Buy a gun or other luxury?

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I'm shopping for a small freshwater fishing boat. $5k would help with some upgrades. The boat show is in 3 weeks.

If I buy a boat I might have to unretire. Jeez, when did the prices go up? They were high before.

Or maybe I'd spend it all on a couple boxes of ammo.
 
I think we did things a little differently back when my father and I were competing. We both had modest priced guns. Model 12 win and 4E Ithaca. We spent extra money travelling to different shoots.
Fla, Colo, N.D.,Mo, Ohio, Ind, Ky, Tenn, Mich, and Ill state trapshoots. Other ATA events too such as Zone shoots etc. Money well spent. Memories made.
 
If I had an extra 5 grand and all of the bills and family obligations were taken care of, it would go to training, probably a trip to Gunsite or Thunder Ranch.

Just my .02,
LeonCarr
 
The Vision: What do suppose that $125 leisure suit I bought shortly after the rifle is worth now? The rifle has kept pace with inflation, can you name something other than precious metals that has done the same?
 
The wife and I don't have any serious debt, so I guess if I had to spend it on firearms: (in no particular order)

- Springfield '03A3, so I wouldn't have to shoot my cherry '03 so much
- M1 Garand
- S&W 460XVR
- S&W 617 (10-shot)
- Glock 20
- Rimfire ammo
- Reloading supplies

I might buy some or all of the above list, or I might just buy $5K worth of reloading supplies.

Of course, as stated above, you cannot go wrong buying something for the wife.
Mine wants something in .40S&W.
 
If you are interested in something in 40 S&W, try the Ruger SR40. I instantly fell in love with it as it handles, aims, and shoots very naturally. To me it is a much better weapon that my Springfield XD40 which was my first .40 caliber pistol.
 
5K? Pay off some bills, invest some, and make some upgrades/repairs to the house. If all of that was already taken care of, THEN there would be some talk about a new gun.
 
Steel Horse Rider said:
The other side of that coin is that I bought a Remington 788 in 6MM Remington for $110 in 1973 that I could probably sell for $500 today. That was a pretty good investment.
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I bought that exact same gun for that exact amount; but I think it was '71 or '72. Still got it. Very accurate.

Even better is the .22-250 788 I bought in '68. Paid $88 for that one. First new gun I ever bought. It's still around too and my .22-250 Rem 700 VSSF can barely keep up with its accuracy.

Remington would do a service to shooters by bringing back the 788.
 
Ignition Override said:
Replace the Toyota which has over 100,000 miles on it.
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100k is just getting broken in. My Toyota has close to 200k and runs as good as it did when I bought it 20 years ago. Driving it that long saved me $5000+ that I could spend on guns or other toys.
 
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The rifle has kept pace with inflation, can you name something other than precious metals that has done the same?
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Classic cars, art, real estate in certain locations, many stocks - actually all of those have outpaced inflation.
 
Put up the new fence my wife wants for the dogs. Then if there was any leftover, take her away for a few days.
 
The rifle has kept pace with inflation, can you name something other than precious metals that has done the same?
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Many other investments have done better. Just as an example the Nasdaq Composite has gone from 99.97 in 1978 to 3,292 in Nov. 2013.

The Dow Industrials have gone from 1500 in January 1986 to 15,615 in Nov. 2013.

So while I have a lot of guns, and appreciate them, they are a very poor investment. We could certainly look at very specific points in time, such as late 2012's run on firearms and see prices double in a couple of months, and I sold some guns during the great panic of 2012 so I felt good about that. But the people that bought those guns won't see a return on their "investment" for 20-30 years if ever. They may be like the 1980's buyers of Silver at $50 and have never gotten back to the point that they can break even.

Precious metals are just about as poor an investment although they are much more liquid than guns. We all know the heartbreak of silver, but look at gold charts. In 1980 gold was at $834, then down to $284 in 1985. It floated from $284 to $500 for 15 years before finally bottoming at $253 in 1999. It had a very strong run up to the great crash finally in 2009/10 reaching $1900 an oz. at one point. It's since settled in and floated downward pretty steadily to $1200 an oz. in late 2013. If you are a good trader you could have made excellent returns buying and selling gold during the period, but few gold investors do that, they buy and hold.
 
What would I do?

At this point, I'd use it on my ROTH IRA. No Debit, only overhanging expenses are things I deferred during the great gun panic of 2013, like getting my Skagen fixed.
 
We really have to raise that 5 thousand, to 50, because 5 doesn't go that far these days. One custom 45 and you are done.
 
A car or ammo.

ColtPythonElite:
What if you were very close to possible retirement with that Toyota? Quite frankly I would Really, Really, Really Like to go into "Gunbot" and choose another 6,000 rds. of Russian 7.62x39 at .22/rd (price yesterday on "Gunbot").
The present price makes them more fun to shoot than my Garands at .50/rd. (now .60 rd.: The new CMP price).

Added to my present 3,500 rds, it could be a lifetime supply for my new pair of beautiful Yugo M59 SKS.
No grenade launchers are much 'mo betta.
 
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