How much are you paying for transfer fees?

[LuckySG]

I understand the many "Whys" a FFL charges a fee for transfers.
Nor do I begrudge them for charging a fee....After all I do want my local gun stores to stay in business.

My complaint is more against the BGC for a sale between private parties
Having to pay for a transfer with a private party sale , is having me pay , for following a law...and I am not happy 'bout having to pay a fee for following a law.
Andy

I agree, when we were free to use our own judgement in deciding on going forward with a sale (with no fees) of a personal firearm, it did not need the coordination it does today. Unfortunately it is now the same 20 years of storing that paperwork that costs me money and the greatest risk if I ever take a vacation because the second I land on some beautiful white sand island I will find a message from an ATFE agent that wants to look at a form from August 2016 and I need to make that happen.

 

[CLT65]

I understand the many "Whys" a FFL charges a fee for transfers.
Nor do I begrudge them for charging a fee....After all I do want my local gun stores to stay in business.

My complaint is more against the BGC for a sale between private parties
Having to pay for a transfer with a private party sale , is having me pay , for following a law...and I am not happy 'bout having to pay a fee for following a law.
Andy

Agreed, especially since it's effectively voluntary. Not voluntary as per the law, but some people just aren't going to do it. Criminals by their nature don't care about the law. It's law abiding people like us who are careful to follow the rules.

They could have written these laws so they would have impacted law abiding people much less, and still have been at least as effective (or ineffective as the case may be) as what we have now. Instead they chose to just sock it to law abiding gun owners, whether out of ignorance or political hatred I don't know.

 

[rscinsc]

In the PDX area I would say the standard is $25 (All in)....there are multiple places that do the transfer for that fee.
I buy 5-10 firearms / year....so I will also talk to the larger problem of online (Buds and others) vs local shops (which is the exact same as Amazon vs local shops).
Here is how I "market" price firearms:
1. If there is a specific gun I am looking for, I go to the big auction sites, buds etc and find the market price.
Market Price = Online price + CC markup + shipping/insurance (this is my 'at the FFL Market Price)
2. I then will ask my local preferred shops if they would sell me the gun +/- 5% of that price (or if they are a Davidson's distributor; if the Gun Genie price (all in) is within 5% of the Market Price.
This has resulted in about 1/2 of my purchases being at the local store....and 1/2 from online shopping places.
As a general rule...specialty/high end guns (like a recent Sig Max Michel 1911) get purchased online.
Generic guns...like an M&P Shield in .45 acp get purchased from local dealer.

I feel this method keeps me within 5% of the market price...and supports the local businesses.
I do not know if this method is 'fair' to the local dealers or not....and I am sure some will disagree (on both sides).

 

[KKG]

...I do not know if this method is 'fair' to the local dealers or not....and I am sure some will disagree (on both sides)...

I for one, think you have done your homework and done it very well. I operated an LGS for many years and much of the time it was before the Internet but even then we had Shotgun News and other rags. I don't think I can count how many times someone walked into the shop and said they wanted "This gun for That price" waving a copy of SN. More than one guy would even show with a copy that was months or years out of date. I used to keep old copies of SN and show some of them that the ad was exactly the same one that they outfit had been running for years and they still didn't have that particular item in stock.

The bottom line is you are giving your LGS a fighting chance at your business and in my opinion that's great.

 

[joken]

LGS I had bought several guns from. I wanted to transfer a pistol that I had purchased from them to a friend that had bought a number of guns from them as well. They said they don't do private party transfers. That's fine, it's their business and they can do as they please. I haven't set foot in the place since.

 

[Dan Adams]

As a member of the Washington Arms Collectors, I pay $10 for transfers for guns purchased either at the shows or from other members. (Non-members can't buy or sell at WAC shows.) If you can time your purchase right, you can sometimes arrange with whoever is doing the transfers (different gun shops volunteer their services for different shows) to accept shipments from others, bring them to the next show and do the transfer. It's a minor hassle, but great if you have the patience. Perhaps there is/are similar group(s) in Oregon? An idea: any of this forum's sponsors want to offer less expensive transfers on a rotating basis? P.S. I have driven as far as Southern Oregon, from Seattle, to buy rifles. Saves more in sales tax than the cost to drive, even if I didn't get to visit family and friends on those trips, and it supports those local brick-and-mortar folks.

 

[MikeInOr]

Seeing as it's such a drain on the dedicated "Gun Shops", a pawn shop may be more willing to take the $20.00-$30.00 for a private party transfer.

The pawn shop "CentWise" told me $25... when I met the seller there they told us they were not allowed to do individual to individual transfers. The seller actually bought the gun from CentWise and was going to use the money I paid him to buy an AR from Centwise. I won't go into CentWise pawn shop any more because of their "We Do"... "We Don't" B.S. Neither will the seller who was previously a good customer of theirs.

Called 2 other gun shops while in the CentWise parking lot and they both told me $50 + $10 to transfer. Neither of these will get my business either. One of them "Black Rifle" I have been to several times and I purchased an AR from them a year or so ago. I really liked the people there. $60 to transfer feels like gouging the customer to me... so I will take my business else where.

Gun shops are allowed to set what ever prices they want.. even if they collude with other local guns shops to set high transfer fees. As a customer I am allowed to take my business anywhere I want. If any/all three of these shops go out of business I will not care in the least.... in my eyes it will be their own fault.

 

[Keepmsharp]

Gun stores need to understand that consumers don't want to set foot In a retail location to do a transfer. We are forced to illegally.

 

[KKG]

I don't know what the laws in OR say about Pawn Shop doing private party to private party transfers but from what I've been seeing here it might not be legal. As far as the cost is concerned, that's up to the shop owner. If you don't like it maybe you need to get your own FFL.

 

[SavageGerbil]

Tritac doubled theirs from $20+10 to $40+10 and it's the last time I'll be doing one there. With all my trades, I've covered at least one paycheck out of my pocket, two or more when you count all the people I've brought in. They sold every dollar I'd have spent there for an extra $20 (well, $40, trade)

The BGC thing is BS, when they pushed in the law to require it for private parties, they should have provided a way for us to get it done. I've stopped shopping with anyone who won't help me out with them, and found new places to spend money in replacing them.

It doesn't make sense to me not to do it. I understand not wanting to facilitate people buying from online vendors at the expense of your own sales, but it's zero overhead money. Forms are provided by ATF, and you're already paying the employee to be there, those $20 fees add up to be a revenue bump. If nothing else, a single transfer that takes a few minutes and a wait will cover the hour that employee is paid, and potentially grab you more sales on ammo or accessories (erm, or in my case a firearm or two...poor impulse control)

Pardon the rant, still freshly irritated from a recent transfer. Little plug to go with it, Coat of Arms does them dirt cheap, $20 including BGC last time I was there if I'm not mistaken. Guy's a gem, has some solid prices on his inventory too.

 

[Mikej]

Tritac doubled theirs from $20+10 to $40+10 and it's the last time I'll be doing one there. With all my trades, I've covered at least one paycheck out of my pocket, two or more when you count all the people I've brought in. They sold every dollar I'd have spent there for an extra $20 (well, $40, trade)

Shout it from the mountain!!