Changing Systems- Avoiding Financial Loss

What is the best method to avoid substantial financial loss when changing systems, if one is heavily invested in the lenses for a system? Especially if one has many expensive pro-level lenses?

Ideally, one would like to sell it all at a go, but that does not seem possible. It seems one must go piece by piece, and that's a hassle, as well as a huge loss (you get less than one half the new value).

With ebay, if the buyer says he received a brick, any money he paid goes right back to him and you are out an expensive camera or lens. Locally, still a hassle, and a big loss. Here on dpreview, still a question of where the risk falls.

Any solutions?

abe4652 said:

What is the best method to avoid substantial financial loss when changing systems, if one is heavily invested in the lenses for a system? Especially if one has many expensive pro-level lenses?

Ideally, one would like to sell it all at a go, but that does not seem possible. It seems one must go piece by piece, and that's a hassle, as well as a huge loss (you get less than one half the new value).

With ebay, if the buyer says he received a brick, any money he paid goes right back to him and you are out an expensive camera or lens. Locally, still a hassle, and a big loss. Here on dpreview, still a question of where the risk falls.

Any solutions?

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You will lose money every time you buy something new and sell it. Just remember, we aren’t talking BIG money here and you are probably not changing systems because you HAVE to but because you WANT to.

If you buy used, though, you can usually come close to breaking even.

abe4652 said:

What is the best method to avoid substantial financial loss when changing systems, if one is heavily invested in the lenses for a system? Especially if one has many expensive pro-level lenses?

Ideally, one would like to sell it all at a go, but that does not seem possible. It seems one must go piece by piece, and that's a hassle, as well as a huge loss (you get less than one half the new value).

With ebay, if the buyer says he received a brick, any money he paid goes right back to him and you are out an expensive camera or lens. Locally, still a hassle, and a big loss. Here on dpreview, still a question of where the risk falls.

Any solutions?

Click to expand...

If there was an easy solution, I suspect people would switch systems a lot more often. When you sell your used gear and buy new you are going to lose, whether you use ebay, Craigslist, the forums, or just selling locally to friends or other photographers. One way to minimize your loss is to buy used when switching systems, but that probably defeats the purpose of migrating to something newer & better.

To be specific, we're talking run of the mill equipment here, not exotics or collectables or stuff in short supply, which are a completely different animal.

As with cars, as soon as it leaves the store the price drops. With digital stuff it's even worse. There's too much excellent condition used stuff available for people not to demand a significant discount from new.

If you want safe, sell to KEH, B & H, Adorama, your favorite camera store, or somebody you know who will hand you cash.

If you want the best price you take a chance and sell on eBay. Personally, I've been doing that a rather long time and never gotten burned, although I did have one guy give it a try. He just wasn't a very good thief.

Craigs List may be marginally better for the seller, assuming you meet in a appropriate location and get paid in cash.

Bottom line, it's an expensive undertaking and you are going to lose a bundle any way you go about it.

In my own purchasing, I prefer to search out lightly used items from people who enjoy having the latest and greatest as much as they enjoy making photographs. My experience would indicate this is a buyers market. (which is not to say I don't also get skinned occasionally, just not as bad or as often )

--
"Good judgement is generally the result of experience. Experience, unfortunately, is generally the result of bad judgement" - attributed to a whole bunch of folks

abe4652 said:

What is the best method to avoid substantial financial loss when changing systems, if one is heavily invested in the lenses for a system? Especially if one has many expensive pro-level lenses?

Ideally, one would like to sell it all at a go, but that does not seem possible. It seems one must go piece by piece, and that's a hassle, as well as a huge loss (you get less than one half the new value).

With ebay, if the buyer says he received a brick, any money he paid goes right back to him and you are out an expensive camera or lens. Locally, still a hassle, and a big loss. Here on dpreview, still a question of where the risk falls.

Any solutions?

Click to expand...

I don't think there is an easy way.

I bought one lens for about £250 used. That is its market value. If I sold it to a dealer I would get a fraction of that because they still have to make a margin. If I sold it myself direct then I might get its value but there is slightly more hassle involved.

I bought another lens new for £1,200 about iirc - as soon as I bought it, it became used and already lost a lot of value. Then Nikon replaced it with a newer model and mine lost more value, now its market value as a used lens is probably between £400 - 500 max and I could only realise this if I sold it myself not if I went to a dealer.

The only way you can get market value is by selling them yourself.

Mark_A

Thread for Sunrise & Sunset pictures (part 3!)

abe4652 said:

Any solutions?

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You actually give three goals:

• avoid taking a bath on costs
• avoid risk
• avoid hassle

I tend to agree with Schrodingers_cat, "If you want safe, sell to KEH, B & H, Adorama." Smaller and less known, National Camera Exchange--I've dealt with them more than once and been satisfied. That takes care of the safe and low-hassle points.

On costs--see if they'll give you a better deal if you take account credit for your gear rather than cash, so you're more trading equipment than buying and selling with different parties. The suggestion of buying used--especially for an array of lenses, is a good one when dealing with a reputable vendor, as the above are.

bob5050

abe4652 said:

What is the best method to avoid substantial financial loss when changing systems, if one is heavily invested in the lenses for a system? Especially if one has many expensive pro-level lenses?

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The best method is to not change systems.

abe4652 said:

Ideally, one would like to sell it all at a go, but that does not seem possible. It seems one must go piece by piece, and that's a hassle, as well as a huge loss (you get less than one half the new value).

With ebay, if the buyer says he received a brick, any money he paid goes right back to him and you are out an expensive camera or lens. Locally, still a hassle, and a big loss. Here on dpreview, still a question of where the risk falls.

Any solutions?

Click to expand...

Mark B. said:

abe4652 said:

What is the best method to avoid substantial financial loss when changing systems, if one is heavily invested in the lenses for a system? Especially if one has many expensive pro-level lenses?

Ideally, one would like to sell it all at a go, but that does not seem possible. It seems one must go piece by piece, and that's a hassle, as well as a huge loss (you get less than one half the new value).

With ebay, if the buyer says he received a brick, any money he paid goes right back to him and you are out an expensive camera or lens. Locally, still a hassle, and a big loss. Here on dpreview, still a question of where the risk falls.

Any solutions?

Click to expand...

If there was an easy solution, I suspect people would switch systems a lot more often. When you sell your used gear and buy new you are going to lose, whether you use ebay, Craigslist, the forums, or just selling locally to friends or other photographers. One way to minimize your loss is to buy used when switching systems, but that probably defeats the purpose of migrating to something newer & better.

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There aren't that many systems (relatively speaking).

I just had an idea. What if we tried the old "coincidence of wants" idea? Meaning, at any given time there is someone trying to move from m43 to FF, and there is someone going the other way.

What if we set up a board, not for sales (at low prices) but for wholesale exchanges? Meaning...an exchange of an m43 camera plus a few high quality lenses for an FF? And if its not exactly equal, a minor exchange of money as well.

I'm in Toronto.

I've traded equipment in at camera stores, where they have prices they think are fair to both sides. So the store may offer $200, say, just for you showing up, and you'd need to look for weeks to find some stranger willing to pay $250.

So what's the speed worth to you?

In Ontario, we have a combined federal and provincial tax.

If you are trading in and buying new stuff in the same transaction, you only pay tax on the difference.

For instance, let's say there is no trade, and you go to the store and buy a body and two lenses and a flash for $7000.

You pay $910 in tax.

Or you trade in stuff. The store allows you $4000 credit for your old stuff. You want $7000 worth of new stuff.

You pay tax only on $3000, the difference between trade in and new equipment. That tax is $390.

That's obviously less than $910.

I was in a store on Thursday last week, and noticed that there is a lot of used equipment for sale. That is not good news as far as selling your stuff goes.

BAK

abe4652 said:

What is the best method to avoid substantial financial loss when changing systems,...

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I don't think that selling and buying equipment at what is a fair market price can be described as "financial loss". Of course new equipment has a higher fair marker price than used one; thus it cost money to replace old with new. He who perceives such transaction as a "financial loss" should not undertake it.

Excellent answer above. It is not financial loss - it's the price of the hobby. Anybody that would buy a new piece of photo gear expecting its value to remain the same has obviously never studied photo equipment values much. At the current rate of tecnology cameras stand the chance of being totally obsolete and worth next to nothing within months. Lenses longer, but who knows there either.

The OP could think of it as paying for the use of the gear during the period they owned it. You can't expect to get all that photographic fun( and all those images) for free, can you?

Wheatfield7 said:

The best method is to not change systems.

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Agreed. There are no bad systems and no systems that are extraordinarily compelling.

abe4652 said:

abe4652 wrote

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abe4652 said:

I just had an idea. What if we tried the old "coincidence of wants" idea? Meaning, at any given time there is someone trying to move from m43 to FF, and there is someone going the other way.

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I thought about that same thing (no, I'm not switching). It's worth a try - the loss for both of you will be minimized.

Rental for years of use and thousands of photos--right?

Last time I sold a camera in ebay, I researched the buyer and asked him for a phone number to call. Before calling, I matched the phone number to the person I researched. I was lucky, he was a nice guy.

More than half of the offers I got were scam attempts.

As to the loss, you have gotten a certain amount of use and pleasure from the gear - and some earnings if you do any paid work. Hopefully your gear has paid for its depreciation, either in earnings or in enjoyment. If you are not earning money or receiving pleasure from its use what's the point?

As to risk, if you sell online you risk losing money. To some extent you can minimize the risk by selling items separately, insuring your shipments, and, when possible, screening buyers. I buy and sell on ebay several times a year and have been since the service started. I've never had a serious problem but if I keep going long enough it will happen. Life is like that.

If you sell in person to strangers you risk being whacked on the head, or worse. On the whole I'd rather take my chances online.

If you sell to a known dealer, either online or locally, you take a lower price (essentially wholesale) but you minimize the risk.

In my opinion, photography equipment should not be considered a long-term investment. Keep in mind when you buy that it probably will not be around more than 2 or 3 years and think about what value you get from it while it lasts.

Gato

abe4652 said:

What is the best method to avoid substantial financial loss when changing systems, if one is heavily invested in the lenses for a system? Especially if one has many expensive pro-level lenses?

Ideally, one would like to sell it all at a go, but that does not seem possible. It seems one must go piece by piece, and that's a hassle, as well as a huge loss (you get less than one half the new value).

With ebay, if the buyer says he received a brick, any money he paid goes right back to him and you are out an expensive camera or lens. Locally, still a hassle, and a big loss. Here on dpreview, still a question of where the risk falls.

Any solutions?

Click to expand...

Generally I would say the bigger online dealers tend to be the best option, I'v sold to MPB several times and gotten far better prices that highstreet shops were offering without the hassle of ebay.

Just as big an issue of course is how you bought the lenses in the first place, personally I tend to go used with anything I'm not entirely sure I'm going to stick with to limit loses if I end up selling.

Gato Amarillo said:

....

In my opinion, photography equipment should not be considered a long-term investment. Keep in mind when you buy that it probably will not be around more than 2 or 3 years and think about what value you get from it while it lasts

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Hi Gato,

I would agree a little wrt bodies, though I made my last one last, but not where lenses are concerned, I bought my lenses 16-17 years ago and they are still very much treasured and used.

Mark_A

Thread for Sunrise & Sunset pictures (part 3!)

Nansen said:

abe4652 said:

What is the best method to avoid substantial financial loss when changing systems,...

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I don't think that selling and buying equipment at what is a fair market price can be described as "financial loss". Of course new equipment has a higher fair marker price than used one; thus it cost money to replace old with new. He who perceives such transaction as a "financial loss" should not undertake it.

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Good point.

People keep thinking of their equipment as being worth the original price paid.