheap to drive 20 miles straight past their gate and go to the big smoke and buy brand new off the shelf, with no rust or paint and junk bits to clean off used. Even their new off cuts or brand new steel they used to bring back in empty trucks were a crazy price before they stopped doing it.

I remember when I left the U.K in 2000 the scrap dropped so much a guy had to pay scrappers to come get it, or some you just hoped their yard wasn't full and gave it to them with you delivering it! i know a few places where the shale in the ground was worth more than scrap. My backhoe loader dug a few good holes for guys. the Shale out was for roads and the good clean no oil and grease scrap went in the hole and topsoil back over. I kinda always wondered with the high prices whether any of that stuff re appeared a few years later L.O.L .
I kinda heard 5 years might be the next high cycle, true or not i don't know. Mine needs to go good or bad prices.
Regards Robert
 
1 penny a pound was the price for years and years...

New farm machinery cost 1 dollar a pound, and scrap was 1 penny a pound.
 
The price is so bad, no one is recycling. Scrap yard has no business. Will this cause some scrap yards to go belly up? They paid big bucks for scrap and now it's worth more than ten times less.
 
Scrap prices are down because the economy stinks (both world and US).

When this will "turn around" depends upon many factors and no one can accurately predict such.

Dean
 
Just hang onto it for awhile if you can. Unless you have city or county after you to clean it up ?
I don't know how many times I pulled something back out of my pile to make something else from !
 
I have a tandem axle trailer loaded with sorted steel. Currently, by the time I buy gas to take it to the scrapyard, there won't even be beer money left. Besides that, I keep raiding it and using peices for my projects.
Loren
 
there is a 48 ft trailer loaded with scrap near me ,waiting for the price to go up ,. papec chopper ,haybine 2 j deere combine heads ,,.. all worn out for the mostpart ,,. ,,,.I was there looking t heifers and the guy commented that there have been serveral parts grabs on the haybine and combine heads,, not just by him ,but his neighbors too ... personally the low price for scrap has beniffited me . I always seem to buy last owner type worn equipment and make any necessary repairs and run it and sell it when it is top condition.. got a nice ihc 1190 haybine for 250 on a cold windy day at auction ... the markets cycle ,, plain and simp;le , china has reached its pinnacle and lost her momentum , and therefore its appetite for steel ,, the entire Asian toilet rim follows them . Russia is mad at us ,,the rest of the European union is seemingly holding on to their last hudred bux , for the lowest price ,, especially true in current grain markets ,..seems that ever ywhere bins are full , prices steadily dropping and who ever blinx 1st loses
 
I have some that needs to go no mater what the price. None of it that can ever be used for anything.
 
Nice pickup bed trailer. On another tractor board a few years ago, that would have garnered some nice comments. Re the scrap prices, aside from the scrap yard owners, the low scrap prices can't be all bad, for tractor collectors (less chance of good parts tractors being scrapped) and local residents (less liklihood of thieves stealing their metals to make a quick buck). Just sayin....
 
Hi,
I spoke with a couple of the "junkyards" around here, and its my understanding, though I can't remember which country(s) were mentioned, but China and other buyers are purchasing scrap from India, etc. rather than the U.S. as of now. When those run low, or price goes up, scrap metal purchasers will begin buying from the U.S. again. All of the aforementioned posts add into the low prices. I was a trash hauler for awhile,
and there are magazines, etc in that industry which help serve as a guide. However, it is kind of a waiting game, as you all know.

I've a scrap pile I use for fabrication or wait for prices to go up,
but since turning colder, all rodents, rabbits, etc are homing in there. Thus, my dogs are coming in with severe lacerations on their paws. Expensive. I'm gonna have to part with my scrap, hate to. Around here it is a penny a pound for bailing material.
So, I'm losing money due to suture vet bills, dog-gone-it.
I don't know the answer, just thought I'd throw that out there.
I may have the boys fence the scrap pile for me,
but they're pretty busy lately.
Just another scrap metal story, haha.
Danny
 
There is a world-wide recession, bordering on depression, that the media is conveniently ignoring. No one is buying, and when they do, it is as another poster said, they get it somewhere cheaper.
 
At the Farm/Estate auction I attended today, they could not even give stuff away, no scrappers there. A four-bottom JD semi-mount plow went without a bid! The only thing to come close to retail prices was the one thing I wanted, of course.
 
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