Lefty Vintage Buyer Woes

[59TweedVibrolux]

Well the market is down and likely to get worse before it gets better. With few buyers with money and if you're a Dealer Selling a Lefty Vintage Guitar finding a buyer is like Winning the lottery these days.

I thought now is the right time to look around for a nice guitar. Dealers though are still holding out for high prices on what L/H guitars they might have , not that there is a lot around. You would think a dealer would grab a fair offer rather than have the guitar hnging around for months or 3 yrs as in the case of a '65 Strat I know of in LA. Surely even taking a small loss is offset with sales of other guitars for a dealer. Hanging there is dead money.

Elliot Easton made good points in an Interview with Guitar Aficionado Mag....

. “First, you have to find a lefty—there aren’t that many of us. And then it has to be a lefty who has the money to buy something like that.”

Easton is also quick to point out that because there is comparatively little demand for left-handed vintage guitars, their extreme paucity is also not reflected in their price. “You’d think that because there are so few lefty vintage guitars, they would be worth exponentially more,” Easton says. “It’s like, I have a mint ’58 Telecaster, lefty. How many of those could there be. Maybe three? If a righty is worth $30,000 and there’s thousands of them, this lefty has to be worth $100,000 because there’s none of them, right? But it doesn’t work that way, because lefties are harder to sell and have a much smaller market.”

I thought Elliot had sold the '58 ? but moving a lefty is a tough ask.

So should I try to negotiate a deal on a late '50s Tele or would a better option be on a '66 Tele which would fetch a lot less ?

[StratBluesRock]

Whichever one sounds/plays better.

[sentrido]

I feel your pain! I call it the lefty tax. A lot of the nice lefty guitars out there are either on consignment or the dealer doesn't really need the money so they sit... forever... :(

The higher you go up the value ladder, my advice would be to get a guitar you want to own and play and not so much as an investment. 3-5K your ok, as you go higher it does become exponentially harder to move stuff quickly without eating a loss.

[Lefty Addams]

I hear your pain mate, and I do agree. The 'lefty tax' is indeed a swine .... and must be even worse for a vintage.

[StratBluesRock]

I'm righty, what if I bought a sweet lefty Strat to flip it righty, right as the guy who wanted it (a lefty) walked into the shop .

[Lefty Addams]

Then I would hope you would offer it to the lefty and go for a true right handed instrument, god knows you have some choice ..... otherwise you would just be teasing the poor fellow!

[Flipped Mustang]

Much like the real estate market, it takes some time for dealers to get real about falling pricing. Unlike real estate, dealers can sit on nice vintage left handed guitars for long periods of time looking for the one person to throw down the big bucks. I've never noticed particularly good or realistic prices from most vintage guitar dealers, let alone on lefty guitars. I've always come up against the "it's rare, it's a lefty" mentality from dealers.
I've also never noticed a lack of left handed guitar players looking for nice guitars. Every time I hear about a nice one locally, by the time I get there it's gone :( I've also watched many a nice lefty go past what I would pay for it on eBay. The horror.....

I agree with StratBluesRock. See which guitar feels and sounds better to you.

[IPLAYLOUD]

Rare to see, then and now.
A local guy brings out a lefty '62 Strat in Sunburst...with an A neck.

I think in the old days, they would flip a new student over and say "learn it this way" very often.

[dan1952]

Wait till you go looking for a lefty piano. Or a lefty violin. Or a lefty trumpet. Or a lefty...oh, never mind...

[sentrido]

Originally Posted by Flipped Mustang

... I've also watched many a nice lefty go past what I would pay for it on eBay. The horror.....

In my experience when that happens it tends to be shenanigans nowadays rather than a real sale. When I bid on something, I am often contacted after an auction has ended, sometimes within hours?!! :), and told some bs that for some reason or another the high bidder "made a mistake" or hasn't "responded" to the seller and am offered a second chance or whatever.

[Flipped Mustang]

Originally Posted by IPLAYLOUD

Wow, great video! Dream Esquire and look at that Rick!

Originally Posted by sentrido

In my experience when that happens it tends to be shenanigans nowadays rather than a real sale. When I bid on something, I am often contacted after an auction has ended, sometimes within hours?!! :), and told some bs that for some reason or another the high bidder "made a mistake" or hasn't "responded" to the seller and am offered a second chance or whatever.

This happened to me last week on an item. I kept bidding the price up but was "outbid" over and over. Seconds SECONDS after the auction ended, the seller sent me a second chance offer :0 I declined. I think it's a new way for sellers to try and avoid reserve fees.

[otterhound]

Originally Posted by dan1952

Wait till you go looking for a lefty piano. Or a lefty violin. Or a lefty trumpet. Or a lefty...oh, never mind...

This crap again .
Pianos and trumpets are left handed , you just refuse to admit it .
Google left handed violins and learn how foolish your statement is .
I can understand the desire for a vintage guitar but I also accept the reality of the limited number of them available .
This is a huge part of why I build .
Find one , new or old , that speaks to you and have at it .

[dan1952]

Originally Posted by otterhound

This crap again .
Pianos and trumpets are left handed , you just refuse to admit it .
Google left handed violins and learn how foolish your statement is .
I can understand the desire for a vintage guitar but I also accept the reality of the limited number of them available .
This is a huge part of why I build .
Find one , new or old , that speaks to you and have at it .

Calm down, friend, these are the jokes...

[59TweedVibrolux]

Originally Posted by sentrido

In my experience when that happens it tends to be shenanigans nowadays rather than a real sale. When I bid on something, I am often contacted after an auction has ended, sometimes within hours?!! :), and told some bs that for some reason or another the high bidder "made a mistake" or hasn't "responded" to the seller and am offered a second chance or whatever.

Agreed. Being a Lefty you have so little choice either in New or Vintage with Dealers. It's easy for others to say..... "try out a few and see which is best", yeah that's easy when you have a wall of R/H Fenders hanging there.

With Vintage so few were made only on Custom Order. Finding one is hard enough then to face a dealer who has a pre WFC price on it and lets it hang there for eternity. Even if he has money, it makes no business sense to have dead money hanging there. I would rather take a loss of a few thousand to clear it and make that up on other R/H guitars. Buyers know if something has been hanging there for ages and suspect either 1. Something wrong with the guitar or 2. Overpriced. There is a You Tube with Elliot playing a '65 Strat at an L.A. dealers showroom. Video was posted 3 yrs ago and still the guitar is in his Secret Stash , along with other R/H Strats that have sat for ages unsold. Sure thats the dealers choice to hold at those prices but I still feel it makes no sense.

Either Dealers want to Sell Vintage Guitars in this market at real prices or they choose to become Warehouses to store these guitars waiting for the Good Times to come again....... er fellas , they aint a coming back. People are trying to feed their families , pay the mortgage and keep a job , not pay $35,000 + for a guitar with the definite prospect in todays World Economy that it will never increase in value. Even Drew Berlin (Burst Bros) admitted that some of the big Collectors they had helped build collections for had sold off most of their gear due to hitting hard times lately.

[6x47]

And what about picks? How many dealers stock lefty picks?

[boris bubbanov]

Originally Posted by Flipped Mustang

Wow, great video! Dream Esquire and look at that Rick!

Never mind the guitars; look at the guy playing the Rick (Clarence Brown)!

+

I think the lefty vintage buyer has to be super patient and super sociable about getting the word out there that he's in the market.

I still think a substantial number of lefty vintage guitars are owned by older or retired lefty players and if they knew you were a younger genuine lefty player, they might make you a really righteous deal. But you'd have to emphasize your abilities and your need, and also don't talk about taking advantage of the sluggish market.

Because the dealers are still about the money.

[StratBluesRock]

I have a left handed Twin Reverb .

[otterhound]

Originally Posted by 6x47

And what about picks? How many dealers stock lefty picks?

There are left handed thumb picks .
Oh yes , I get the joke .

[Drubbing]

Vintage - who cares, there's barely of them anyway, so why would prices still be high. Just because they're rare doesn't make them valuable if there's not enough of a market. Supply and demand sets prices - the sooner they get that, the sooner they'll shift stock.

As a lefty I'm pretty pissed at the pathetic offerings from Fender and other major brands - 3 guitars out of a bloated range of tweaks for geeks and gotta-haves for those who already have too many, fer crying out loud.

Originally Posted by dan1952

Wait till you go looking for a lefty piano. Or a lefty violin. Or a lefty trumpet. Or a lefty...oh, never mind...

Flip your guitar over and try and play it. That's what it feels like for us. Why should we try and learn to do the impossible?

[otterhound]

Why should we try and learn to do the impossible?[/QUOTE]
Simple , my friend .
It is expected because we do it every day and they cannot .
It is difficult to pull from what is almost a non existent market . This is why I just don't look to what was as a lefty .
The legacy that the lefty of today will leave will speak volumes to the next generation . I see the current times to be a " Golden Era " to the lefty players to come because the genie has finally been let out of the bottle and the stigmas and dogmas of the past are truly in the past .
Surely , there will be those that will refuse to let go of the old ways , but they too will pass .