Best deal you ever got on a firearm

[Joe13]

Joe,
Is that the ol' Model 20 pump?
I've got one of those, too.

Dean

Dean,

I honestly don't know the model without looking at it.

I know they sources my model out during '51 and '52 to high standard and it's an excellent shotgun.

Named it Butta cuz the action is so smooth that you can hit the bolt release and it will open automatically with just a slight tilt upward (not sloppy, it's well fit. It is just super smooth).

I'll take it out of the safe tonight and look for a model number.

 

[CLT65]

One thing I've found out the hard way over the years is that full retail on something you really like, that fits your needs and taste perfectly, is actually a better deal than a steal on something you don't really like so well.

Unless of course you can sell the thing you don't care for so much for enough profit to buy what you really want.

 

[CLT65]

It's funny how some people are so fixated on a great deal that the "deal" seems to take a life of its own, and an importance beyond mere financial savings. You see guys at gun shows who spend tremendous time and effort finding the very best deal on what they want, and negotiate down to the bare-bones bottom dollar. Then they leave in their $50k truck and spend $80 on dinner on the way home. :/

Others are willing to throw away friendships over a few bucks. An acquaintance told me a story once about how back in the day he had an extra $300 AK. There was a gun control scare and a buddy of his kept bugging him to sell him the rifle, and he wanted a good price, a buddy deal. He sold it to him for $300. He found out a while later that the guy had turned around and re-sold it for almost triple. With friends like that...

 

[pharmseller]

Weirdest thing, I was in the Lloyd Center parking lot and this guy was running by hell bent for election. He sees me, runs over, and asks me if I want to buy a gun, cheap. Nice 1911A1, only had three rounds left in the mag. I gave him $20 and he ran off. Man, he was in a hurry to get somewhere.

Good deal, right?




P

 

[Joe13]

It's funny how some people are so fixated on a great deal that the "deal" seems to take a life of its own, and an importance beyond mere financial savings. You see guys at gun shows who spend tremendous time and effort finding the very best deal on what they want, and negotiate down to the bare-bones bottom dollar. Then they leave in their $50k truck and spend $80 on dinner on the way home. :/

Others are willing to throw away friendships over a few bucks. An acquaintance told me a story once about how back in the day he had an extra $300 AK. There was a gun control scare and a buddy of his kept bugging him to sell him the rifle, and he wanted a good price, a buddy deal. He sold it to him for $300. He found out a while later that the guy had turned around and re-sold it for almost triple. With friends like that...

I grew up overseas so haggling is in my blood.

After being State side for most of my life I will still haggle if the item is priced mid to high range. If it's a smoking deal though I'll generally pay the asking price.


I would never buy anything from a friend and then resell it for much more. If I did for some reason I would split the profits.

 

[v0lcom13sn0w]

got my kids 1st 22 as a gift so that was nice.

 

[11Charlie]

Best deal I ever got was my first AR for $100 S&W 15 sport. Almost sold it during the last boom for $900 but decided to keep it.

As for selling to friends. I would rather give a gun to a friend on a good deal and see someone enjoy it than it just sit in the safe. Good friends are hard to come by and I enjoy the smile.

 

[CLT65]

I grew up overseas so haggling is in my blood.

After being State side for most of my life I will still haggle if the item is priced mid to high range. If it's a smoking deal though I'll generally pay the asking price.


I would never buy anything from a friend and then resell it for much more. If I did for some reason I would split the profits.

I understand that haggling is a cultural thing. I can do it but don't particularly enjoy it. What I especially don't like is when people won't put a price on something they are selling. I usually walk on by the tables at gun shows where nothing is marked with a price.

 

[2ndtimer]

My best deal, years ago was a new Winchester Model 70 Lightweight Carbine in 30-06. Sunset Sports (the precursor to Herman's Sporting Goods, now Big Five), was having a "Moonlight Madness Sale", where everything with a green tag was 50% off the lowest listed price. I looked at the rifles, hoping for a deal and asked if they had one in .308 Win., and they said no, that this was the only one they had. The tag said $279.95, a pretty good buy, since retail, if I recall was in the $429 neighborhood. I really didn't want a lightweight 30-06 20" featherweight contour barrel, but then I noticed the green tag! I confirmed that, indeed the price was $140.00, oh, and by the way, it also had a $25 mail in rebate. So I wound up with a total of $115.00 in it. Put a $125.00 Leupold Vari-Xii 2-7X scope on it and took my first buck with it. My only mistake was selling it, along with most of my guns around 1995, when I thought building some computers for my 3 boys would be fun.

 

[SIG34]

Got a brand new Glock 17 gen 3 for $300.. I still pinch myself

 

[2Wheels4Ever]

I have scored a few decent deals.

S&W 686 pre lock for $430
Marlin .44 mag JM for $400
Marin 1895 45/70 JM for $450
S&W K22 for $350
Marlin M60 for $60

I too got a keltec P40, thugh not as cheap as you. I paid $100.

I used to horse trade around, now that is over. Thanks SB941

 

[CLT65]

I suppose the reason I don't like haggling is because when I was young and first into guns, dirt bikes and such, I got taken pretty bad when I had something to sell.

I was naive and didn't understand how the world works. I can think of a couple times in particular that I got beat up on price real bad by some wheeler-dealer getting the very best deal he could, probably laughed all the way to the bank about how he screwed a dumb kid out of every last dime.

Yeah, I guess I am still a little sore about it, decades later. Haggling with someone who knows the game is one thing, but ripping someone off is another.

 

[KKG]

Yesterday(4-17-18) at 6:46pm I posted a original Thread:

I decided to add a few more details about the Model 10-5. Shown in the 2nd Edition of the S&W Catalog, written by Jim Spuica and Richard Nahas on Page 129 as a Model 10-8. I talk with these Gentleman in 2005, at the SWCA Meeting in Salt Lake City and showed them my Revolver and the Documents I have connected to this Gun. To the Best of their knowledge mine is the ONLY known example. Roy Jinks(until certainly the Factory Historian) agreed that it was the ONLY one Extant. My Revolver is not NIB, it has a damaged Ejector Rod, that's how I came to get to talk to the Original Owner; he was trying to tighten it with a pair of pliers (the wrong way) an Army Captain (Dentist). I showed him the Right Way and got to see the Engraving. I didn't "Know" what it was but I "Knew" it was Special.

I've have talked to several Iranians I have have been told that Anything and Everything that had "Made in America" was destroyed by the Ayatollah Khomeini and his Followers. Since He is nolonger around, I've heard pretty much the same thing from people who have traveled over there in more recent years.

Well, that's pretty much it.

Oh I've STILL got this Smith and Wesson Revolver. It's not going anywhere soon!!!

 

[JamesG]

Mine was a like new Sig P232 with box, 2 mags night sights and nice holster for $325. I wish I still had that one.
Thanks:
James

 

[DeanMk]

Dean,

I honestly don't know the model without looking at it.

I know they sources my model out during '51 and '52 to high standard and it's an excellent shotgun.

Named it Butta cuz the action is so smooth that you can hit the bolt release and it will open automatically with just a slight tilt upward (not sloppy, it's well fit. It is just super smooth).

I'll take it out of the safe tonight and look for a model number.

Hey thanks, that would be great.
I ask because the JC Higgins Model 20 was special built for Sears to have as a "house gun" in the late 40's.
The designer chosen was High Standard and that design went on to be marketed by HS as their legendary Flite-King line of shotguns (even though MY Model 20 looks nothing like a Flite-King, if you ask me).
Action is very smooth on my Model 20 as well, but it has a bad habit of dropping shells out of the bottom of the receiver because there's no "cover" of any kind down there. Just a big hole and a skeletonized lifter to coerce the shell up into the chamber.


Dean

 

[po18guy]

An Auschwitz model 54 Sporter, at a pawn shop in Santa Ana CA for $100, "I never sold a 22 for more than a hundred bucks" sold it in days for $800.
A near perfect GEW98 and a few hundred rounds of ammo on strippers for a $100.

Of course this was back in the 80's and 90's

I'm guessing that it was an Anschutz.
Danged auto-correct!

 

[coop44]

Thanks, fixed it

 

[41mag]

What are your best scores?

15+ years ago I stopped by a random 'estate sale'. There was a smattering of low end "vintage firearms from before the middle of the last century", junkers, clunkers, poor condition. The woman in charge said her (forget which) relative ("firearm expert") had priced everything out & she wasn't going to deviate from his advise. I tried to give her more, but she was unmovable. My prize for the day was a 1st year Winchester Model 88 in .243 WITH an antique Weaver Alaskan 4x scope attached. Perfect wood with no 'fleur de lis' damage, good blueing & no rust. Cost me $70 hard cash in an era when everyone had grandpas guns up for grabs.

Messed a couple years with it, in some deranged fit took an offer of over $700 for the rifle & over $150 for the scope. Life was good.

 

[Diamondback]

Friend of a friend wanted a new Glock. Wife told him "to buy one you gotta sell one." Gun he chose to sell was the 1911 he built in our mutual friend's "Build a 1911" class at the Boeing Gun Club, hand-tuned, asking price was the $400 price of his desired Glock.

Far and away I got the better deal...

 

[Diamondback]

On my 21st bday (long time ago in 2001) I was being driven around to some local watering holes when we walked past Wild Bull's in Molalla. I went in for fun and left with a S&W 629 classic for $350 out the door. I didn't even know that I was looking! He had it on consignment for a friend. I sold it several years later for close to $800. I wish I had it back, I'd pay full price too!

This is why, whichever side of private transactions I'm on--though I've only done one, as buyer--I insist on a "Right Of First Offer" clause in the contract.