How to Tell You’re Paying a Good Price
Guns aren’t cheap. Well, some guns are cheap but most guns aren’t. For the vast majority of us, the purchase of a gun is a big deal and requires a great deal of planning, budgeting and bribing of the significant other.
Personally, I’ve always had the rule of “if it costs more than $100, I have to spend at least a week making sure I’m not only buying the right thing but getting a decent deal.” For starters, it saves me from impulse buys which rarely turn out well. At the same time, it makes sure I make good use of every penny.
When we’re at the store or gun show and picking out our gun, how can we be sure we’re getting the best bang for the buck…so to speak? Let’s take a look at how I work through it, as well as some of my favorite resources for either buying a gun or at least figuring out the going rates.
For starters, pick a price limit and stick with it. Let’s say you get a bonus from work for $700. We’ll use that as our budget. That’s our absolute upper limit and, keep in mind, that will include tax, tag and title on the gun. Most places here in FL charge an extra $10 to cover the background check so our budget is really $690 now. There’s also a 7% sales tax in Florida so, at a worst case scenario, we have to assume a $641 budget now to account for that. Yes, there’s a more precise way to calculate the maximum I can spend in order to stay below $690 when tax is added but I don’t feel like going through all the calculations. I’m a gun geek not a math geek. This gives us the worst case and could possibly leave us enough to buy a box of ammo as well.
Moving on…
Knowledge is power so the best thing you can do is research beforehand. Figure out the kind of gun you’re looking for. Even if you’re not looking for a specific gun or firearm, just take a good look out there to see what you can get for $640. Whenever I do that, my first stop is Gunbroker.com. Their advanced search lets you set a high and low value. Pro Tip: don’t put 0 for the low value. You’ll get all the magazines and accessories if you do that. Chances are, 99% of the guns you would actually want for this estimation are going to be over $200 so that’s what I always use for my lower limit. Make sure you select “Firearms” from the “Search in Categories” box.
This gives me a nice snapshot of the world around me. As I’m writing this, I see a pile of Mosin Nagants (although $200 for a Mosin seems a bit steep to me), some Taurus pistols, a few Mossberg Maverick 88s, a bunch of Winchesters…and I’m not even past the $200s yet! Closer to our max number, I’m seeing some Berettas, XDm’s, some M&Ps, even some AR-15’s! Ok, not bad pickings in this range.
But how do I know said pickings aren’t bad? That’s the other trick. It helps to spend a bit of time looking at various manufacturer sites. They’re going to be showing the MSRP which, as I’ve mentioned before, is a price you should never pay. Still, it gives you a good point of reference.
Another great place to get a snapshot of MSRP prices, instead of scouring a bunch of manufacturer pages is guns.findthebest.com. I absolutely adore this site and its search functions. Considering we’re dealing with MSRP here, make sure you add about $100 to $150 to your upper limit. The search options available on this site let you really nail down the exact gun you’re looking for. It might not have an absolute, 100% comprehensive list of every gun available but it certainly has a darn good selection of the most common guns you’re going to run into at just about any store.
I’m going to pick a random item from the gun broker list. In this case, it’s an STI Spartan III. The ad says it’s brand new and they’re asking $639 on GunBroker. According to STI’s site, the MSRP for this particular gun is $725. An $86 difference isn’t bad. Now let’s say I go to my local gun show and see the exact same pistol for $630. That might be only $9 cheaper than GunBroker but I can try and haggle with the dealer if I wanted. At the same time, I would be saving on the cost to ship the GunBroker pistol as well as the FFL fees which combined can add upwards of $50 to the price of a gun. So if I was looking for a compact 1911 to carry, and STI is one heck of a 1911 manufacturer, I’d call that a decent deal at the show.
Another great resource is www.ArmsList.com. This is like Craigslist, but for guns. This can give you a good idea of what the regional values for used guns are. Just because a gun is going for $700 in South Carolina doesn’t mean it’s going to be $700 everywhere. There are good deals to be had there, by the way, but definitely have a “buyer beware” attitude.
The final technique requires a bit of legwork. Namely, make sure you frequent your local stores. It helps to know which stores have the best prices as well as which stores seem to be willing to negotiate. This may seem logical but, believe it or not, a lot of people seem to forget this. I’ve met people who will only buy guns from Gander Mountain even though pretty much every store in my area sells almost at MSRP. There is one store in Jax that has a tendency to be significantly below everyone else’s price. They follow the “I’d rather sell five guns at $1 profit than one gun at $5 profit” mentality. This means they get a lot of guns out the door. Despite this, a large number of people in town seem to believe that this store is a rip off and overpriced meanwhile they’re paying $75 more for a gun down the street. Had they bothered to shop around, they would have saved enough money to buy a couple boxes of ammo to go along with their new gun. Now, considering the inexpensive store is usually crowded, the salespeople might not spend as much time with you as they would in other stores but being able to shoot the breeze with the clerk isn’t worth $75 to me.
In the end, knowing what your local market looks like will greatly help you to know how good the gun show prices are or if that auction at GunBroker is worth it. I guess the TL;DR version of this article is the same advice you would get when shopping for a car or a new toaster: always shop around. In the end, it’s your responsibility to know if the price is good or not because the retailer isn’t going to tell you. Well, they’ll always tell you that they have the best price. With a bit of research, you’ll know if they’re right or not.
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