Kyle, you are being sandbagged
Kyle
I am "remote" so I don't have access now to old newsletters (and I only have a few) but will try to see if the by-laws address the issue of discussing prices. But for this post, I might be elbow jabbing Fred and Brett a little and trust that they, and other club members, know that it is not mean spirited. Here goes
Everything, Kyle, has a "fair market value" -- that is, the value a willing buyer will pay a willing seller. And the way we estimate, or appraise, that value is to look at the history of sales. It is not intuitive, as Brett suggests, it is a function of sales history
If you had a rare coin, coin collectors would say if the condition is X, the value is between this and that, and if the condition of Y, the value is between this and that. And then there is wholesale and retail
And depending on various market conditions, the values can have a range and sometimes that range is very great, and frustrating. Ian was pretty square with you with his reference to ebay. ebay is becoming a serious factor in giving us sales history for determining value. Some complain ebay pumps the prices and others talk of ebay being saturated. Well, Kyle, that is market fluctuation. Values can be different at different times. The housing market is currently providing glaring illusration of that
I believe (I am sure they will straighten me out if I am wrong) that all of the big guns in this club have a notion of the value of your machine. But they won't publish their opinion on this forum (maybe that is in the by-laws - smile). Those members keep an eye on ebay and pay attention to other sales. They know, probably better than any other source, the answer to your question.
So why, then, (you should ask) are you given non-answers to such a litigimate question? I am not sure. On the one hand, it seems like there is a tone of "we are preserving history and not crass merchants and need to be able to obtain these machines for next to nothing because we have limited means but good hearts." But that doesn't make sense because if the goal is to preserve and restore, more preservation and restoration will happen if the value makes it worth your while
Perhaps the best reason you can't get a straight answer is that if that starts happening here, then people who really don't give a rip about old cleaners will be tuning in to help them sell what to them is just a commodity. And while such inquiry is litigitmate, it is probably better suited for a different site, club, or whatever
And a concern that discussing prices on this site will make this forum into something else, and less desirable, is, in my view, fair. I am just not sure it is necessary to have such a restriction -- that is, we could try it and see what happens
If I am assisting people administer decedent's estates, Fred's suggestion that omething is only worth how much someone else is willing to pay for it is not helpful when I need to show an inventory to the county attorney. Everything has a value. Everything. You are being sandbagged
