How to Inspect a Used Appliance Before You Buy

A used appliance is a good deal only if you can confirm two things before you hand over money: that it runs a full cycle right now, and that parts for it are still available. Everything else below supports those two questions. The machines that ruin people are bought cold, unplugged, "just needs a part," from a seller who is done with it.

Start with the model and serial number

Ask for a photo of the data tag before you drive across the metro. It costs the seller nothing and tells you more than the listing photos. The tag sits in a predictable spot:

• Refrigerator: inside the fresh food compartment, left wall or ceiling.
• Top-load washer: under the lid rim, or on the rear panel.
• Front-load washer and dryer: inside the door opening on the front frame.
• Dishwasher: on the edge of the inner door panel.
• Range: behind the storage drawer, or on the frame behind the oven door.

Then do three lookups. Manufacture date: most brands encode it in the serial, and a search for the brand plus "serial number date code" will translate it. Sellers routinely call a 14-year-old machine "a few years old," and they are not always lying. They often bought it used.

Recalls: run the model number against the brand's recall page and the federal recall database. Recall repairs are free even to a second owner.

Parts availability, which matters most: search the model number plus "control board." If the major electronic parts show as discontinued, that appliance is disposable the day it breaks. A board discontinued in 2019 cannot be found.

Run a full cycle, or walk away

Standing in a stranger's basement for 40 minutes is awkward. Do it anyway.

Washer. Run a short cycle with water. Both hot and cold should flow; a trickle on one side is a clogged screen or a failing inlet valve. Then stay for the spin, because spin is where a washer tells the truth. A front-loader with a failing rear drum bearing makes a rumbling growl that rises and falls with drum speed. Before it is plugged in, grab the drum at six and twelve o'clock and rock it. Play, or a gritty feel by hand, means the bearing or spider arm is going.

Dryer. Run it on heat and feel the exhaust, which should be hot within two minutes. Thumping is drum rollers, a squeal is the idler pulley, both cheap. Heavy lint packing behind the drum means it ran on a restricted vent, which is how heating elements and thermal fuses die.

Refrigerator. It should already be plugged in and cold. If not, come back after 24 hours of running. Look at the rear freezer panel: thin even frost is normal, a thick sheet of clear ice means the defrost system failed. Listen for the evaporator fan, separate from the compressor hum below.

Dishwasher. Hard to test uninstalled. Check the sump and filter, and inspect the racks, because rusted tines leave marks on dishes and replacement racks often cost more than the machine is worth.

Range. Turn on every element or burner, then run bake and broil. On gas, look for a clean blue flame and prompt ignition without repeated clicking. An oven that takes minutes to light has a weak igniter.

Rust, water damage, and door seals

Rust at the bottom rear of a washer is bearing or tub seal leakage. Rust at the base of a refrigerator usually means the condensate pan has overflowed repeatedly, which points back to a defrost or drain problem. Surface rust on a side panel from a damp basement is cosmetic. Warped particleboard where the appliance sat is evidence of a leak nobody mentioned, and a burnt-electrical smell is a walk-away. Refrigerator gaskets should be pliable, unbroken at the corners, and should hold a dollar bill with real drag all the way around.

Ask why it is being sold

"We remodeled and these didn't match" is a good answer. "It just needs a part" means it is broken and the seller decided it was not worth fixing. "We wanted something newer" deserves a follow-up: when did you last run it?

Hard water shortens appliance life across this metro. Scale builds on dishwasher heating elements and in washer valves, so if the seller never used softened water, the water-carrying parts are older than the age suggests.

Which machines are worth buying used

Simple controls beat touch panels. Fewer expensive failure points, and the parts that fail are usually available. A premium unit with a proprietary display and three interconnected boards can be a great appliance and a terrible used purchase, because one discontinued board ends it.

Older heavy top-load washers and the plain dryers that went with them are the most repairable machines in circulation, and dryer parts are cheap.

Be careful with front-load washers past about eight years old, because the bearing and spider assembly is the failure that ends them.

Scratch-and-dent is usually the best channel, because the units are typically new and unused. Confirm whether the full manufacturer's warranty applies or only a store warranty, and check where the damage is. A dent on a panel that will face a cabinet is free money. A dent near a door's seal line is not.

The math nobody runs before they buy

A $250 used front-loader with a failing rear bearing is not a $250 washer. Bearing and spider work is one of the most labor-intensive jobs in laundry repair, and on many models the honest recommendation is not to do it. You have bought a machine you will replace within a year. Our washer repair page covers it.

Compare that to the machine you already own. A typical repair runs $150 to $400 including parts and labor, with a one-year warranty on both. Our diagnostic is $109, credited to the repair when you approve the written quote.

The reverse is true too: if your 12-year-old refrigerator needs $700 of sealed-system work, replacement is usually the better call, and a well-chosen used or scratch-and-dent unit is a reasonable way to do it. The point is not to avoid used appliances. It is to avoid buying a repair bill you did not know about. Our pricing section has the ranges and our FAQ page covers how a service call works. And measure your doorways and stairwell turns first, because getting a refrigerator up a narrow older-home stairway in Brookside or Hyde Park is its own problem.