Are there any trusted dealers

Help me
Are there any dealers of vintage watches to be trusted I looked at vintage watch collections after a little research seems this guy is a fraud , same for vintage portfolio, old Maximilian doesn’t appear to be who he says .Then I looked at Fine auction club , more negative feedback is anyone in the business of being honest ,
Pleeease

https://omegaforums.net/threads/Ωf-unanimously-favorite-ebay-sellers-list.3612/ But heed @Dan S advice.

Most dealers are good as long as watch is good and the deal goes well. What identifies a great dealer is how they manage problems.

As previously mentioned the main advice is to know what you buy rather than trust the person who sells it. There’s not a dealer in the world that only has perfect no-issue watches.

its not helpful to generalise dealers as "bad" or "good" from single experiences. many watch stores grow or evolve over time, sometimes for the better, sometimes for the worse. even at high end London auctions houses watches that are questionable appear on regular basis and also there find their buyer. generally speaking, the market clears itself from dealers that do a poor job, on average, over time.

I would personally not buy from the dealers you mentioned as you can get better watches for less prices on the open market. But I also see no particular problem with the stock of watches at fine auction club for instance. most of the watches offered there are redials but there is definitely a market for these kind of polished and redialed watches. when following closed ebay auctions redialed watches in the below 1000 USD range sell for nearly the same price than original dialed watches. beside the doors of this forum and hardcore vintage collectors the general public does not care a lot about redials. they see it as a fresh paint job on an old-timer car.

Figure out what references/calibers you're interested in, learn all that you can about them, then pull "barn find" watches from auctions. Bypass dealers completely.

very informative ... thanks for all the information here

it's like everywhere

there are terrible dealers and awesome ones but the same counts for private sellers.
there is nothing wrong if u buy from a dealer. yes they live from the money they make on selling watches. on the other hand if u have a great dealer, the watch is serviced and comes with a warranty and later on the dealer might be willing to take it back if u like to upgrade ...

I think, for me anyway, "Buy the Seller"/"Trusted Seller" refers more to New/Pre-Owned watches where you can fully trust that the watch is legitimate, in good condition and with assurance that any problem will be rectified. You don't need more info than which model you like and what price you are willing to pay. Armed with that, going to a Trusted Seller is a safe transaction.

Vintage on the other hand, well, it would be ridiculous to buy *from anyone* without extensive researching of the piece you are looking to acquire. While "Buy the Seller" still applies, its only part of the equation.