Waukesha, WI Business Licensing & Operations: Secondhand Dealers (2026)

03 requires anyone who buys or sells secondhand articles, or who buys, sells or exchanges secondhand jewelry, as a business to hold a City secondhand article dealer's license or secondhand jewelry dealer's license. The ordinance exempts occasional garage and yard sales, estate sales, gun, knife, gem or antique shows and auctions; anyone already licensed as a junk dealer, junk collector or auctioneer; charitable organizations and sales benefiting them; a straight return or exchange of a new item with the original retailer; and a dealer's purchase or sale of an item that came to or from a charitable organization as a gift.

A person selling only at a licensed secondhand dealer mall or flea market does not need a separate individual license; instead the mall or flea market owner obtains a $165 license covering the whole site, valid for two years running May 1 of odd years to April 30 of the next odd year, provided every dealer keeps a separate identified sales spot and all sales run through one central record. Individual secondhand article and secondhand jewelry dealer licenses each cost $40 a year, run July 1 through June 30, and require the same application and 10-year criminal-history disclosure and police background check the ordinance imposes on pawnbrokers.

Every dealer must check customer photo ID, refuse transactions with anyone under 18 absent parental consent, and keep a written inventory of every secondhand article bought off-premises or consigned for sale, recording the customer's name and address, the transaction's date, time and place, and a detailed item description, plus a customer-signed declaration of ownership, retained for at least one year. Dealers must also compile a weekly list of every transaction and electronically report each purchase to the Waukesha Police Department within 24 hours. Coins, gold or silver bullion, and consigned goods are exempt from the reporting and holding-period rules. Violations draw the same forfeiture range as pawnbroker violations.