My rant is one that I'm sure many of you can relate to. When I post audio gear for sale locally, I tend to price it quite realistically. Yet, as the years go by, the selling conditions seem to get worse.
Now, I feel as though I have to carefully select my purchases and what might result in a sale down the road so I can anticipate what to expect. The market wasn't always this way. Though, I do feel some degradation each year with respect to sales.
Happy Holidays, y'all.
- Buyers think it's on open marketplace and can offer silly lowball offers and think you're a desperate seller and will bite.
- I recently listed and sold my McIntosh MC-402 amplifier. Bear in mind, this is an amplifier that typically sells for $4,000 - $4,300. Yet, I was getting offers of $1,000 for the amplifier, which was in pristine condition. I had it listed @ $3,900 and listed that my price was firm. After getting a half dozen silly offers, I eventually sold it to an appreciative buyer at my asking price.
- I had my 1-year-old pair of 10" Monolith subwoofers listed for sale at $650. They were in excellent condition and I had installed 4 SVS SoundPath isolation feet on each subwoofer at a cost of $50, each. At my listed price, I did expect some room for negotiation. Yet, felt my price was quite good for what was being offered and my objective price was $600.
- A buyer came over yesterday, had me play several Dolby and DTS demo tracks in my condominium so he could get a feel of the bass that could be achieved from the Monolith subwoofers. Granted, I live in a condominium and in the year that I owned them, I only used them for music listening, which I mainly don't go above 65dB in my listening position.
- After about 30 minutes of subjecting my neighbor's china and anything not secured to some severe vibration effects in their homes, the guy then tells me that he's willing to offer $450 for the pair. I had to say "No" because that just wasn't realistic. We then agreed on $500, but it meant that the SVS SoundPath feet would be replaced with the factory rubber feet. This was then fine by me because I needed to free up room in my living room because I have 3 other subwoofers in the process of being set up for use with my music listening.
- We then spent about 15 minutes of time going over the home theater speakers that he has and which crossover points he can utilize for setting up his front L/R speakers, center speaker and rear surrounds.
- I helped the guy load the Monolith subwoofers into his "8" series BMW and all seemed good. Emphasis on the automobile.
- This morning, I get a text that he has them set up and isn't getting enough "thump" out of them in his 200 s.f. room - similar size to my listening area in my place, where we had the subwoofers pounding like crazy just yesterday.
- I texted him back and said he has to ensure his levels on configuration on his Denon AVR are correct. I guess he magically just expected to plug the subs in and they'd work without any additional configuration.
- Similar story about 6 months back. I had the crowned Emotiva SA-250 amplifier available for sale @ $550, which was a steal compared to the $700 to $800 that they normally sell for the market.
- We agreed on a price of $500 because I had too many amps at the time and couldn't bear to hold onto another one.
- The guy then chides me because I don't have the original box. Ugh! Well, that's why I priced it as I did and indicated in my ad that the power cord, trigger cable and manual were present, but not the original box.
- We go outside to load the 52 Lb. amplifier into his Range Rover. Emphasis on the vehicle.
- Though, the guy was actually OK as I checked in with him a few days later to ensure he was happy - and, he was.
- People who get my down to an absurd level on the price that I agree on just to get the equipment out of my place. When they get to my door, they then happen to drop the question: "Hey, you don't have any spare cables you could give me?" Me: "Um no, sorry. You might have stop at Best Buy and pay them $49.99 for that generic RCA cable."
- When a customer has come over to buy an item. When those customers ask if I have any spare speaker cable, I gladly go into my huge bin and pull out 20' feet of cable for them or a spare set of RCA cables that I have so the can immediately connect their gear when they get home and avoid that dreaded Best Buy trip.
Now, I feel as though I have to carefully select my purchases and what might result in a sale down the road so I can anticipate what to expect. The market wasn't always this way. Though, I do feel some degradation each year with respect to sales.
Happy Holidays, y'all.
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