Used iron sets, or seven single irons

Irons are the most expensive thing in the bag and the most awkward to buy used, because you are buying seven clubs that need to match. The obvious dodge is to build the set one club at a time from single listings, which are cheap and plentiful. We track both, so we can price the dodge.

A used set of 75,563 sets listed £675.00

7 single irons13,757 singles listed £406.00

Assembling is the more expensive option, by 66%. The single listings are individually cheap and collectively dearer, which is the standard shape of a market where the awkward part is priced in.

Why the singles are not the bargain they look

The single-iron market is mostly replacements. Somebody has snapped a 7 iron and needs exactly that club, and the price reflects that they have no alternative. The cheap singles are the ends of the set, the 3 and the 4 iron that most people no longer carry, and those are cheap because nobody wants them, not because they are underpriced.

The other thing working against the assembly plan is that iron sets have one of the widest price spreads we measure: the dearest live listing of a given set is typically 2.77 times the cheapest. The money is in shopping the set properly, not in avoiding it.

What "7 piece" does not tell you

The single most expensive mistake in buying used irons is assuming a club count describes a set. It does not. A seven-piece set can be 4 to PW, or 5 to GW, or 5 to PW with a gap wedge that came from somewhere else. Those are three different purchases at the same headline number, and the difference between them is a club you will either have to buy separately or never use.

Work out which clubs you actually want first, then read the listing against that. Most golfers below a mid handicap get more from a hybrid than from a 4 iron, which makes a 5 to PW set the honest baseline and a 4 iron a small bonus rather than a reason to pay more.

The shaft is the set

A set of irons is defined by its shafts more than by its heads. All of them should be the same model and the same flex, stepped through the set. A set that has had one club replaced with the same head on a different shaft is a set of six and a spare, and it will not feel consistent no matter how good the heads are.

This is also where steel and graphite matter. The same heads with graphite shafts are a different product with a different price and a different buyer, and a listing that does not say which is a listing you should ask about before bidding.

What to actually check

• The exact clubs. Not the count. Written out, 5-6-7-8-9-PW or whatever it is.
• Shaft model and flex, and that it is the same across all of them. If the listing does not say, ask.
• Steel or graphite, and lie angle or length if the set has been adjusted for someone taller or shorter than you.
• Groove wear on the scoring clubs. The 9 iron and pitching wedge do the most work and wear first. Judge the set by those, not by the 6 iron that has had an easy life.
• Grips. A full set of replacement grips is real money and is almost never mentioned. Assume you are paying for it.

The last two are why the set-versus-singles arithmetic above is not the whole story in your favour. A set bought cheap that needs seven new grips has quietly closed most of the gap on a dearer set that does not.

Every iron and iron set we track, priced separately, and the cost of a full bag for where this sits against everything else.