My contract is up at AT&T and I'm on their grandfathered "unlimited" plan. I want to do the following:

1. Buy a subsidized iPhone 5 for $200 (leave it in the shrinkrap as new)
2. Unlock it.
3. Sell it on Craigslist for $650
4. Buy a different phone.

Can you guys think of anything that would go wrong? I'm not entirely sure IF I need to unlock it before I sell it.

11/19/2012 9:25:16 AM

are they not doing like Verizon is and murdering your unlimited plan if you renew your contract?

11/19/2012 10:16:01 AM

yeah, ^ is what i'd be concerned about...subsidized phones mean you're locked into a contract and it seems that the trend these days is to fully fuck you over if you have a decent "grandfathered" plan

i guess you net $450 before purchasing a new phone, right? what's the unsubsidized cost of the new phone you want? $500-550? so you save $100 (assuming you get the $650)

furthermore...isn't the unsubsidized price for an iphone 5 (16GB) $650, anyway? why wouldn't someone just spend that money in the first place if they want to get a phone off-contract?

11/19/2012 10:51:17 AM

^^
I've read that AT&T is letting people do this as their "unlimited" plan is no longer really unlimited. I'm still uneasy, though.

^
I have the Galaxy Nexus and will be picking up a used nexus4 (whenever the market stabilizes).
I was considering selling the iphone5 on ebay where they're selling for $700 unlocked.

The unlocking part is the real kicker here. I don't think I can unlock it without opening it up.

I was going to tell the CSR that I'm using my subsidized phone price to give the iPhone to my GF for christmas. I spoke with a CSR in Apex; he said that my "plan" should work, but he sounded like he had no idea what he was talking about.

[Edited on November 19, 2012 at 11:04 AM. Reason : f]

11/19/2012 11:03:32 AM

paging bmel

I'm Krallum and I approved this message.

11/19/2012 11:20:33 AM

yeah, I'd too be a bit hesitant. Had a few friends who lost their true unlimited plans because of the cock up from CS guys at ATT. They'd promise one thing or say something about their service when its completely false. Had an ATT dude tell me one time that you can't have their service without a contract... He literally yelled it at me.

11/19/2012 11:56:40 AM

Quote :

"are they not doing like Verizon is and murdering your unlimited plan if you renew your contract?"

You keep the unlimited plan if you renew your contract. The caveat though is they throttle you after 5GB (LTE). No charge though. I don't know what they throttle you down to though...

11/19/2012 12:41:59 PM

ha, 5 GB? I'd be throttled in a day or so.

11/19/2012 1:48:43 PM

^ what in the world do you download on your PHONE that takes up 5GB in a month, let alone a day? or is that a hotspot, your only intarweb access, and you're downloading torrents?

11/19/2012 1:55:39 PM

Yeah i never use more than 2-3GB on my phone in a month. Now my hotspot I use 10-15GB but my company pays for it.

At home that's a whole other matter entirely.

Unless you never have wifi and stream all the time I don't see how anyone could get close to 5GB.

11/19/2012 2:05:01 PM

5GB in a day??? Holy shit.

11/19/2012 2:11:24 PM

I mean truthfully streaming a Netflix movie on a phone can easily hit 1-2GB if it's high quality. So that's really only a few movies a month but that's worst case scenario if you don't have wifi.

11/19/2012 2:18:01 PM

I'm trying to think about how the IMEI number would be associated with my account.

11/19/2012 2:45:30 PM