Tomorrow's Rare and Collectible

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What firearms regularly manufactured and sold today do you think will become highly sought after collectibles sometime in the future?

This may require some prescience unavailable to us mere mortals, as the guns may increase wildly in value only if production stops.

My guess is AR-15s, but that's mainly because of foreseeable legal restrictions - not any highly sought craftsman's work like a Python.

I'm also going to say the CZ-75B; I don't own one, but they seem to be semi-scarce as it is, people put them up on a pedestal, and if production ever stopped I imagine this would make it highly desirable.

What do you think?
 
I would focus on low volume, well made firearms that suit a specific purpose well. I don't think that the AR-15 fits that bill mainly because of the number of them that are in circulation. If they are restricted, I imagine the value will hinge on whether they are transferable.
 
I'd say some S&W third gen autos. The 4506 comes to mind as one that already has a cult following, and I think it will only grow as more of them come off the market into collector's hands. There are also a few rare variants where a certain frame material and caliber are a rare combination and not many were made.

Maybe Beretta 92F from before the FS modifications? They seem to be fairly uncommon, and uncommon variants of popular well made firearms tend to catch on for collector value.

The S&W 696 is already starting to have a following, and I expect that mint condition ones will fetch over $1k in the very near future, with NIB examples selling for significantly more.

These are just a few examples I can think of.
 
Not that they are still being manufactured but Mosin Nagants and SKS's I think will go up quite a bit down the road. I've been saying it for awhile with the Mosins and they've already gone from $99 to $160 at least what I'm seeing. Maybe that's an artificial inflation but things never seem to go back down once they go up. All my Mosins (yes I love them and have several) I paid $100 or less for so I'm happy. :)

SKS's used to be $50-$100 now people are actually getting $400 for them.
 
You can tie up a lot of money (assets) in firearms "guessing" about future market trends. So I think you need to be very interested first and if they don't go up in value greater than inflation, then you made a little money if you sell. Generally buy the good stuff, not necessarily the cheap stuff.

My suggestion is that you look to firearms manufactured 20 years ago or so and do your "guessing". Again buy what you like or have an interest in.

The gun dealers have the right of things.... for the most part they buy a gun at resale prices, and sell it at near market prices making a profit and do it again and again and again. It doesn't really matter if the gun was $50 or $5000 as long as they can make their profit and move forward.

Dealers depend on people sitting on guns for many years in hopes that the values will go up. They eventually buy them and resell them after you have tied up thousands of dollars in stuff you like or were "guessing" about future values. They made their money and move on to the next one. The secret is not to get attached to these things and treat them like any other commodity.
 
Tomorrow's Rare and Collectible
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Ammo ;)

I'd say some S&W third gen autos. The 4506 comes to mind as one that already has a cult following, and I think it will only grow as more of them come off the market into collector's hands.
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I think maybe all metal guns of decent manufacture, if not only because once tooling and fixtures wear or get destroyed they didn't get replaced but nothing plastic as the molds will live forever.
 
I purchased a SA loaded operator 1911 when they first came out with the full length light rail. Turns out they only made that version for less than 2 years, and now you have to go to their custom shop to get one. I didn't realize it was going to turn out to be a relatively rare gun when I bought it.
 
Fella's;

I'm a lefty, and as such I tend to focus on that segment of the firearms market. But, in the spirit of the original question, here's an example of a recent firearm that's now collectable & a guess as to what's available now that'll become so.

For a very short time USRAC, Winchester New Haven, made stainless model 70's with BOSS. Some extremely few were left handed. Don't believe me, go try to find one. Not sayin' you can't, but I know the production numbers were quite limited. To a Winchester collecter, they're not easily found.

I think that the current production of Browning T-bolts might be a relatively short run, you don't see four or five examples in most gun shops. Then there's the left handed T-bolts, and then there's the odd niches within the LH guns. The heavy barreled target/varmint versions in a less popular caliber, like .17HM2 for instance. That would seem to me to be at least a decent bet for rarity & therefore value increasing beyond inflation in the future.

900F
 
The problem with this sort of speculation (and I mean speculation in the economic sense here) is that scarcity does not predictably dictate value. Nor does rarity.

For example, there are some things of which there are, and were ever only, so few that nobody cares about them at all...maybe nobody ever heard of it.

Conversely: Civil war firearms and19th century Winchesters. Millions of the former, thousands upon thousands of the latter were manufactured and a large number of both still exist in a variety of conditions today. Both, with povenance, extremely valuable to collectors.

So I would look to firearms that were popular, well received, and common enough that a sufficient number of people really got to liking them. I think a good more modern example would be the HK P7 and similar. Very cool gun (there's a pun in there for those who know), plenty were made so plenty of folks like them, and they are no longer being made. I'd suspect they will hold and appreciate value. Colt Pythons same deal. Remington Nylon 66. right now, none of these are gold mines but there are collectors and people actively looking for them.

From what's actually being made today? Harder to know. Let's face it, there are not a whole lot of interesting guns being made today. There sure as heck are a lot of good guns being made but how many are going to be looked back upon fondly?
 
no guns made today will be collectibles. everything made today is junk in comparison to the old days when things were made with quality and craftsmanship. that doesn't exist anymore. good ammo will be worth more than the guns that shoot them if things keep going the way they are. also no plastic gun will be a collectible. dont confuse collectible with a fad ect. I could buy new AR15s "used" at $400-$600... they decreased in value faster than anything I have ever seen besides maybe baseball cards. people collect all kinds of things but that doesn't make them collectible... a fad will last for so long, then when its over... its all over.
 
I've been saying it for awhile with the Mosins and they've already gone from $99 to $160 at least what I'm seeing.
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That's just the Soviet 91/30's, too. Finnish M39's have gone from $200-$250 a decade ago to $350-$550 now. Rare subtypes are getting over $1,000. The surplus market in general has gone nutty, and while AR's have come way down the old guns show no signs of doing so. I gave up trying to find a Nagant 1895 because they'd gone from $80 to $300 in a few years. Military Makarovs are bordering on genuine collector's items, with some of the Russian military versions spurring auctions wars well over a grand. Even ratty old WW1 French rifles are getting harder to find for cheap. Berthiers you used to be able to get for under a hundred are twice or three times that now.

As far as current production, limited run Rugers seem to have a certain market. And some of the nicer hunting rifles like the older CZ's. But much of what's coming out is not all that well made.
 
javjacob said:
no guns made today will be collectibles.
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LMAO! That quote is exactly why they WILL become collectible. They're so common today that no one imagines them becoming collectible.

I've got a safe full of 1st/2nd generation SAA's and pre-64 Winchesters that people were saying the exact same thing about them in the 1960's.

Even today pre-lock S&W revolvers and pre-safety Marlin lever actions bring premium prices.
 
Fella's;

And I can remember, in late 1964, when that cheap tin-can Falcon re-do came out. Old men were head to mutter: it's a hunkajunk! Go try to buy an original 1965 Mustang today, they are authentic collector's items, and cost like it too.

900F
 
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It depends on what stops being made. For example, pre-lock S&Ws are more collectible now than when they were just a part of the catalog. Blued steel and walnut will always be collectible. I don't think polymer framed handguns will ever be that collectible unless there is some future registry like transferable class III items today. Any US gun where production moves offshore will be more collectible (for example, winchester rifles.) AR15s won't be collectible unless they are banned with existing rifles grandfathered in. There are just too many of them. Considering I mistimed the NASDAQ crash, the housing bubble, and the 150% market return after 2009, I may be (or probably am) wrong.
 
LMAO! That quote is exactly why they WILL become collectible. They're so common today that no one imagines them becoming collectible.
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Exactly. It's the mentality my father had when he took those Micky Mantle baseball cards and put them in the spokes of his bicycle. Who would ever collect these?

I cringe to think of how much value got torn up in those bike spokes. But who knew?
 
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