Quote:
Originally Posted by Bob Womack
What's left for the used market is a specialty group of buyers: those who don't have the money for a new guitar
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I buy almost all guitars/amps/audiophile equipment used, and I can assure you I can easily afford everything I own new if I wanted. The amount of stuff that has come and gone through my hands over the years must be cresting 6 figures and the loss was minimal because I bought and sold used. In some cases I made a good chunk of $$ (ie. Audio Technica ATH-L3000 headphones bought in 2005 for $1500, sold in 2007 for $2200).
I'm just really getting into nicer acoustic guitars, but there seems to be tons of folks like me out there in electric guitar world going by thegearpage - there are folks who literally buy and flip an amp or two monthly chasing some tone. If you bought new it would be an untenable hobby.
I don't think the comparison to something like an automobile is valid *except* for the depreciation aspect... you lose a good 20% off the lot, but it's not something that suffers from mechanical wear and tear in nearly the same way.
The only time I buy new is when the item is too hard or rare to find at a reasonable price used. For instance, I recently picked up an OM-28 authentic for $4300 shipped.... but if you look at Reverb, most folks selling these used are right around or above what a forum sponsor sells new. Even negotiating down a few hundred less than new (ie. say $4900), it still is too much when giving up the warranty. But $900 less? Heck yeah, a warranty is not worth that much, esp. if it's non-transferable.