Let me clarify: The 66-1 is "new in box, never fired except by S&W, has all the paper work, as well as the original box in excellent shape. Includes the oil paper that S&W ships with their guns." Also has the tools, screwdriver, cleaning rod and brush, and swab. The gun of course is stainless.
NRA perfect doesn't effect me at all. I'm not buying on NRA's recommendation. And the M66 does come in six inch barrel, I've saw plenty of them. Just wondering what you guys thought about a proper price.
Thanks
NRA standards are just that: standards, not recommendations; just a handy way of having agreed upon terms and criteria rather than a scattershot approach where, say, your definition of "mint", for instance, and mine are two different things and can lead to misunderstanding and difficulty in a negotiation.
Based on your clarification, I stick to my original assessment and numbers.
You're talking about, in essence, a new gun; that right there puts it in the price range of its nearest current analogue purchased new (the 6" 686, around $700 after dealer discount).
That it is a highly desired model from a preferred era (pinned and recessed), pre-MIM, pre-lock, and in collector's grade condition bumps the value even more.
If I were in the market for this kind and condition of gun, as stated before, I'd be happy to get it for between $650 and $750. Retailers that specialize in similar items in this condition, I'm confident, would open at $800 or more.
Better deals, for whatever reason, are certainly sometimes found: sellers may not know what they have or what they could get for it; they're sometimes motivated to sell quickly and so at a discount; occasionally what appears to be a perfect gun at a great price is not; heck, sometimes you get a seller who just doesn't like what he sees in gun inflation and insists on a lower price because he believes in it.
But otherwise, the numbers I'm suggesting are based on watching the market and what similar items are selling for, and also what's arguably reasonable.
And yes, there will always be "that guy" who says he bought one exactly like it "a couple years ago" in a pawn shop in the middle of nowhere for $250 and nobody should ever pay a dime more. That guy has astonishing luck and a sense of used gun prices that seems to have calcified around the mid-1980s.
Let us know what you do, and post some pics if you buy it.
