Ever wondered why people sell certain guns?

[hkcavalier]

Seen a few times:

"S&W 329PD for sale. Will throw in partial box of 49 240gr JSPs."

Only regret selling two guns, one a SIG Sauer and one a S&W. Sometimes I regret selling my PTR-91, but then I go shoot my Adams Arms piston gun with 1/5th the felt recoil and feel a lot better about the decision...

Don't see much of the impulse buying and selling anymore in WA since the laws changed in 2014.

 

[otis24]

In the past two or three years, I’ve flipped several pistols. Some, I bought new and never shot.

I had a Sig P365XL. Never shot it Demand was high with the 2020 election. I had wanted a Kahr K9 for a long time. I had one in the past. I reasoned that if I was going to have that much invested, I should own what I want. I usually have to sell one if I want something else. So I sold the P365 and bought a Kahr K9.

Had a Glock 43X. After I got it home and had a chance to play with it for an extended time, I discovered that my trigger finger would drag the bottom of the trigger guard. Didn’t like that so I sold it.

I’m a stickler for reliability. If I know a pistol I own has a lot of reported issues, I will dump it.

 

[Golddollar]

I had to sell a boatload of guns and ammunition during my last bout of unemployment. For me it was a matter of saving my house, which I helped design. The guys at the auction house and I still chuckle about when I drove into their property I had so much stuff in the car that the body was practically riding on the axles. Some things I did replace, but after I got back to full time employment it turned out that my interests changed and I never got around to replacing some of what I sold off. Happily I held onto the classics like my Colt Python, Colt Detective Special, Finnish L-35 Lahti, and John Giles customized guns.

 

[Llance]

I’m a stickler for reliability. If I know a pistol I own has a lot of reported issues, I will dump it.

My first question is: Have you ever heard of "Gun Tests Magazine"? I usually check there before I buy a gun unless it's a model I've held and like the feel.

Many here have stated they bought a gun tried it a time or two and then sold it as the chase was more fun than the owning. I have to agree with this, but I also have to tell you I tried this with wimmin and to be honest, Good Wife didn't think it was such a good idea. She has put a real strong dislike knot on the top of my head with a 7" cast iron frying pan for just doing an interview of a perspective replacement. I don't chase any more.

 

[ZGrand]

I've never sold a gun in my life.

Someone mentioned cars. My son doesn't seem to keep a car more than six months. He's had more cars in the last 10 years than I have my whole life.

 

[Inusuit]

I've sold or traded more guns than I've kept or currently own. Recently acquired a Charles Daly 1911 new in the box in a trade and traded it and another gun for something I wanted. I don't understand why some people seem to think that selling or trading a gun is a character flaw.

 

[diyj98]

I thought most used guns were unfired?? It seems almost everyone who buys a used gun posts on some internet form with "doesn't appear to have ever been shot" or at worst "appears to have only been fired one or two times"

As far as selling guns, some many sell because the gun isn't as easy to carry, as accurate, etc. as they thought it should be. Most of the ones I've sold are because my interests shifted. I just had to have the new 11mm Remchester, but after owning if for a while, I get bored with it.

 

[Baltimoreed11754]

Back when I deer hunted every season I bought deer rifles but since I don’t hunt anymore they are gone, my .30 caliber interest now has turned toward milsurps. Ive got a bunch of .22 Woodsmans but haven’t picked up another one in years. I do still buy and have sold military .45 revolvers. Tastes and interests change over time.

 

[sipowicz]

As I’ve carried a 5 or 6 shot snub most of the time over 30 years I have watched many trade in a 5 or 6 shot for a seven shot…or an 8…then a 15. Or a double action for a single action….or striker fired. Guess all those gun rag articles about the next great CCW gun has an audience. Same group that needs night sights, then fiber optic, then a red dot. I tell myself every time the latest and greatest comes out that I’ll probably be okay with my 6 shot DS in a civilian encounter. And I most likely won’t see my sights either.

 

[ladder13]

Maybe people have no one to leave their guns to, and have no desire to leave their wife a mess to deal with when they croak, like tomorrow.
I’ve seen it more than once, it ain’t pretty.

Maybe some just don’t care.

 

[elm_creek_smith]

A few years back I was taking my late wife to Houston for a battery of tests when I realized that I didn't have my EDC on me or in our baggage. I stopped at a little pawn shop in Calera, OK, & found a nearly new Ruger EC9s, 1 mag, no box, for $195. The kid behind the counter called it a "tax refund" gun. Said folks buy guns with their refund checks & lose money at the nearby casino, hock/sell their new guns, & repeat it next year. Since I was a veteran, I got it & a box of ammo OTD for $175. The trip was uneventful, & I swapped it to my grandson a few years later.

Sent with some arcane communications device.

 

[BillBro]

Seems to me to be a sad commentary on todays society. We make and buy few things of any real value, we take care of nothing, we dont know HOW to take care of anything. Its a throw away mentality.
My Granny and PaPa bought two Belgium Browning shotguns and used them until they died. Granny was a rabbits worst nightmare. I honestly dont think people know anything about maintenance, of anything. And the **** that most gunmakers churn out year after year are made of alot of plastics, polymers, MIMmetal parts, 3D printers!!?? even? Whats the point in taking care of that? Many today wouldnt know craftsmanship if it slapped them across the face.

Sorry for the curmudgeonly rant.

 

[Echo40]

In my experience, there are a lot of folks out there who insist upon firing their guns fresh out of the box with the absolute cheapest ammo that they can possibly find, and if it won't cycle it 100% reliably, then they flip it.

I don't understand it personally, as I believe in keeping my carry guns clean, lubricated, and loaded with high quality ammo, but some folks cannot trust their life to anything but a gun that is so ridiculously reliable that it will feed ammo straight out of the box, with no cleaning, no lubrication, and loaded with El Cheapo Steel Cased ammunition.

 

[Grayfox]

I got bit by the gun bug early in life. I was an avid reader of the monthly gun magazines (pre-internet) and drooled over the latest and greatest they featured. But I was young and money was extremely tight. So for many years I was in the "gotta sell one to get one" mode. I sold some really great guns and regretted it deeply. The ones that replaced them weren't always what they were cracked up to be.
But as the years wore on and finances improved, I've managed to acquire replacements for the most of the ones I foolishly sold.

In the last 30 years I don't think I've sold more than a dozen guns. The ones I did sell were mistakes to start with. I shouldn't have bought them. In fact a couple I grew to downright hate.

OTOH, I'm not above an impulse buy. I see a gun and think "Ooo I like that!" and shell out the cash. Nor am i above buying something I don't need just because it a bargain. Just recently I bought a LNIB RIA 1911. I had absolutely no need for it, but the price was too good to pass up.

The way I see it is I don't need the money, they don't take up much space and that's just more for my kids when I'm gone. So why sell?

 

[Drm50]

Hunting & shooting is all I’ve ever been interested in since big enough to walk. Other than fishing tackle have never spent the time or money on anything else.
It aggravates me when some idiot wants to make you look stupid for selling or trading guns. I traded a few because I didn’t like them. I traded others because I took them on trades and had no use for them. I mostly traded to get something better. Bottom line, I wasn’t independently wealthy to keep
them all.

 

[StakeOut]

I have no grail gun(s).
I have no firearm I'm overly attached to.
I do want everything I buy as close to original as possible.
No project guns.
No rescues.
Nothing made earlier than 1950.
I want to enjoy what I have at the range and then move on to something else.
Two of you have sold me something not as you described and I won't forget it.

 

[ladder13]

I’ve sold hundreds of guns. I have no Golden calves.

 

[gregintenn]

I've often wondered why folks sell guns their father or grandfather left them. Other than that, I just figure people change their minds.

 

[Puller]

I've often wondered why folks sell guns their father or grandfather left them. Other than that, I just figure people change their minds.

Could be because they see no value in them. I recall reading a post hear a while back where someone inherited their father's or father-in-law's high dollar golf club collection, only they didn't golf and didn't care to learn. They ended up selling off the collection of expensive equipment for pennies on the dollar just to get rid of it because it held no sentimental value to them.

Not everyone cares about their relatives guns outside of an opportunity to transfer them into cash.

 

[biku324]

When it's time, I'll sell my favorite firearms because I won't use them after cremation or when rotting in a hole. My heirs will be helped more by what money these things will bring no matter how much I like my stuff.

Hank Williams - House of Gold - YouTube