Dear Lifehacker,
I'm clumsy. I dropped my phone and broke its screen something fierce. The problem is, I don't exactly have the money to drop on a new phone right away. What are my options?
Dear Totaled,
If you don't have the money to buy a new phone outright, you still have a few options—but first let's look at whether your phone is repairable.
If the problem with your phone ranges from simple things like a busted camera to a shattered screen, you may be able to repair it yourself. We've previously featured a guide on the most common smartphone repairs you can do yourself as well as a number of DIY fixes and upgrades. While it's not quite as simple as swapping out a card in your desktop, many of them are actually pretty simple, provided the manufacturer hasn't made it impossible to open up your phone.
It should be noted, however, that if you try to fix your own phone, not only is your warranty void (though for many of the things that can break, it may already be so), but you could make it harder to sell it (yes, it's possible and we'll come back to that) or get an insurance claim filled.
Just because you need to get a replacement smartphone in a hurry doesn't mean you necessarily have to drop $600+ right away. Several new options have only popped up in the last few years to get you a new smartphone without waiting for an upgrade or taking out a second mortgage. Depending on the carrier, some of these options change semi-regularly, so if you need a new phone, be sure to check with your provider for options.
One relatively new option that's popped up lately is phone financing. It's not universally available, but if you find yourself stuck with a broken phone mid-contract, nearly everyone has some option available to them.
Finance directly from the carrier: T-Mobile, Verizon, and Sprint all offer options for financing a phone, (relatively) no-questions-asked financing on full-priced handsets. T-Mobile handles all phone purchases this way. Verizon and Sprint offer more complex models, but new and existing customers can still walk in and have the option to walk out with a new phone without dropping several hundred bucks.
AT&T is a little bit of an outlier here. You can, technically, finance phones with AT&T, but the carrier requires you to sign on with its early upgrade Next program. As you might recall, we've found early upgrade programs aren't always the best deal. How it affects existing customers is particularly unclear because the plans have changed several times in the last year. Recent customers could have an easy jump, but long-time customers may run the risk of losing a grandfathered unlimited plan, so be sure to thoroughly check with your carrier before changing plans.
Finance directly from the manufacturer: Getting a financed phone directly from the manufacturer are considerably more rare than financing from a carrier, but you can still sometimes find the option. HTC has occasionally offered interest-free financing deals (though they're inconsistent), while Motorola has a standard financing offer.
No matter what option you use, getting a replacement phone is going to cost a decent chunk of money. Any value you can get out of your phone is worth it. For lost phones, you're obviously out of luck, but you can still squeeze a few bucks out of a broken phone.
You may be able to do a number of smartphone repairs yourself, but if you don't want to go to the trouble, you can sell a broken phone on Glyde. Depending on the phone and the condition it's in, you can get at least a few bucks for it. It might not be a lot, but a popular phone with relatively fixable damage like a broken screen can get around $100-200. Glyde even guarantees a certain amount of money in the event you can't sell it to an individual via repair partnerships.
As we've established before, early upgrade plans can range from mediocre to really crappy deals. However, if you think you're likely to break your phone, you could end up spending the money anyway. Certain carriers' deals are better than others on this front. For example, T-Mobile's plan requires a $10/month charge, but it includes devices insurance, which gives you not one but two options for replacing a phone. However, AT&T's Next program can result in you paying hundreds of dollars more than you would by selling old phones or financing new device.
Phone insurance can be of questionable value, depending on how much it would be to replace your phone off-contract. Most of the most popular, high-end smartphones cost around $600 or more, which means insurance might be worth it—if you lead an active lifestyle and chances of breakage are high. However, the rise of cheaper, high-end phones (like the Nexus or Moto lines) make it a bit more complicated. There are two main costs to insurance you'll need to calculate to figure out if getting insurance is worth it:
If both of these costs together are significantly less than the cost of a replacement phone, then insurance might be worth it. However, assuming even a moderate monthly cost and a low-balled deductible, you're still looking at over $300 to get a new handset even with insurance. Between used phones, refurbished devices, and models that are simply cheaper, your chances of getting a decent handset if you just save that money and buy it yourself have never been better.
Buying phones more frequently than once every two years is always going to be more expensive, no matter what elaborate system carriers, manufacturers, or insurers come up with. The upside is that you have plenty of options available. Just be sure to do a little math for the particulars of your situation.