Free part-out value calculator — is it worth parting out?
The part-out math you already run in your head — off the napkin, onto the screen. Enter what the unit costs, what its parts should bring, and what selling takes, and see parting out, selling whole, and scrapping side by side.
No account. No email. Nothing uploaded. The math runs in your browser and resets when you leave — your costs and prices never leave your device.
The presets are editable ballparks to start from — rename the parts, and replace the numbers with your unit, your prices, and your labor rate.
The unit
The parts you'd pull
Rename any part to match what you're pulling, then enter the gross price you expect it to sell for — what a buyer pays, before marketplace fees. The tool takes fees and your other selling costs out below.
Selling costs & the alternatives
Your three outcomes
See the net for parting out, selling whole, and taking the cash-or-scrap offer — side by side, with the break-even point.
What makes a unit worth parting out?
You already know — you run this math on every unit, in your head at the auction or on a napkin at the bench: part it out when the resale of the sellable parts clears the labor, fees, packaging, and storage of selling them, by more than the unit brings whole or as scrap. The calculator doesn't change your judgment; it gets the math out of your head and into the palm of your hand, where the pieces the napkin skips — storage time, your own hours, the leftover carcass — stay visible. The math is the same whether the donor unit is a laptop, a washer, a motorcycle, or a combine — only the numbers change.
How does the calculator work?
Parts revenue is the sum of what each sellable part brings — enter the gross price you expect each part to sell for, what a buyer pays before marketplace fees, not a best-case sticker and not a fee- or condition-adjusted number. The calculator does the adjusting: from that revenue it subtracts marketplace fees, teardown labor at your shop rate, packaging, a storage burden, and what the unit cost you, then adds back what the leftover carcass brings as scrap. The result sits next to the two alternatives — selling the unit whole online (the same fee rate applies) or a no-fee cash offer / scrap price — plus the parts revenue you'd need just to break even.
It deliberately encodes the decision, not a parts database: no scraped prices, no made-up market data. You know what parts bring in your niche — the calculator just keeps the arithmetic honest.
How much can you make parting out a car?
Sellers who part out vehicles commonly report recovering roughly 10–30% of the vehicle's original value, with the engine, transmission, and catalytic converter carrying most of that. The honest benchmark isn't the car's book value — it's the junk-buyer offer or scrap price you'd take instead: enter that in the calculator's no-fee cash field and it sits right next to the part-out net. The trade-off is time: a full vehicle part-out is measured in workdays, not minutes, and body panels can occupy racking for months.
Is it worth parting out an appliance?
Usually, yes — this is one of the strongest part-out categories. A typical washer, dryer, or refrigerator yields roughly $150–300 in sellable parts — control boards, motors, and pumps are the high-value pieces — against the few dollars a scrap yard pays for the whole unit. The teardown is often under an hour, and appliance repair demand keeps boards and motors moving. Run the appliance preset above with your own prices to see it on your numbers.
Is it worth parting out a laptop?
Usually yes, if the drive, RAM, screen, or keyboard still work. A working SSD alone commonly brings $50–150, so a parted-out laptop typically clears far more than a recycler pays for it whole. The cost is per-part effort: each piece needs a photo, a listing, and a labeled spot on the shelf until it sells — which is manageable for one laptop and a real workflow question at fifty.
What eats into part-out profit?
Five costs eat part-out profit: unpriced labor, marketplace fees, the parts that never sell, storage time, and pieces that are expensive to pack and ship.
- Labor you don't price. Teardown, testing, photography, and listing time are real hours — the calculator makes you charge your shop rate for them.
- Marketplace fees. Roughly 13% of each sale on a typical parts listing, before packaging.
- The parts that never sell. Not every part finds a buyer — the calculator counts each part you enter as sold once, so list only the pieces you're confident will move.
- Storage time. Shelf and rack space isn't free, and slow movers occupy it for months.
- Odd shapes. Bumpers, panels, and glass cost real money to pack and ship — or force local-pickup-only prices.
What doesn't the calculator count?
The calculator doesn't count the cost of losing track of parts after the teardown — its math assumes every part you pull stays findable, sells once, and ships as the thing the listing promised. That's a workflow problem, not an arithmetic one. Once you're parting out units every week, each part needs a SKU the moment it comes off, a labeled location, and a record of which donor it came from and what else it fits. That's the part of the job Ordovee was designed for — from whole unit to sold part on one system, with a compatibility catalog you build as you go. The calculator answers whether to tear down; ODV keeps what happens next from eating the margin you just calculated.
One honest boundary: ODV doesn't price or value parts for you, and neither does this tool — every number here is yours.
Frequently asked questions
Is the part-out value calculator free?
Yes — no account, no email, and nothing is uploaded to a server. The math runs in your browser and your numbers never leave it. It is built by Ordovee, and the product links on this page are the only trade for keeping it free.
When is it not worth parting something out?
Skip the teardown when a working unit sells whole for near its parted value, when only a couple of parts carry real resale value, or when the parts are bulky enough that storage and shipping erase the margin. A thin edge on paper usually means the whole-unit sale wins once your time is priced in.
Is parting out a car worth the time?
A full vehicle part-out is measured in workdays — pulling, testing, photographing, and listing dozens of parts — so it pays only when the engine, transmission, and catalytic converter are sellable. Enter a junk-buyer cash offer in the calculator’s no-fee field and your realistic part prices, and let the side-by-side answer it for your car, not the average one.
What percentage do marketplaces take when you sell parts?
Budget roughly 13% of the sale price for marketplace fees on a typical parts listing, plus packaging, and shipping if you price shipping in. The calculator applies your fee percentage to your total parts revenue and subtracts it before the verdict, so marketplace fees are already priced into the part-out net.
Where do the preset numbers come from?
They are editable ballparks chosen to be plausible starting points for each unit type — not live market data and not a pricing feed. Replace them with your own unit cost, part prices, and labor rate; the verdict is only as good as your numbers.
Parting out at volume and tired of spreadsheets? See how the whole pipeline runs on one system in the product overview, or talk to us about your operation — the calculator stays free either way.