SeeYou190 I have my collection registered on the Brasstrains web site. . According to their calculator I have lost $1,000.00 in value in the last six months. . As an investment, I would say no. As an awesome way to enjoy the hobby, I woudl say yes. . -Kevin .
I have my collection registered on the Brasstrains web site.
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According to their calculator I have lost $1,000.00 in value in the last six months.
As an investment, I would say no. As an awesome way to enjoy the hobby, I woudl say yes.
-Kevin
sold it to a guy in PA & it got stolen off his porch
I own only four brass locomotives, and none were bought as investments in the monetary sense of the word.
However, I did consider them investments in improving my skills, and in modifying them to match photos of specific prototypes at specific periods of their existence, rather than leaving them as a generic example of their particular class. Learning to make them better runners was also a gain.While I may consider those changes to be improvements, I don't especially care if their next owner feels the same way, nor do I care if my original monetary outlay shows a gain or a loss, as I'll not be around. To have had the experience and enjoyment of working on them and running them is a pay-off not measureable in dollars.
Wayne
doctorwaynenone were bought as investments in the monetary sense of the word
None of mine are investments either. They were all puchased with the intent of me running them on my layout, repainting them for my railroad, and ruining all the value anyway.
I have never purchased a brass locmotive that did not have a place on my roster. It is actually good for me that the prices continue to fall.
Living the dream.
Brass trains as an investment? I'm going with NO generally speaking.
I owned a painted Westside SP 4-10-2 nearly 25 years ago at $300. I can buy one on Ebay, unpainted, now, for $325, but Brasstrains.com says it is only worth $250...
Only the very rarest, newest (or last runs) of a given brass model, that are truly of exceptional workmanship or rarity, steadily increase in value. Those models are difficult to locate on any consistent basis because they are truly rare. Also, the market on the high end brass is very fickle: One model may currently sell for $1500, but just a slightly different version of the same model, made at the same time, may have now appreciated to $3000. To the untrained or less experienced collector, there may be very little visual difference between the two. One just, according to the values on Brasstrains.com, must be more highly sought after. That's all it takes.
Buy the model because you like it, want to run it, or because you personally consider it to be fine art. A few will appreciate. Most, not so much because the generation who bought them is dying off without suitable replacements.
Brass diesels, particularly, are a bad purchase. Even more so if unpainted. Some have dropped in value just in the last 6 months as generally "better" (in the eyes of many would-be buyers today) plastic versions of the same model have been released. I personally have a couple high end, rare brass diesels that are just not selling, period. I'm going to lose money on them.
Respectfully,
John Mock
PRR8259Buy the model because you like it, want to run it
So true.
I justy bought an 8,000 gallon pressurized insulated tank car with a platform from Brasstrains.
It is an interesting and unique model that I am going to paint and run. I bought it for no other reason.
Also--unpainted brass models are generally plummetting in value.
Why?
Simply stated, the generation of quality painters of these models in the U.S. has left the scene. Bob Hunter actually was part of the Southern steam excursion program, knew how the steamers operated, how they got dirty, and he could do fantastic, realistic painting and weathering. There are other fine painters, likewise no longer with us. Brasstrains has a few experts who still do this work, but I'm sure none of them are cheap, and their models command a premium, especially the passenger cars with full interiors and lighting.
Many people will paint brass models for a fee, but only a handful--and I mean literally a handful of people in the U.S.--can do a quality paint and decal job, and reassemble the model so it will run well, such that by painting the model value has actually been added.
Most custom paint jobs on brass do not add value to the model's selling price. They just do not.
Factory painted models are generally preferred.
I have one diesel out for pro paint now. The painting and lighting will cost me $500 plus the decals for it. The work will be nearly museum quality, by David Long of Bozeman, MT, but I will have more money in that model than it will be worth.
I'm getting the model I want in the paint and lettering I want.
Maybe there are other painters out there that I've not met, but I judge the work by models I've seen in person or photos available online, and I'm sorry to say, few can match the paint quality of the latter Samhongsa or Ajin Precision or Boo Rim factory paint jobs.
John
PRR8259Most custom paint jobs on brass do not add value to the model's selling price.
I destroy the value of all my brass models, like this Overland PENNSYLVANIA covered hopper that I painted for the DIAMONDBACK AND WESTERN.
I bought it to run it.
Kevin--
Ha ha...
If it was a model I needed to have, I'd buy it with the custom, or fictitious road, paint job, as long as it was a decent paint finish. The private roadname is not necessarily a turn off. Above I was referring more to the quality of the final finish...
If you look for example at The Caboose's typical model descriptions:
CP OB G (custom painted original box good) can have a lot of leeway.
My brass collecting buddies invented additional facetious categories based on some of the horrible paint jobs we used to see (that needed stripped). Instead of OB, we would sometimes say OD, for owner dipped, must be stripped. lol
At The Caboose, OP really means Owner Painted ie not necessarily that good. If they list a model as CP, custom painted, that more typically means they think somebody did a pretty good job on it, and it shouldn't require stripping and repainting.
My 2c.
Ever go to a general collectible/antique show? Usually in the front there are racks of periodicals of things now popular to collect. Everyone on this planet, even those who expouse four letter words waiting for train to pass at a crossing has some sort of an affinity for railroads.....many with with great likings and interest, but have no knowledge of how enjoyable collecting model trains could be...especially well made trains....not plastic models in huge runs.
One major reason with brass prices plummeting is ignorance. Newbies in the hobby cannot relate to them as rarely today does anything ever appear in the MR press. Still importers continue to market their brass models in a field now filled with operation and price oriented folks. Years back Bob Hunter, Roy Brakmann, and myself were going to become importers. We spent over a year doing research on four never done models to be built by Samhongsa with really great details and to come in beautiful finished wood presentation boxes complete with parts, operation, and history of prototypes literature. Roy passed away just prior to releasing funds, and Hunter became ill eventually passing away a few years later. I chose not to continue alone, as these two partners cound not be replaced. Our plans were of course to offer models to MR community, but we had planned on showing at the many fine collectible shows including Atlantic City....and even Barrett Jackson, albiet the huge cost outlay for selling/display space. If this would have worked I'd need a long stick with a donkey skull on one end to predict this, but my guess would be quite positive...even more so today. Now at age 81, I'm slowing down quite a bit although I'll be atteding the new Brass Expo next week.
I think a big factor in the declining interest in brass is simply that the necessity for brass engines isn't really there like it was in the past. Back in the 1970's-80's, the majority of model railroaders were old enough to remember steam, and most model railroads were set in the steam era. The only way to get accurate steam engines for a particular railroad was to buy brass.
Today, many more model railroaders only know diesels, and companies like Atlas, Athearn Genesis, Bowser, BLI and others are making plastic diesels that are detailed for specific railroads to a degree that in the past only brass could be - and often run much better than brass - but at a fraction of the price of brass.
I don't know about that. There's people on another forum taking Rapido to task for making a business decision not to do a specific pilot step variation.
And quite honestly, the late blue box Overland diesels (which have dual mode decoders) outrun anything I've tried in plastic, and even start running at a lower voltage in plain dc. I have been pleasantly surprised at how good they run.