Get The Most Value for Your Xbox 360 Before You Upgrade

Just as some predicted it would, purchasing an Xbox One has gotten significantly cheaper with time. Adopting the console early on could easily cost as much as a rent payment in a medium size city. $499 without any free games, is how much an Xbox One cost at launch. Many sold their Xbox 360s hoping to lower that cost a little.

Today an Xbox One costs as little as $299 for some bundles. Upgrading to the console has never been cheaper. These console bundles come with a free game – often two free games. With the Xbox One Backwards Compatibility Program now available to everyone, Microsoft has made it easier to give up your Xbox 360 to finance your purchase of an Xbox One. That’s where the trouble comes in. Prices on the Xbox One have fallen and so has the value of an Xbox 360. Less people want the console since there’s something new available.

Read: The Xbox One Upgrade: What You Need to Know

Getting the most store credit or cash for your Xbox 360 trade-in or sale has never been harder than it is today.

Where to Trade

For years, buying a new console meant relegating the older console to a secondary shelf or a closet. There wasn’t an easy way to sell. Often times, the new console didn’t support the games that you’d purchased for the console you were moving away from. People just sat on their old console purchases, choosing to keep them around for nostalgia purposes rather than rushing out to sell them.

Everything changed when GameStop removed the headaches involved in selling consoles. Anyone could show some identification and get cash for their old games and console. That money could then be applied to a newer purchase, keeping the cost of staying current down. In recent years, trade-in programs like the one GameStop still offers have ballooned.

GameStop

Despite big competition from new comers, GameStop’s trade-in program is still the gold standard by which other trade-in programs are judged. Getting rid of your Xbox 360 there is pretty easy – provided you’re ok with generally low trade-in value. The company hands out cash and gift cards to shoppers that trade-in their stuff, but there’s an obvious emphasis on giving that money right back to the company with a purchase.

• Original Xbox 360 without Hard Drive $16 Cash & $20 Credit
• Xbox 360 S with 4GB of Storage $20 Cash & 25 Credit
• Xbox 360 E with 4GB of Storage $20 Cash & $25 Credit
• Xbox 360 S with 250GB of Storage $28 Cash & $35 Credit
• Xbox 360 E with 250GB of Storage $36 Cash & $45 Credit
• Xbox 360 E with 500GB of Storage $44 Cash & $55 Credit

Note that GameStop doesn’t require your system to function for all trade-ins, apparently. Trade-ins at the company do require a single controller and the power cable that came with the console. All other extras, like Kinect and a second controller can be traded-in separately for more cash.

Amazon

Online retailer Amazon sticks to straight store credit for its trade-in program. It doesn’t hand out cash and sellers have to box up their trade-in and send it to get verified before they get store credit.

• Original Xbox 360 with 60GB Hard Drive $44 in Credit
• Xbox 360 S with 4GB of Storage $37.27 in Credit
• Xbox 360 E with 4GB of Storage $56.93 in Credit
• Xbox 360 S with 250GB of Storage $51.41 in Credit
• Xbox 360 E with 250GB of Storage $75.79 in Credit
• Xbox 360 E with 500GB of Storage $149.51 in Credit

Note that Amazon pays for postage and expects all accessories that came with each bundle to be included. Extra controllers and accessories qualify for trade-in too.

Best Buy

Finally, there’s Best Buy, which offers trade-ins online and in store. It took hands out store credit that can be used on other items. Not cash, like GameStop does.

• Xbox 360 S with 4GB of Storage $24 in Credit
• Xbox 360 E with 4GB of Storage $24 in Credit
• Xbox 360 E with 250GB of Storage $32 in Credit

Best Buy’s online tool can be a bit odd when trying to simply identify your specific console bundle. As such, it’s a better idea to call into the company’s stores to get the right trade-in value for your particular console. The console has to be unlocked and in working order, Best Buy says.

Where to Sell

If you’re willing to try your hand at auctions, online site Ebay is a perfectly valid alternative to trade-in programs.

On Ebay right now, Xbox 360 S consoles with 4GB of storage are worth $129. Xbox 360 E consoles with 500GB of storage sell for around $170. The problem with eBay is that there’s no effective way to predict how much your auction will reach. There’s also the delays in getting money from sales and have to share some of the profits with eBay for each thing that you sell.

Sell prices for consoles on Craigslist range even more than on eBay. The more extras you include with your console bundle, the higher price you’ll be able to demand there. You don’t have to share the profits with Craigslist, but you do have to handle the sell personally.

Tips

Before you sell or trade-in your Xbox 360, here are some quick tips. First, remove everything on your console before selling it – that includes your profile. If you don’t, someone that buys the console could get access to your Xbox Live account and charge games and extras to it. It’s happened before.

Second, be sure to keep an eye on sales in your area at local retailers. Best Buy and GameStop have offered boosts on trade-in value before when users were upgrading to an Xbox One. Those deals could come back at any moment.

Don’t worry about your profile or any video that you’ve purchased through the Xbox 360. That content will transfer over. Games that you’ve purchased through store will show up on the Xbox One as they become available in the Xbox One Backwards Compatibility Program. Make sure that all of your game saves are in the cloud so that they’ll transfer over too. Keep in mind that some games may never transfer over to the newer console.

Read: Xbox One Backwards Compatibility What You Need to Know

Good luck with your Xbox 360 trade-in or sell.