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We're still in an interim period where people don't know which way things are going to go. The Wall Street weisenheimers can't decide if we're going to have deflation, or if inflation is going to be the bigger worry. Real estate has already deflated and continues to do so in most markets. For a while, many used cars went up in price. This was because fewer new cars were being purchased, and as a result the competition for less expensive used cars tended to trend up. Another thing was, since new cars were selling more slowly, there were fewer used cars traded in to go back on the market.

Guns are a somewhat unique category of merchandise. Lots of people realize (absent more restrictive legislation) that guns usually are a good store of value. They are an item that, given reasonable care, will get you back most if not all of your money when you go to sell. They tend to be inflation proof, going up in price as the value of paper money declines.

Always keep your eye on the ball as to the time value of money. If you bought a gun in 1967 for $100 and sold it recently for $600, and thought you made $500, forget it. Factoring inflation into the deal, you broke even. Still, that's not a bad thing; how many other things would hold their value like that? Not many. And like I said, guns are a different breed of cat. Very many guns have gone up in value way beyond a factor of six since 1967. My own theory about why this is so is because at any given time, there are more people being created in the world than there are guns being made. When it comes to older guns that are collectible, no more of these are being made, yet more potential collectors are always being born.

Lots of people have inflationary tendencies embedded in their minds. Why shouldn't they; we haven't had deflation in this country since before WW2 so nobody has any experience with it. I have a neighbor who has two pickup trucks to sell. He inherited both of them. One is a tired and rusty 1968 Dodge D200 Power Wagon that had the original engine replaced with a newer one of 440 cubic inches. The other is a 1980-something Dodge pickup with fairly low mileage, about 65,000 and a 400 cubic inch engine. He keeps telling me he has to sell these things; he has to get rid of them, he hates seeing them in his driveway. He just doesn't get it about price. Yes, some used cars have gone up in value, but not gas hogs. Worse, as gasoline prices trend back up again, the value and desireability of gas hog vehicles goes down even more. This neighbor wants $3,500 for the rusty Power Wagon, and get this, $6,000 for the '80-something pickup. Yes, I realize the newer truck has only 65K miles on it, but his price is still way, way high. It looks pretty good, but it's not outstanding. As to the rusty Power Wagon, he said something like, "If you restored that truck, it would be worth over $15,000!" The operative word in that sentence is "IF". If you spent $15,000 (or more) on that truck restoring it properly, you'd still have a truck worth maybe $5,000. No offense is meant if you are a Dodge truck fan, but both of these trucks are not what you'd call handsome. One of my theories is that if you are going to pee money away on old cars, you might as well do it on cars that are attractive in some way. It's kinda like the selection of wives; all things being equal it's just as easy to love a pretty one as a homely one, and the pretty one is easier to look at.

Anyway, this neighbor is holding out for as much money as he can squeeze out of these trucks (mind you, he got them free which if anything makes his behavior worse). The trouble is, in a market that is experiencing tight money or deflation, the longer he hangs onto these things the lower their real value may go. He's holding out, trying to squeeze that last penny out of them, with his mind stuck in how things were a few years ago.

Anything will sell; it's just a matter of price.