GetRightRobot wrote:Rated X wrote:If I may inject my two cents into this. It's no secret I support KO's to the fullest. (no disrespect to aybody who doesnt) One issue I have is that the creation of e-bay has doubled and tripled the price of what many scarce collectibles in general are worth. An original Fort Max should have never reached a $700-900 value price. As with many e-bay listed items, you are not paying for what the figure is really worth. You are paying a comparison of what some collector that lives in the middle of nowhere is willing to pay out of desparation. In other words, if a few rich princes from the middle east decide to bid $2000 on Fort Max figures, then $2000 becomes the new value of Fort Max because they just drove up the price. Then the rest of the sellers raise their price based on speculation that they can make $2000 as well. So if you are a middle class income collector who worked your a** off to afford an original Fort Max at inflated rich collector prices, you got my respect. I commend you for finding your holy grail. However, I also feel you are a victim of an unfair system of price inflation. This is why I endorse KO's. They even the playing field. Especially the quality KO's from CHMS and Kold. They give anal e-bay sellers a reality check and encourage them to lower their prices to more respectable ones. The sellers who dont just continue to have their items collect dust on e-bay with the "buy it now" option. And those prices are not the real value in my opinion. They are just shark bait thrown in the water to catch a big fish. Some will bite, others wont. Im sure a few people will agree with me and some will disagree and trash talk my opinions. Go for it, I gotta roll out to work now.
Ok, I have the Kold Blue Convoy, to go with my DIA commander, I like it. I have no problems with a KO in general, however, if HAS/Tak released a Blue Classics Prime, I have no doubts it would be of a higher quality. As far as value, it's like this Rated X: Transformers are only worth the market will yield. If some shmuck scalper tries to sell a figure for 10grand he's not going to sell it. If he sells a figure for something someone is willing to pay, then that is the value of that figure at that time. The is no law or rule other than what SOMEONE (including idiots) is willing to pay. For me, personally, in my collection, a Knock Off holy grail is redundant. Lets take Henkei Wildrider. I want one sure. I'm not gonna pay $500 bucks, so a Knockoff will suffice. It will do. In this case, in my experience, IMO, for me, personally, a milestone piece like Max as a KO is pointless. Like getting a fake Michael Jordan rookie card signed by a homeless man on the street. It looks right, it feels right and it only cost you a quarter, but is it the same?
GRR stole my thunder before I could get to a computer to comment, but I second his analysis. Collectibles follow the same rules as anything else sold in a free market: buyer demand determines price/value/worth. This is why gold is selling at over $2000 an ounce now. Is that an insane price? Yes. Is that where the market value is now set? Yes. You can try to buck it all you want, but it will continue to rise unless a flood of product hits the market. Fort Max is expensive on the secondary market because it was expensive to begin with, and it hasn't been manufactured in 25 years (Brave Max not withstanding). $900 secondary for a complete Max originally sold for $100 is still keeping in line with $75/$85/$100 secondary for a complete deluxe Autobot car from '84/5 that originally sold for $8.99. That's still a markup of ten times original price, but we don't holler about that. We chalk it up to the name of the game. And, quite frankly, a lot of inflated prices on websites like eBay come from sellers trying to recoup losses to ever-increasing fees. Amazon.com Marketplace takes almost 20% off the top from some sales before throwing a bit back to you as a "shipping credit."
I truly don't believe this KO will affect the secondary market for Fort Max much, if at all. It will just create additional primary and secondary markets for the KO. If you really have your eyes on an '86 Max, you'll save your pennies and hunt for one with a price you're willing to meet. If not, you'll hunt for a KO with a price you're willing to meet. I'm not saying I'm happy with this thing being released; I'm saying to each his own and buyer beware, like it says in the headline.
Posted: Wed Aug 31, 2011 10:46 pm
