This is a guest post by the guys at DiamondPriceGuru.com, a diamond search engine. Pretty cool stuff. Check it out.
So you’ve calculated how much you can spend on the engagement ring. What next? You could walk into the nearest jewelry store, hand over your two months’ paychecks, and say, “What will you give me for this?” It’s not romantic, but it gets the job done.
You could study more about the 4Cs than you ever did for the SATs, then try walking into the jewelry store, handing over the dough, and asking, “What’s the largest flawless, ideal cut, white diamond I can buy for this?” You’re still likely to be taken for a ride. And possibly laughed at.
There are three places where you can buy a diamond engagement ring – a brick-and-mortar retailer, a wholesaler, and an online store. At that strip mall jewelry store you will get an amazing service (or not) and will pay 30-50% more than it’s worth it for your rock, no doubt. To find a diamond wholesaler – ask around in case some of your married friends know some reliable ones. And finding and quickly comparing prices for diamonds on the Internet is easy: here’s a handy tool for figuring out what kinds of diamonds are within your price range before you fork over your money - we created a Diamond Search Engine. Tell the search engine how much you can afford (make sure to knock off 10% to 20% to pay for the ring setting later), pick a shape, and see what types of diamonds pop up at 10 competing online retailers. You can switch shapes, set a limit on color, clarity, cut grade, and carat weight, and narrow down your search. Tips along the bottom of the search results page help describe the diamonds’ grades in easy-to-understand non-jeweler talk.
