For those in the know: Which is the better investment given a 20 year time horizon - a new Heym 89b or Verney-Carron, or a new Westley Richards?
Put differently, factoring resale value, is one more likely to recoup a greater percentage of the purchase price with a bespoke British double rifle than with a moderately priced Continental rifle? Secondly, would one be better off buying a Heym for $25k and investing $50k or buying a Westley Richards for $75k?

Opinions welcome, especially with some real life examples. Thanks!

quote:

Originally posted by drongo:
For those in the know: Which is the better investment given a 20 year time horizon - a new Heym 89b or Verney-Carron, or a new Westley Richards?
Put differently, factoring resale value, is one more likely to recoup a greater percentage of the purchase price with a bespoke British double rifle than with a moderately priced Continental rifle? Secondly, would one be better off buying a Heym for $25k and investing $50k or buying a Westley Richards for $75k?

Opinions welcome, especially with some real life examples. Thanks!

Invest the 50K. I bought 500 shares of FB for 15K a few years ago; could have bought an inexpensive double. Today alone those 500 shares went up 2K; now worth 92,685.

I don't know that any new double rifle purchased today would be considered an investment....expected to increase in value.

I would by the rifle I liked, shoot it, and let someone else worry about it’s moneta value after I am dead.

I would not regard any rifle, double or otherwise, custom or bespoke, as an investment-like commodity. That said, I think the only doubles that have a reasonable chance of being worth more twenty years from now than they are today are pre-war British doubles.

Mike, I fear that in 20 years, large-bore DRS will be curios, as the opportunities to use them will have passed.

My guess is that to some extent every generation says the exact same thing. Just like a broken clock is right two times a day, I guess if we say it long enough it’s bound to be true one day.

quote:

I would by the rifle I liked, shoot it, and let someone else worry about it’s moneta value after I am dead.

+1

quote:

Originally posted by crshelton:

quote:

I would by the rifle I liked, shoot it, and let someone else worry about it’s moneta value after I am dead.

+1

+2
ive had all three and enjoyed them

Most things bought new go down in value, rifles included.

A new Corvette will depreciate in value. Buy a 1967 and it will appreciate in value. Same as guns. Antique double rifles will go up.

Now is the time to buy as the prices have fallen 25% the past few years.

There are many reasons to buy new stuff. Investment is not one of the reasons.

Old houses, old rifles, old cars, old model trains, old women are the way to go.
Cal

Even at the best of times, I doubt if new rifles make good investments. For a long time I could buy new but cheap shotguns and sell them a few years later for more than I'd paid. That was, however, only because new guns at that later time cost even more. So, as with houses and (esp.) cars, there is a 'new' premium that you can rarely get back in real terms (ie considering inflation/currency-value erosion).

Used guns and rifles appreciate better in value - but even there, take out inflation and they rarely make a ripper investment - and db rifles seem to have been in a bit of a trough lately. Maybe that makes this a good time to buy used doubles, hoping the market returns to the growth it showed a few years ago.

Buy the WR and get some peace avoiding all the thinking of not having that WR between your hands...

I have a VC and I have a Heym, but spend a lot of thinking about how it would be to have a WR ... Prewar or new - does not matter ...


Morten

Buy the one you like; values are and will continue to go, down. Why? Because young guys, even hunters, are clueless to classic wood and steel rifles, and the concept of one with two barrels is completely lost on them. I see that every time I take mine to the range. All manner of gawks at something none of them have seen. Even Walnut stocked bolt actions are dodos now, on the market. Of course, there will always be a select few, but they are dwindling fast. Look at the ages of the DR owners here on AR and you will see. 90% are way over 50 and many are well up in years. Affordability of rifles, and hunts to places to use them is one factor. Times are changing and not for the best. MY opinion.
Buy what you like and can afford; forget appreciation.

quote:

Originally posted by cal pappas:
... old women are the way to go.

History has shown that double rifle prices can drop for many reasons. In the 1960s and 1970s and a bit longer many rifles were almost impossible to sell for a reasonably high price. In the next twenty years there may be little to use them for as far as DG hunting goes. If that happens, they may have a significant price drop. Just my two cents.

If you have to ask those questions, then you cannot really afford the WR, IMHO.

If you think that you can afford the WR, then you are not asking the right questions.

If I had that kind of money to spare I would pay down the mortgage and buy a British Webley 450/400 NE for $15k if I can find a really good one.

quote:

Originally posted by Nakihunter:
If you have to ask those questions, then you cannot really afford the WR, IMHO.

If you think that you can afford the WR, then you are not asking the right questions.

If I had that kind of money to spare I would pay down the mortgage and buy a British Webley 450/400 NE for $15k if I can find a really good one.

Anyone who pays 75k for a gun and has a mortgage is nuts - unless they have the money but choose not to pay it off deploying their capital elsewhere.

Hey - my FB stock was up another 2k today.

Sorry AZ.

Most of us don't pick investments as well as you.

My $15k investment in Northwest Airlines is worth a hell of a lot less than the $15k my Dakota rifle African battery cost me, even if it is not worth $15k. I have yet to have a IPO that I brought in to be worth money 10 years down the road.

My mutual funds are worth a bit more than I invested, but depending on when you look at it, they really haven't kept up with inflation to be a long term solid growth situation. Growth, sure...but I'm not moving up into the top 1% there by that investment strategy.

Long ago I decided that I need to save some for retirement, but since then I decided that retirement isn't a guarantee and I might as well enjoy some now too. I might have enjoyed playing the investment game if I didn't have the opposite of the Midas touch financially.

CR:

Hey, I have had my mistakes too; I shorted long term govt bonds several years ago and lost 25K before pulling the plug. Just reinforced a big lesson: don't speculate. I don't own any Bitcoin and won't.

I hired a financial advisor some years ago: another big mistake. He put half the money I gave him in closed end junk bond funds, explaining they would act the opposite of equities. WRONG: they act just like equities, and when the GFC hit I took a bath on them, although they have mostly recovered and paid 9% the whole time. Taught me a second lesson: don't let someone who has less net worth than you manage your money.

I built a custom house just before the crash; it is worth less than half what I paid for it if you believe Zillow. It is a nice house, but it was a mistake.

I bought FB simply because they were piling up cash on their balance sheet. I read Barron's every Saturday, but they had just written how FB was going down to $15. On the other hand, they had a story about a small company Kulicke and Soffa Industries that had almost as much cash on their balance sheet as their market cap. So I bought bought 1000 shares for $13.42 on Oct 22 2013. I then bought 2 contracts for deep in the money calls and ended up buying 200 more shares at $15.08 on Apr 17, 2015 when the options expired. Today that is worth a bit over 30K.

I interviewed a guy once for a job for my software business but he turned me down to go work for "Mr. Smith," a guy who used to be a big wig at "company x." I asked what Mr. Smith was doing (I used to work for him a long time ago before he became Mr Big) and this guy said, "it is confidential."

I thought, well, he isn't working for the CIA, and he isn't working for NSA, so he must be doing DD for a PE firm. A month or so later one of my customers asked me what Mr. Big was doing, because he was touring their facility, and had been to a sister plant the week before.

"Poof," I thought, "He must be doing due diligence for someone looking to buy company XYZ." I bought a bunch of shares. I remember waking up a few months later, checking my phone, and seeing company Y was buying company XYZ. I doubled my money. It wasn't insider trading; it was just connecting the dots. But it was also lucky, because I spoke with Mr Big after the sale and he said that while he was doing DD for a buyer, it wasn't company Y. Nevertheless, I knew they were for sale.

But you don't have to do a lot of thinking. Most of my stock holdings are in three things: SPY (SPY index ETF), BRK A and B (Berkshire Hathaway), and QQQ (Nasdaq index ETF).

During the GFC houses in Phoenix were selling for less than the cost of materials. I knew that wasn't going to last forever, so I decided to invest a lot in that, but with a twist: I give my tenants an option to buy similar to a covered call. My real estate income now pays for all of my hunts with enough left over to retire on today. I also recall at my college reunion in 2011 two of my friends (one was a Harvard MBA and the other a Chicago MBA who ran a bond fund) telling me I was catching a falling knife. I couldn't believe they didn't see the opportunity...

Wow. I wish I heard leaned that during my MBA! Honestly.

Having kids very late in life has strange consequences. The silver lining was that I got to spend a lot of time with the kids as they were growing up.

I now realise that not all mistakes are fatal. Not all good fortune takes you to heaven!

Investments are always tricky to advise. You probably better to put $50k is to a solid bond instrument that returns a bit above inflation so you keep your capital than spending $75k new on a Westley Richards. I looked at a Purdey sidelock last year. Being sold for £25k and less than 10 years old. Even old guns struggle to return their original value. I have a nearly hundred year old Alex Martin sidelock that was originally sold for £75 in 1920. That was a huge amount in those days - average factory workers wage was c£200 per annum.

I paid £4,000 for it last year - average income is now c£20,000. It Iain good condition, albeit used.

The best value guns will always be those that are a bit older, but don’t have a lot of use. Provided you chose something that is of good quality and well built and not messed about with or too eccentric it’s probably not a bad place to park some capital. Don’t expect to make a financial return, but you return comes in other ways.

For a double rifle, provenance and calibre will make a difference. If it has some history so much the better. If it’s an obscure calibre, well you should get it cheaper. But if you reload and have brass and bullets it’s not so much of an issue.

Licencing also makes a big difference. Shotguns hold value better - certainly in the UK as they are so much easier to buy and sell. The UK market for doubles is limited, certainly in the big bores.

But the market is getting stronger in the medium calibre - 7x 65r, 8x57 jrs and 9.3x74r as wild boar shooting on the continent is becoming more and more popular and available.

Buy what you can afford and shoot the hell out of it. All the money has already been made on them over the last 50 years; that appreciation will never happen again at that same rate for a lot of reasons.

quote:

Originally posted by MJines:
I would not regard any rifle, double or otherwise, custom or bespoke, as an investment-like commodity. That said, I think the only doubles that have a reasonable chance of being worth more twenty years from now than they are today are pre-war British doubles.

derongo, The above is your answer!

MAYBE only if a quality double rifle made today after it is 90 years old may be a considered a collector item, but a person old enough to buy one today will be no more than a memory in 90 years.

.................................................................Only my opinion!

Interesting conundrum!! I would always buy the pre-war Westley at about the same price you can buy the Continental doubles new. Like Cal says, prices are down now, I will bet that MOST doubles DON'T sell for the big asking prices advertised on Guns International.
Do you know that you could buy a WR DROPLOCK pre-war or later double for (a lot) less than a new boxlock?? I believe one of the finest built rifles on the planet!!
Cheers,

It depends what you are trying to accomplish. If making gun investments to maximize growth? Other investments than in doubles are a more sure thing. If doubles, buy the built-in vintage. I'd rather buy one or two high condition, cased, tools, bit of history vintage double(s) than something new. Life gets in the way sometimes, if something comes up, you can at least break even on a good vintage purchase. Unlikely on a new purchase. (The same reason I can find used Sakos less than new Rugers.). Do you want to make money? Off topic but class III firearms are the answer. Why? there are no more - a finite resource that seem to increase on a quarterly basis. HK Mp5s that were $3,500 in the 90s are pushing $40,000. Many, many other examples in these types of weapons. Again, out of scope, but if investment potential is the driver, worth a consideration.

quote:

Originally posted by Kynoch:
It depends what you are trying to accomplish. If making gun investments to maximize growth? Other investments than in doubles are a more sure thing. If doubles, buy the built-in vintage. I'd rather buy one or two high condition, cased, tools, bit of history vintage double(s) than something new. Life gets in the way sometimes, if something comes up, you can at least break even on a good vintage purchase. Unlikely on a new purchase. (The same reason I can find used Sakos less than new Rugers.). Do you want to make money? Off topic but class III firearms are the answer. Why? there are no more - a finite resource that seem to increase on a quarterly basis. HK Mp5s that were $3,500 in the 90s are pushing $40,000. Many, many other examples in these types of weapons. Again, out of scope, but if investment potential is the driver, worth a consideration.

All this has to do with what you want a double rifle for! The oldest double rifle I own is a Westley Richards 500-450#1 express that was sold out of the London store in 1892 to an unknown buyer. It is a hammerless action with selective ejectors with double triggers with a set on the front trigger. It has 28 in barrels and is cased. It is not for sell, and never will be in my life time. However My main use for a double rifle is for hunting and I see absolutely no reason to sell any of them and the fact that the newly made double actually lose monetary value in time, as long as they work like they are supposed to and get the job done on big game, they are just as valuable to me as the best Britt made double money can buy!

It is true at age 81 I will not live long enough to see these rifle increase in monetary value, but I couldn't care less!

,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,

You may see that value gather, Mac. Anyone who writes as well as you do at 81 is probably headed for 100!

quote:

Originally posted by sambarman338:
You may see that value gather, Mac. Anyone who writes as well as you do at 81 is probably headed for 100!

...................

There are many here who would disagree with your opinion of my writing, but thank you just the same!

.................................................................Good hunting !