Re: [CR] Buying on the cheap

<classicrendezvous@bikelist.org> Sent: Monday, January 18, 2010 8:25 PM Subject: Re: [CR] Buying on the cheap

> At 06:14 PM 1/18/2010, coel canth wrote:
>>are there really people out there offering to pay two or three times
>>asking price when they stumble upon a SWEET DEAL ?!?
>
> Depends on the situation;
> I did pay 3 times the asking price for a low mileage '70 Moulton Mk III.
> The seller had just lost her job and had no idea what it was worth.
> I paid the widow of a well known local bike nut twice what she had been
> told a '57 RRA project was worth.
>
> OTOH
>
> I was offered a very clean Jack Taylor Lugged Tourist frame, fork and
> racks* for $275!!!. He obviously didn't know what it was worth so I
> offered him $250 and we settled on $262.50.
>
> The difference?
> The seller had been given the JT by an English friend. He said he didn't
> use it because the frame weighed 1/2 a pound more than his Trek 720 frame.
> When the friend passed away he was finally free to get rid of it. That
> he had a house the size of my lot and he and the wife had matching
> Escalades may have made me even more determined to get it as cheaply as
> possible.
>
> *The front rack had never been installed, the rear installed but never
> used. Also a TA BB in like new condition.
>
> BTW I thought he`was Philistine for preferring a Trek over a Jack Taylor.
> But now I also have a 720 and can sorta see his point. The story of the
> Taylor brothers, and British framebuilding are fascinating to me. If they
> weren't, I might favor the Trek too.
>
> Mark Stonich;
> BikeSmith Design & Fabrication
> 5349 Elliot Ave S. - Minneapolis. MN 55417
> Ph. (612) 824-2372 http://bikesmithdesign.com
> http://mnhpva.org