investment

[Cldplytkmn]

starting to think that my old guitar instructor (www.vincelewis.com) has the right idea. He said quite a few years ago he started buying guitars up that seems to be disappearing. He's got some nice old acoustics and also electrics. He told me that he's made more money buying and selling guitars than the rest of his investments... I know i can't do it on the scale he does (i think he has 50-60 guitars, or did when i was 'under' him) but basically i need to justify buying an HD28 or another gibson.

[LDF]

If you can afford to buy it go ahead. An HD28 can really only go up in value in the long run. I try to buy high-end guitars for the same reason.

 

A good guitar is always a good investment.

[Cldplytkmn]

not what my savings wanted to hear LDF! haha

[Herb Hunter]

I'm not going to say never but, generally, I wouldn't buy a guitar as an investment. I only by guitars that I want for myself. I've acquired expensive guitars because I wanted them. If 10 years from now they start to appreciate fine. If they don't that is fine too because I bought them for my enjoyment and to me they were worth what I originally paid.

 

Trying to predict what the market will demand in the future is a gamble at which some are better than others.

 

Incidentally, I've noticed that most high-end guitars on eBay tend to go unsold by the end of the auction.

[Chirpy_72]

The main thing to consider when buying a guitar for an investment is the demand and rarity of the guitar.

 

The Martin HD28 is a great guitar that people want ... there is a demand

 

BUT, it is hardly a rare guitar. Martin is producing more HD28 now than they ever had. Now look down the road, 25 - 30 yrs there will be tens of thousands of 25-30yr od HD28's.

 

 

I don't think it'll be a wise investment, but it will be a great player.

[lalatingstrings]

i agree you should NEVER buy a guitar as an "investment".Buy one cause you TOTALLY LOVE IT and want to play it 10 hours a day your whole life.you will end up being so much happier that way.AND you wont have to justify the $$$$$$ cause the kind of happiness a dream guitar can bring is priceless.......

[axegrinder77]

it's an investment in your playing. guitars can deteriorate, or be dropped, or stolen. not a really great financial investment if you ask me.

[JasmineTea]

See, if you had all the guitars you USED TO have, then you'd be talking about investment.

You the ones I mean, that used LesPaul you bought back in the '70s, the used Strat you traded for the used Tele. The beat up old Martin 000-18 you gave to your girlfriend who broke up with you and started dating the bass player. She gave the 000-18 to him and he sold it to get a bag of coke...

 

Those guitars.

[Kap'n]

I buy guitars never expecting them to go up in value.

 

However, I do buy guitars that will retain their value.

 

That being said, I've never sold a guitar at a loss in about twenty years. I've always at least broken even.

[guitarcapo]

I think Jumbo Harmony Sovereigns in playable condition are a good investment.

 

They sell for around 200 bucks but often need a neck reset. But on the plus side:

 

Brazilian Rosewood neck and fretboard

Solid one piece 16" wide Honduran mahogany back (a Martin D-18 is 2 piece)

Solid Honduran mahogany sides

Solid extreme tight grained solid spruce top.

Solid quartersawn spruce braces.

Truss rod.

40 years old

Solid one piece mahogany neck

Spirit varnish (not polyester or nitro)

Hide glue used everywhere

Made in the U.S.A.

 

It was also the guitar that played the most famous acoustic guitar intro in rock and roll: The intro to Stairway to Heaven

 

And they sell for around 200 bucks to 300 bucks regularly on Ebay. I have 3 and plan on buying a few more.

 

Sooner or later people will catch on to them.

 

 

 

Investment? Here's an INVESTMENT!

[Cldplytkmn]

i agree an HD28 will by no means be rare at any conceivable point in the mid-far future... i'd love to buy one or two old gibsons to keep around... i'm kinda a sucker for gibsons, sue me... and i know already... they gotta be older than '69... I still think it would be killer to pull out a guitar case that holds a guitar that is essentially brand new, but 30 years old...

[knockwood]

I don't think I could ever look at a guitar as a financially-oriented investment... and nevermind that I don't have any guitars that are worth more than five cents. I've developed some kind of weirdo emotional bond with my gits, and don't think I could ever part with any of them. Even the crappier ones (I don't have any crappy ones, but let's say I did). It'd be like selling one of my kids (not that I have any kids, but OH FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, WILL YOU STOP GETTING HUNG UP ON THESE SILLY FACTUAL SPECIFICS!)...

 

On the other hand, if you had a really prized guitar that you loved more than anything and you suddenly lost your job and your wife left you and ran over your dog and the paper boy on the way out and the dog needed an operation and the paper boy's folks were suing you and a rich city slicker were to come buy and offer you a nice chunk o' change for the git, I'd say do it 'cause if nothing else there's a pretty good country song in there somewhere.

[Tweedledee]

 

Originally posted by Kap'n I buy guitars never expecting them to go up in value. However, I do buy guitars that will retain their value. That being said, I've never sold a guitar at a loss in about twenty years. I've always at least broken even.

 

 

This is basically the mentality that I have about guitars as well. If you buy a quality guitar used (and I'm not talking a pre-war Martin or something), it will basically retain its value. In general it's not an investment, it's more like a savings account with a very low rate of return. It seems like the increase in the value of a "normal", but high quality, used guitar tends to be on pace with inflation. I just end up getting my money back out of them in the end (plus maybe 5 or 10% of what I paid initially, on occasion), plus I get a few years of joy out of playing them, which is what justifies spending money on a decent guitar anyway.

 

The only real "investment" side of guitar collecting seems to be in the really high-end older stuff (or maybe some of the limited run guitars of today, but they don't really seem to go up in value all that much compared to how much they cost initially.) Like someone said earlier, buying a new D-28 probably isn't a good "investment" in the financial sense because in 30 years there will be tens of thousands of them on the market since so many of them are being produced every year now. Maybe you will get double or triple what you paid for it initially, but with inflation that will probably work out to be essentially what you bought it for. Then again, if you can afford to buy a 1930s Martin at today's prices, it will probably increase in value in a way that outpaces inflation.

[peppy]

 

Originally posted by Tweedledee Then again, if you can afford to buy a 1930s Martin at today's prices, it will probably increase in value in a way that outpaces inflation.

 

 

Several affordable ones here actually:

http://www.gbase.com/Stores/Gear/GearList.aspx?Make=Martin&LY=1942

[Cldplytkmn]

you can see what the "in" guitars are these days by looking at that price list... the 000s and Ds are the high dollar pieces, while the 00s and 0s are actually pretty low.

[peppy]

In addition to my two Santa Cruz acoustics I have an OO...but a bit older, 1929. Actually I don't "have it", my brother-in-law has it to use right now. I don't miss it too much though, with what I have in my Santa Cruz models....an H and a D/PW.

[peppy]

 

Originally posted by axegrinder77 guitars can deteriorate, or be dropped, or stolen. not a really great financial investment if you ask me.

 

 

Good point. A guitar-playing friend asked me if that I had a pre-WWII Martin that was worth over...say....$50,000 or so, what would I do with it? Told him I would probably sell it and invest the money. Not just the theft aspect but it could have the top crack suddenly or someone could come over...see it, think it's just an old guitar of no value...and pound away on it. Too many variables, especially with an acoustic guitar's inherent fragility.

[zatoichi]

 

Originally posted by axegrinder77 guitars can deteriorate, or be dropped, or stolen. not a really great financial investment if you ask me.

in the same way that Katrina argues against owning beachfront property, but NO investment you make is 100% safe - doesn't matter whether love or money is your motivation.

 

There's always a risk....

[zatoichi]

Originally posted by knockwood On the other hand, if you had a really prized guitar that you loved more than anything and you suddenly lost your job and your wife left you and ran over your dog and the paper boy on the way out and the dog needed an operation and the paper boy's folks were suing you and a rich city slicker were to come buy and offer you a nice chunk o' change for the git, I'd say do it 'cause if nothing else there's a pretty good country song in there somewhere.

but if you came out of it just you & the guitar, you'd actually *write* that song - and enough others to fill a couple disks - you could milk some blues out of that sitch.

[zatoichi]

 

Originally posted by Tweedledee The only real "investment" side of guitar collecting seems to be in the really high-end older stuff (or maybe some of the limited run guitars of today, but they don't really seem to go up in value all that much compared to how much they cost initially.)

more & more I think collecting old guitars will be more about who owned it, or what events it was played at than about how its present sound & condition (eg: the Strat Jimi burned @ Monterey, the Les Paul Jeff Beck puts thru his amp in "Blow Up", etc). Jor one thing, those old guitars will get rarer and rarer - and more fragile - over time, and so will the cost; I honestly think many of them will end up in museums, not in the hands of players.

 

On the other hand, hand-made one-of-a-kind guitars are fetching over $20,000 in some cases - hard to see room for much short-term appreciation in a price like that! Still, I think for players this will be the field of dreams over the next 25 years or so.

[Jlliu59]

I don't think an HD28 will be a fantastic investment. Given it's a solid guitar that will retain value well, but don't expect to make much off of it.

 

If you were to invest in a guitar with exotic woods or are handmade in a smaller factory, there might be something to that. As some of the rare hardwoods like Brazillian Rosewood or Koa become more rare, well built guitars with those woods will become more valueable. Also, when when companies have been bought out or have moved to bigger factories, the older models become more sought after. Take Kalamazoo Gibsons and Pre-CBS Fenders.

 

A New HD-28 really won't have those things going for it. Maybe a HD28V if spraying nitrocellulose finish become illegal in a few more states.

[Kap'n]

 

Originally posted by Tweedledee The only real "investment" side of guitar collecting seems to be in the really high-end older stuff (or maybe some of the limited run guitars of today, but they don't really seem to go up in value all that much compared to how much they cost initially.)

 

 

Not entirely true. If you look for instruments that seem to be overlooked by the general populace, but have desirable traits, you can almost always make a few bucks.

 

For example, I bought a near mint Guild Nightbird for $500 around 1990 or so. I bought it because it was a very nice guitar, and a decent price. I never played it all that much, and flipped it for nearly for times that amount ten years later. The reasons, I think, it appriciated that much were:

 

It was a very low production guitar. They only made a few hundred of them.

 

It was their top of the line electric at the time, and had very deluxe appointments.

 

It was reissued by Guild as a less deluxe version as the Bluesbird, instantly creating a "older is better" vibe.

 

Mine was a very low serial number.

 

It had pickups custom made by Semour Duncan that were never available anywhere else, and they probably only made a couple dozen guitars with them.

 

Now, I didn't know ANY of that when I bought it, other than it was a top of the line guitar. I bought it knowing the guitar would never be worth less than the $500 I paid, since it didn't have points or a pink finish. After I bought it, I did the research, and figured it out, and you KNOW I played all that up when I sold it.

 

If I just sold it as some guitar, instead of a rare collectible, I might have gotten a grand for it. Still more than I paid, but half of what I did get. It pays to do your homework.

[knockwood]

I'd think if you're in it for a buck, just look at sought-after dudes who are getting a little up there... How old is Kazuo Yairi? Jim Olson? That's pretty awful, but hell... if you're gonna look at gits as a monetary investment...