"Hell, you could fly to Itay and bring it back for that."
Jerry,
I can't say that I see any significance to this point. We have to assume that the time and effort that it takes to locate and secure a bike in Italy are costs over and above the selling price. This would not be unlike the shipping, handling, and possible duty that the buyer of this particular DeRosa will pay, just much greater. Not only do you need to add costs for airline tickets and hotels, but you need to include the value of any vaction time used, decreased billability, wages lost, or whatever other dollar value you can place on your time. Given the scarcity of super-minty 1972 DeRosas in any particular size, you could spend a lot of your precious time in Italy looking for one. While there may be long-forgotten examples in a few Emelian basements, if they were at all easy to find Matteo would be offering them to us on a regular basis.
While I would personally enjoy a hunting trip to Italy, we can't look at it as "you could fly there" as though that is some sort of bonus. In my preference ordering it might be, but we can only assume all of this stuff to be search costs. It's like the date-matched Campy groups I've pieced together over the years. They came cheap relative to what I'd have to pay for complete groups on Ebay, but I've spent countless hours searching Eaby, going to swaps, trading stuff with other collectors, and buffing and tweeking what I find. Put a value on that time, and making a turnkey purchase on Ebay is a killer deal. Of course, most of us hobbyists enjoy the time we spend doing this stuff, but we could be spending it making money and we'd probably come out ahead (financially, not spiritually). Then again, all work and no play...
Respectfully,
Tom Dalton
Bethlehem, PA
I'm still surprised at the prices. Even if early 70's DeRosa's are rare in the US, you could ship one from Italy for a hell of a lot less than $7,000. Hell, you could fly to Itay and bring it back for that.
Regards,
Jerry Moos Houston, TX
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