How to prep an iPhone 5 before I sell it online?

[iMore Question]

I have my aunt?s old iPhone 5 & she wants me to sell it on eBay for her. She is a bit of a techno-phobe so I?m sure she hasn?t done anything to get it ready to sell. I?m not even sure she ever used iTunes. She just handed it to me & said ?see what you can get for it?. So I?ve heard there is more you need to do before you sell an iPhone than doing the factory reset & wiping the data. The cell still has its SIM card. She has been using her new iPhone 6 with her original Ph# for months now. I want to make sure I don?t do anything that messes up her current service while making sure the phone is ready to be used by a Verizon customer once sold.
-What steps do I need to take to prep the phone correctly for sale?
-Is there an easy way to unlock the phone from Verizon? (I heard its easy w/ ATT & Sprint)

Thanks!

 

[P_Devil]

I believe Verizon iPhone 5 is already unlocked. According to a few articles I was able to dig up, both the iPhone 5 and 5s came unlocked from Verizon. So you shouldn't have to do anything there. You can sell the iPhone without the SIM card if you are really worried.

There are two things you can do in order to completely erase an iPhone: you can use iTunes or do this directly on the device itself. iMore has an article about this, scroll down to the section titled "Anything I should do before I sell?". Their guide is located here: How to sell your iPhone | iMore

 

[DarlaMack]

I have my aunt’s old iPhone 5 & she wants me to sell it on eBay for her. She is a bit of a techno-phobe so I’m sure she hasn’t done anything to get it ready to sell. I’m not even sure she ever used iTunes. She just handed it to me & said “see what you can get for it”. So I’ve heard there is more you need to do before you sell an iPhone than doing the factory reset & wiping the data. The cell still has its SIM card. She has been using her new iPhone 6 with her original Ph# for months now. I want to make sure I don’t do anything that messes up her current service while making sure the phone is ready to be used by a Verizon customer once sold.
-What steps do I need to take to prep the phone correctly for sale?
-Is there an easy way to unlock the phone from Verizon? (I heard its easy w/ ATT & Sprint)

Thanks!

Welcome to iMore!!

You are correct, there are steps that you need to take prior to selling the device. It's my understanding that Verizon's devices are already unlocked. but since you didnt mention as to what type of plan your aunt was on it would be best to check to see if there is an activation lock on.

Also, Apple has a support page to explain just what to do prior to selling. https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201351

Good luck!!

 

[dayou]

Before you sell you old iPhone 5, you'd better erase all personal information like contacts, apps, text messages, photos, etc from it. And just delete them by pressing [delete] or [format] button is not enough. They can be recovered by pro data recovery tool. In case of information leak, you need use pro iPhone Data Eraser tool to erase all data permanently without restore.