Money in the bank, or Guitars ?!

[Cypress Knee]

Most people do not understand savings and investment vehicles. You save or invest for different reasons – to preserve your capital, to get current income to get longer term capital appreciation, or to speculate. The vehicles are usually either intangible – stocks, bonds, checking accounts, or tangible – real estate, precious metals, collectibles or cash in the mattress!

Various risks across all asset classes include inflation, liquidity, time, individual business risk, overall market risk or government intervention.

Guitars should be considered tangible speculative assets subject to all sorts of risks.

Imagine that if the OP had added the idea that the $10,000 was earmarked for the kid’s college tuition starting in two years, and due to the family financial situation there would be no more incoming funds. What would your answer be then? What if the OP was 80 years old and was going to earmark $10,000 to use in five years for college for a nephew, but was ambivalent as to whether funds would eventually be $2,000 or $20,000 depending on the current market value of the guitars. Would your answer be different? Of course.

Enough ranting for today. Back to practice, which will be a lot more productive!
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[JGinNJ]

A $10,000 guitar will probably be a better (financial) investment than a $1000 one, if you keep it a long time,but it won't play 10 times better. But if you really needed the money and had to take the hit, you could sell the $1000 guitar for 500 bucks a lot quicker and easier than selling the 10K guitar for 9500.

I love archtops, and they can be pretty expensive, but I haven't played one that was worth that much money. I did play one last year that was $18,000, and it was really nice, but not THAT nice. I wonder if it's still there, and if they'd take 10?....

[Bluemonk]

Originally Posted by JGinNJ

I love archtops, and they can be pretty expensive, but I haven't played one that was worth that much money. I did play one last year that was $18,000, and it was really nice, but not THAT nice. I wonder if it's still there, and if they'd take 10?....

Curious as to who the maker is. I'm a sucker for high end archtops.

[jojobean39]

Originally Posted by 815C

Here's an interesting article by George Gruhn on investing in guitars vs. the stock market.

I would argue (not to you, to Mr Gruhn) the time has past for such appreciation on guitars. I mean, a similar investment in Gibson and Fender guitars today will surely not give the same return as it would have if you put the money in back in the 60s.

Think of the same situation with baseball cards.

Interesting article, as you say.

[Everton FC]

Originally Posted by seesound

Would you rather have $10k extra in your bank account, or 10k worth of good acoustic guitars around the house?

I pick these guitars:-)
Martin D35 50th Anniversary Brazilian, a Gibson J45 rosewood, a Taylor Coco GA limited and a Martin D28 (2018)-versus 10k extra $ in the bank right now.

I'll take $10K in US Dollars... Deposit it and convert it to Canadian (approx. $12,750.00 CDN) and use the $2,750.00 gained to get a nice acoustic guitar!

[guitar george]

There are very few things that are worth collecting, for profit, these days. Guitars would not be one of them.

[Rosewood99]

I say money in the bank and guitars. I've been blessed to have both.

[1neeto]

I made this long post about how I do my finances, and how it has helped me to drastically pay off debt, but decided to scrap it.

Back to guitars... [emoji4]

[Tico]

10K in the bank is something that you can convert to 10K cash in your hand today.

That is WAY WAY not true with 10K in guitars.
Selling guitars takes time, and you may not get what you think it's worth.
A guitar is not a commodity like an ounce of gold that you sell or buy at the same universally-agreed-to price (after a small commission).
Every single real ounce of gold is worth the same, new or used.

Next, if you pay $10K for guitars (especially new ones) you can't turn around and sell them for $10K.
There is depreciation.
Used usually means no warranty.
Selling privately means no return policy, nor a store to return it to.
This all means a guitar sold by a private party is inherently worth less than the same guitar from a retailer.

[Silly Moustache]

$10,000 ? That's about £7000 and a good meal. Not a lot.

It's gotta be bank or both. Gotta have to a safety blanket in the bank.

[51 Relic]

The way I view it is this . I'm now 60 and taken early retirement. After working all my life with never a single day out of work and guitar playing is my only hobby , after being part of my working life , I'll have my nice guitars but only what I can use .