This is the older one that sold a few days ago on ebay. Here is the play-by-play:
- Seller, a watchmaker in Turkey, listed it on TimeZone and was asking around $2,000
- I swapped e-mails with him, and suggested to him that this price was far too high, in view of the condition of the dial; I visualized a value in the $800 to $1000 range
- Seller listed on ebay and sold it for around $1500, to a dealer here in the US
- We will wait and see whether the dealer will (a) sell with the dial "as is" or (B) refinish / replace the dial . . . in either case, what will be the asking price??
Aren't dealers great!! A friend told me about an average-looking Autavia GMT that sold on ebay a couple of weeks ago, for $1,200 . . . winning bidder was a dealer, who promptly listed it on his site for a cool $2,400. I repeat, aren't dealers great!!
So we can blame some collectors with big bank-rolls, and we can also blame some dealers who hope to flip poor-to-average watches to these collectors.
Jeff
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
: I didn't follow this watch, but the price
: doesnt surpise me the least (see my older
: post about the situation of the vintage
: Heuer market). I have seen very recently a
: mint Autavia cal.12 sell for more than
: $1,7K.
: In times like these one has to make his own
: mind about he value of a watch, that is it's
: value to HIMSELF. I was always against
: generic price evaluations and day after day
: I feel more strongly about it. One should
: decide the price/value of a watch on his
: own. Thw question is "how much I'm I
: willing to pay for this watch?" not
: "how much is this watch worth?". A
: few good pictures, some positive feedback
: and a bit of shilling can drive the price to
: unreasonable levels. Furthermore the market
: in vintage watch niches (like Heuer watches)
: is that small, that just a few people (new
: collectors) with $10K disposable capital
: each can fluctate the prices quite heavily.
: Just my opinion of course...
