Herd thinning advice

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big bear

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Finally, too many! Need advice (from old coots only please, young guys should never sell a firearm). How do you go about thinning the herd painlessly, or at least with minimum pain? In my younger years I regretted every firearm I ever sold. Now I've replaced many of the lost gems and then some. What goes? The gems that are hard to find but no one wants to pay what they are worth, like nice Savage 99's? The only Garand I have that isn't a gem, but nicer than most I see on EE going for crazy$$ But it's an older Springfield, solid shooter with a spare NOS GI Springfield barrel for when the one on it starts to fade.My 3rd favorite Win 71? already sold 2 and still haven't recovered from the separation grief. An unissued SKS or 2 ( and lose money on the deal), nah, that's stupid.The horror of it all. Suggestions?:confused:
 
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Only sell if there is a good reason. I am having to downsize a bit right now because of an impending move from Manitoba to Ontario, and I can only take so much with me. I did take about 40 of the better ones with me when I made a trip in December, and they are in storage right now. However, there is a lot of stuff that is left from 40 years or so of accumulating it.

Some of the choices for me are fairly easy. It is "extras" that you seem to get when you buy or sell firearms over a long period of time. Those "good deals", the rifle or something thrown in by a buyer to sweeten a deal, and those "bulk buys" where you make an offer to buy a half dozen firearms at a reduced price just to get the one you want. The thing is, most of this stuff has now appreciated in value due to the scarcity of even sporterized or slightly "Bubbaed" specimens. The choice here is fairly simple.

BUT, it is those ones that have a sentimental value or personal attachment. That old SMLE that you used when you were growing up and that served you well on the Range when you didn't have a lot of money to spend, but loved target shooting. You could afford the SMEL but not a new Winchester 70 Bull Gun. As you note, there are those rifles that are the special ones; the rare models, the Historic firearms, and those "mint" pieces that are under appreciated and under valued.

It is a tough decision and I feel for you. There have been a few times where I had to sell some very nice items so that I could meet some bills or I needed money for a very good reason. And I knew that I was going to get a lot less than the rifle was worth, or even that I paid for it.

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not old enough to be a coot, but if you have any grand children who are old enough, interested enough, smart enough, and licenced you may consider gifting one or two that they found particularly special. my grandfather used to take us shooting, he had an old mauser(don`t remember the model), and a few other guns. he always said he was going to give me the mauser, my brother a shot gun, and so on. when he passed, the guns were nowhere to be found, but one of my liberal uncles was overheard to say that "those boys don't deserve those guns, etc, etc". us boys were between 23 & 28 at the time. my grandfather rarely shot, he got more enjoyment watching us shoot. my uncles never had time for shooting. with us anyway.
all i have is a waffenampt 1938 FMJ cartridge which was on the floor of the gun closet after his funeral. don`t remember if it was for the mauser or not.
 
For health and money reasons, I sold off 2/3rds of mine, last year. I had to put sentimentality aside, look at actual future usage and favorites. It was a difficult decision to make and I did a lot of second guessing, afterwards. I then focused on optimizing what I kept and planned to shoot more, so that I truly enjoy them. All in all, I'm content with my decision, now:) Note: Selling them online, via Facebook auctions (Alberta), got me more for them than I ever would have, here in NS.
 
With a large collection (let's say 50+) I think there are two basic approachs:

- "quick and dirty" by way of an auction service; or
- one or a few at a time over a long period.

You'll probably earn more with the latter method, but it will be much more work, be much slower, and you'll be exposed to many more risks (read flaky buyers).
 
Well, I feel for you. I am like a big old ship being gently pushed into a harbour. I am slowly, one year at a a time, approaching the old coot stage. I have a pile of stuff, both collector and shooter class. I keep threatening to sell off some of the "unwanted" guns, but it seems I sell two and buy three or five.

I am not too concerned, though, as I enjoy my stuff, whether I shoot them or just have them. As time goes by, guns that might have had little extra value or interest as collector items, sometimes drift into the scarce or even rare status. I have a few that have done that. The Internet has made a huge, huge difference in my ability to research my guns. Someone might post a pic or a question about a certain model, and the hunt is on.

I don't really fit into any particular type of collector, i.e. "crusty", narrow-focus, or whatever. I'll buy a gun because I like it. I own some nice Mausers, Lee Enfields, Mosin Nagants, and others. I also own some nice shotguns and .22's.

I sort of hope I will be strumming a harp when my real favourites are disposed of. I have plans recorded for most of the really good stuff.
 
Guns that can be replaced are on the chopping block for thinning.

For example with Garands, I would put gas-traps, M1-Cs, MC-1s and maybe prize rifles on the "don't sell list"
All other Garands are "common" including M1Ds.
 
a man of like mind

kjohn said:
Well, I feel for you. I am like a big old ship being gently pushed into a harbour. I am slowly, one year at a a time, approaching the old coot stage. I have a pile of stuff, both collector and shooter class. I keep threatening to sell off some of the "unwanted" guns, but it seems I sell two and buy three or five.

I am not too concerned, though, as I enjoy my stuff, whether I shoot them or just have them. As time goes by, guns that might have had little extra value or interest as collector items, sometimes drift into the scarce or even rare status. I have a few that have done that. The Internet has made a huge, huge difference in my ability to research my guns. Someone might post a pic or a question about a certain model, and the hunt is on.

I don't really fit into any particular type of collector, i.e. "crusty", narrow-focus, or whatever. I'll buy a gun because I like it. I own some nice Mausers, Lee Enfields, Mosin Nagants, and others. I also own some nice shotguns and .22's.

I sort of hope I will be strumming a harp when my real favourites are disposed of. I have plans recorded for most of the really good stuff.
Click to expand...

Thanks for your reply, I like your approach as I too am an accumulator, a bunch of lever actions, a bunch of milsurps, and some SAKOs. I haven't got the plans recorded yet, too morbid for my taste for now!
 
I simply did two things.....had i used it lately and was it too pretty to be endangered in the bush. One of those two and the gun was in trouble, two and it was gone.

Unfortunately i seem to have replaced a lot of the pretty guns with utility versions of the same. Then i inherited some. So a few are for sale.

I am trying to assign each a purpose or role. If two have the same role, the more practical gun stays, or the gun with more nostalgia or family history. Still hard to sell, and i find myself more likely to trade or part trade than sell history or loose giant money. Of course the trades start the process all over.......
 
Keep no more than 2 (or most 3) of any given model of maker. For example I have one of each of the Lee Enfield #4 makers. That number can go up, but I keep the best and purge the rest. I might get up to 3 Maltbys, but will eventually bring it down to one again.
 
This is a hard subject to approach.

I'm strictly a Milsurp collector which makes it a little easier. Hunting rifles, shotguns are easy to get rid of for me. Milsurps on the other hand have historical value to me so I have a hard time getting rid of any.

There's a few others that I've gotten from friends/mentors that are of a high value on the sentiment scale so those will stay here forever.

But all of that said when the time comes that I'm an old coot I'll make sure that I sell or give many to those that I know will appreciate them. The rest will be dealt with in my will and then I won't have to part with them knowingly!!

Good luck on the selling, we all feel for you.
 
Let a new collector experience and appreciate the chance to own a piece of history. What might be simply another nice gun in the safe to a seasoned collector would be the centerpiece of pride in the collection of someone new to the hobby. It's a shame to hear stories of guns that were turned over to authorities or museums by family members after, when a collector could have seen them in the hands of someone who would appreciate their historical value during his life.
Just some thoughts worth sharing
 
He who dies with the most toys wins. Keep them all and take them to the grave.

My question would be, when watching an action movie, which are the ones that DON'T come to mind that you want to grab out of the safe to help out the Duke, Willis, Noris, and other such good guys. When you think about taking a deer with an interesting piece, what doesn't come to mind? Are the duplicate and triplicates of anything? And I don't mean M-1 Garand, M1C, M1D and MC-1.
 
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