Buy used, sell used, how much is lost?

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matt35750

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If I want to try out a new caliber or gun and buy a used gun and am not happy with it, how much money would I lose if I sell it back to the shop I bought it or another shop? How much do gun shops usually mark up used guns from what they give the sellers?
 
You're going to lose a lot more by selling it back to a shop. That's just going to be true with almost any product. If you want to buy a used gun and later sell it if you're not in love with it, plan on selling it privately on Armslist or a similar site. You'll lose a lot less money that way.

If you have a specific gun in mind, you can search national Armslist listings to see what the going rate is for a used one on the private market.

Aaron
 
Much. Buy used, sell used on Armslist and you can break even or even profit if you played your cards right on the front end.
 
You will always loose money selling it back to the shop. They have to make their profit. You would be better off selling on the open market, and shouldn't loose much if anything at all assuming you don't over pay in the first place..
 
So if I bought a used rifle for $300 and sold it back to the shop how much would I get for it?
 
I have never owned a business, or even worked for anything but a large company, so my opinions on this are not personal. But common sense strongly suggests that any business has to charge more for a thing than they paid for it, or they will soon have to close down the shop. I think it's stupid that "profit" has become a dirty word. Profit is how the shop is able to pay its employees, pay the rent, light, and heat, and still be at that address a month from now.

So I don't see gun shops as villains who are trying to screw me out of my money by overcharging me. In practice I rarely buy from a shop, and almost never do if I can find what I want in a private sale. But sometimes I do, and when I do I expect to pay more. And I expect to get less in a trade-in than I would if I sold privately.
 
Most gun shops I know will give you 50% of what they can resell it for. If you buy a new rifle or one still in production for 300, you can take it back to the shop a month later and get an offer of 150. Sometimes you can work up a little bit, depending on how good the relationship is. You are better off selling it private sale on Armslist to get close to breaking even.
 
I don't buy used guns locally very often, the prices are crazy high at the LGSs in this area, so I buy online, mostly from GB. I haven't lost much at all in a long time. Even with the transfer and shipping tacked on to the total, most of the time, I at least break even, and last time I had to sell some guns, I made a nice profit on all but one, where I broke even. One of them seemed to bring out the crazy bidders and I pretty much made 100% profit on it. I don't get it, but I sure wasn't going to turn it down!
 
If you buy smart you should never lose more than the sales tax you paid. I've done this numerous times over the years. It gave me the opportunity to try a lot of guns. I've kept the ones I liked and got rid of the rest. I've even been known to make a small profit at times.

You can't deal with stores as a rule. I buy and sell from individuals at gun shows most of the time. With experience you learn when you have a deal. Numerous times I've ran across somebody who needs rent money on Monday and will let something go cheap on Saturday.

I overpaid for a few when I was younger and lost some, but not nearly as much as you'd lose on a new gun. I've gotten better at it and usually come out close to even in recent years. The key is to not over pay.

If you are patient and willing to keep the gun for a few years you can at times do really well as the gun market fluctuates. I paid $250 to a guy needing cash badly a few years ago for a Colt 1991 Commander in 45 ACP. At the time it was a $450 gun new and $350 was the going price for a used one. The $250 I paid the guy was a little more than a dealer would have paid so I didn't take advantage of the guy. I got $600 for it 5-6 years later in trade for a rifle I wanted.
 
Profit isn't a dirty word but that doesn't mean I want someone to make it off of me. I buy from shops that give me a trial period. I get to shoot the gun for between a week and a month. If I don't like it for any reason I bring it back. I've only done that one time and I never even made it out of the store with that gun. They know I'm not there trying to get a free ride with a gun. I wouldn't put my money down if I didn't want it and chances are I will keep it unless it has some serious issue.

If I decide later on that I don't want the gun (rarely happens but does sometimes) I sell it to an individual. I don't lose money on it that way. I make money on guns sometimes if I keep them a while and prices go up. I have quite a few guns that would sell for more now than what I paid for them.

I don't hold it against businesses that they need to make a profit. I just do what I need to do to be able to buy guns myself. It generally works out well al around.
 
Typically they might offer you somewhere around 50 to 60% of what you paid for it. Maybe a little more if you're a regular customer of the shop where you bought it from and do a fair amount of business with them. If you take it to some other gun shop they might offer you 50 to 60% of whatever they deem the condition of the gun to be. This could really vary a great deal depending on their assessment of the gun's condition, whether it would be a fast seller or something that's going to sit there for awhile, if they have any guns that are the same or similar to what you're trying to sell, and so on.
 
Unless youre in a rush, or dont want to mess with Gun Broker, etc, put it up on consignment. Doing so, usually brings highest dollar, as the shop will try and sell it for as much as they can, as they now have an interest in it. They normally take 10-15% of what it sells for.

Ive sold a lot of guns this way, and always made more than the shop would have offered, and in some cases, more than trying to sell it myself.

The shops know what stuff in your area sells for, and what they are likely to get. I used to use one shop, that always had prices on new guns that I considered "high". I rarely bought guns off them, mainly because of that, but they always seemed to do a brisk business. When I put guns in for consignment, if they were in good shaope, they would put them up at just under new prices, and I usually got what that brought, less the 15% they charged.
 
Shoot many; buy one. Find a range that rents guns and save yourself a bucket of money in the long run. If it were to cost $30 to rent a gun say, you're bought $30 worth of shooting time ... give a take a little. But if you buy a $500 gun and then sell it back for 60% of its new cost, you've just "lost" $200. 70% and you've lost $150 and so on. You'd have to sell the gun for over 90% of its new cost to break even.

Not saying that can never be done, but the odds are stacked against you.
 
No "shop" can give you more than 60% of what a gun is worth and hope to stay in business.

They BUY wholesale and SELL retail.
 
I'm not at issue with shops making a profit. I take issue with some of my local shops who will charge you a hundred dollars for a transfer for finding a gun you want on your own.
 
Profit is how the shop is able to pay its employees, pay the rent, light, and heat, and still be at that address a month from now.
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:) Those would all be simple operating costs necessary to break even. Profit would be monies taken in that don't have to go to paying salaries and keeping the light on. No business exists to break even and while away the hours. Profit is WHY companies exist -- even your local gun shop is in business to create wealth for the owner(s).

And that's a good thing.

The trick is that we all wish our LGS will be there forever and always give us the best service, while we want to contribute the absolute minimum to the owner's overhead and certainly as little as possible to his retirement plan. Business, retailing, and good customer relations is a fascinating and complex study.

The best business would be the one that gets the most of your money, for the least outlaid cost, while making you think you got the best end of the deal.
 
Comrade Mike said:
I'm not at issue with shops making a profit. I take issue with some of my local shops who will charge you a hundred dollars for a transfer for finding a gun you want on your own.
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Wow, now that's just sad. This year alone, we've bought three guns online and the two local dealers we used charged $25. I've never even read about anybody charging more than $50 and that was not the norm.
 
Like car dealers, guns stores generally make more on used guns than on a new gun, especially if they bought it right.
Many people have no idea what the gun they brought in is worth, I have seen a nice COLT 1911, traded for a LCP, just because the guy wanted a smaller gun. It's not unusual for people to come in with guns and not have a clue what they are worth.
 
Used guns are low to begin with, you try to sell it back and maybe you get 50% of what you paid. Low end of used Blue Book is abut the max they will pay
 
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