musical instruments · Nova Scotia

Where to sell musical instruments in Halifax

3 businesses in and around Halifax that buy used musical instruments from the public — what each takes, and whether you are offered a purchase, a consignment or a loan.

Verified 2026-09-24 from each organization's own website. We are not affiliated with anyone listed here, nobody pays to be included, and we receive nothing if you sell to them.

How to tell what you have got

Before you call anyone, two minutes with the object settles most of it. None of this needs an expert — it needs a flashlight and a look at the back.

  • Electric and acoustic guitars from the known makersFind the serial number — on the headstock, on the neck plate, or on a label inside the soundhole — and identify the exact model and year before you let anyone make you an offer. Then look at completed sold prices, not asking prices.
  • Tube amplifiersLook through the grille or the back panel for a row of glass tubes. Fender, Marshall, Vox, Traynor and Garnet are names worth stopping for.
  • Effects pedals and analog synthesizersDo not bundle the pedals in with the gig bag as accessories. Price them separately, one at a time.
  • Professional microphones and recording gearShure SM57 and SM58, and anything stamped Neumann, AKG or Sennheiser, are worth identifying rather than boxing up as cables and bits.
  • Step-up and professional band instrumentsA Selmer Paris stamp on a saxophone, or a professional-model designation on a Yamaha or Bach trumpet, changes the answer entirely. Read the engraving near the valves or on the bell before you treat the thing as scrap.
  • Good grand pianos, and only good onesLook for Steinway, Yamaha, Kawai, Bösendorfer or Mason & Hamlin on the fallboard. If the name means nothing to a piano dealer on the phone, it is a disposal job.
  • Orchestral strings above student gradeTake it to a violin shop or luthier for an opinion before a pawnbroker or a general antiques dealer sees it. Keep the bow and the case with it, and do not have it cleaned, repaired or re-varnished first.

Rarely worth anything

Not a rule, and not a reason to bin something without asking. These are the things people most often expect to be worth money and find are not.

  • Upright pianos, player pianos and reed organs
  • Any piano that has not been tuned in decades
  • Student band instruments from the rental era
  • Digital pianos, home keyboards and electronic organs more than about a decade old
  • Record players and hi-fi separates that come out of the house with the instruments
A CITES permit can be required before you ship an instrument out of Canada, and permits are never issued retroactively Canada — applies to export and import across the border, not to a sale within Canada

Environment and Climate Change Canada administers CITES in Canada. Its permits page states that you must have the necessary CITES permits before you import or export items, that the permits must be validated by a border services officer at the place of exit and the place of entry, and that "Permits will not be issued retroactively" — if you do not have the proper permit, border officers can hold and seize the item and you will not be able to get a permit afterward to release it. The page notes that CITES parts and derivatives turn up in items including musical instruments. The materials that matter here are elephant ivory, common in pre-1970s piano key tops, and tortoiseshell. We have deliberately removed the rosewood warning that appeared in an earlier version of this page: CITES changed how it treats rosewood in finished instruments, and we could not retrieve the current annotation text from CITES, whose site refuses automated retrieval, so this page makes no claim about rosewood in either direction — ask CITES Canada before you ship a rosewood instrument abroad. If you sell to a buyer outside Canada and ship the instrument, you are the exporter. Selling the same instrument to someone in Canada does not engage any of this.

Read the rule →
Worked elephant ivory needs a permit for every import and export, personal items included, since 8 January 2024 Canada — border movements only

Environment and Climate Change Canada states that "Permits are required for the import and export of all items of worked elephant tusk (ivory)" and that "The requirements will be in force on January 8, 2024." Raw ivory is prohibited for import and export without a permit outside narrow museum, zoo, scientific research and law-enforcement purposes. Worked ivory held as a personal effect or household item is no longer automatically exempt. This bites on pianos in particular, because ivory key tops were ordinary before the 1970s, and on older bows, woodwind rings and inlays. Confirm with CITES Canada what documentation your specific instrument needs before you list it internationally.

Read the rule →

3 places in Halifax that take musical instruments

Finer Things Antiques & Curios

Buys outright May collect — ask
Buysmilitary and nautical antiques, Indigenous art, Nova Scotia artists' paintings, antique furniture, pre-1850s and Danish Modern, vintage advertising signs, folk art, sterling silver and jewellery, transportation memorabilia, pre-1975 toys and pre-1970 comic books, pottery and glassware, scientific instruments, sporting goods, firearms, seasonal décor
The dealThey buy for their own account rather than taking a cut of a later sale: "We will purchase antiques and collectibles outright and are willing to pay with whatever method is your preference." You do not have to haul anything in first — email a handful of photographs to their address or text the shop number. For estate lots and larger collections they do house calls throughout Nova Scotia.
Where6438 Quinpool Road, Halifax, NS B3L 1A8
This is a dealer buying to resell, and no prices are published, so the figure you are offered is the dealer's own valuation.
Visit their site →(902) 456-1412

Halifax Buy and Sell (Hydrostone)

Buys or lends Not stated — ask
Buysgold, silver, jewellery, laptops, high-end gaming computers, home electronics, televisions, musical instruments, power tools, video game consoles and games
The dealThis is the only shop in this list whose own site confirms it does both. It describes itself as "Specializing in small collateral loans (pawns) and buying and selling new and gently used merchandise." Those are two different transactions. Selling outright ends your claim on the item: the money is yours and the item is theirs. A pawn is a loan secured on the item: you get cash now, the shop holds the item as collateral, and you repay to get it back. If the loan is not redeemed within the agreed period the item is forfeited and sold. The site publishes no loan period, no fee and no rate, so the cost of borrowing is not knowable from the website.
Where3081 Gottingen St, Halifax, NS B3K 3E4
Confirm at the counter which of the two transactions you are being offered. No loan period, fee or rate is published anywhere on the site, so ask for the full terms in writing before pledging anything.
Visit their site →(902) 701-4449

Most Wanted (Dartmouth)

Buys outright Not stated — ask
Buysgold, silver, coins, jewellery, tools, phones, musical instruments, electronics, video games
The dealTrades under a pawn name but the site describes outright purchase only: "We buy gold, silver, coins and jewellery, tested and weighed in front of you" and "We buy tools, phones, instruments and more, cash on the spot." Their About page mentions pawn only in the past tense, describing the first store opening on 12 May 2009 in Charlottetown "as a small but full-featured pawnshop." Checked across the site, no pawn loan, collateral loan, lending or redemption terms are published anywhere. So what is advertised here is a sale: final, and the money is yours.
Where1245 Cole Harbour Road, Dartmouth, NS B2V 1N1
Trades as a pawn shop, but what it advertises is an outright purchase. Ask which one you are being offered.
The name says pawn; the advertised transaction is purchase. Ask which one you are being offered before handing anything over, because a sale cannot be undone and a pawn loan has to be repaid to get the item back.
Visit their site →(902) 446-7296
We could not verify this city’s municipal rules for second-hand dealers and pawnbrokers from an official source, so we state none. Check with the City or the province before relying on anything you read about them elsewhere.

Not sure what you have got?

Photograph it and we will tell you what it is and what it is worth — including when the honest answer is that it is worth nothing.

See what it's worth Everything in Halifax →

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