I’m curious to learn more about the “dos and don’ts” about flipping around here. Of course, this community is diverse in the interests of the members here so it’s no real surprise that I see somewhat conflicting positions with regards to the concept. I guess I’m just trying to wrap my brain around it and understand better.

For me, personally, I have only ever considered purchasing watches that I intend to wear or gift to someone special. It seems like some folks like to acquire interesting pieces for themselves and sometimes those end up being so special that they keep them in safes or bank vaults. The cohort I have the least familiarity with are the ones who seem to attempt to acquire a piece at the lowest possible price and resell it at the highest possible price in the shortest timeframe possible.

Perhaps foremost, what is the general consensus on the term itself? Am I correct in my interpretation of the term?For what it’s worth, I have most recently spent a fair bit of time in a community that tends to perceive this negatively although I try not to let that color my own perspective and try to remain as objective as possible. I guess one particularly confusing concrete example would be that I perceive a fair bit of grumbling around how Rolex intentionally limits supply and how that ends up with highly inflated prices of those pieces on the aftermarket.

I’m not trying to start any us vs them arguments; I’m curious to learn more about what sorts of things motivate someone to gravitate towards this niche of the watch collecting hobby and what are some of the written or unwritten rules for participating as such. Thanks in advance for all your thoughtful and diplomatic responses.

 

Generally speaking, if it's your watch you can do what you want with it.

What I personally would consider bad form, is if someone bought a watch here and then put it up for sale at a vastly inflated price.

This would annoy me because, in 99.9% instances, you are getting an honest watch at an honest price.So for someone to come along and cherry pick watches only to sell on for considerable profit goes against the spirit of what this community represents, (to me at least.)

 

For a bit of context, where I'm coming from is low volume manufacturing of custom product designs. In these cases, the demand far outweighs the ability for designers to get the products into customer hands. Designers are trying to find new ways to make products available to customers in a variety of ways to ensure that the folks who have genuine interest have a fair opportunity and discouraging people from just purchasing these things and immediately selling them for two to three times the price that the product was originally offered for. I think this is different from watches which tend to come from global public companies which manage their own risk at a much larger scale.

 

I think your approach - trying to get good design into the hands of those who appreciate, rather than those who can merely afford - is absolutely laudable. Unfortunately though, I don't think there is any commercial enterprise that sustains itself that way over the long run.
It certainly is easy to feel animosity towards the arbitrageur, but I'm afraid that is an element of how capitalism works. Normally, we don't have to see it in operation - which is why it is such bad form, as @lillatroll rightly put it, when you get "your" stuff sold back to you at a mark-up.
On those occasions when something is advertised above original cost, but well below subsequently inflated open market price, I guess it's a bit different. I probably wouldn't buy, but I would feel less resentment towards the lucky seller. Then again, if a pattern emerged of a community member persistently acquiring from peers, then later re-selling for a modest mark-up, I'd say that's dealing at community expense, and subtracting community value.
YMMV!

 

I think it is context mixed with frequency and similar to previous comment. For me something like:

Flipper A buys a piece on OF for a great price and immediately puts it for sale on another platform at a higher price = Frowned upon at best, someone I don’t want to sell to.

Flipper B buys a piece, keeps it for a short time, doesn’t bond/wants a different watch and sells for a profit = Just another collector supporting their habit, no worries from me. (Unless it happens regularly, like 2x/mth, that’s the frequency part of the equation that can move it to a negative Flipper-type for me)

Then there are dealers who make a living at this and I put them in a different category altogether, not really a flipper IMO.

Just my thoughts on the Flipper, just an opinion and as the kids say YMMV.

 

I think “flipper” implies buying low with the intention of selling for a profit. Same term is used in real estate- buy it cheap, do the bare minimum to make it salable to maximize profit, sell at top market price. The ethical problem with this is that it keeps the decent values out of the hands of those who wish to put in the sweat equity and live in a house that is within their means- it drives the market rates up and prices out those who can only afford the bargains. Same goes with watches.
Some are happy to buy a flipped house, the work has already been done (albeit at the bare minimum of quality usually) and they get a move-in ready house. Again, same can be said for watch flippers who buy a rough and non working watch with the intention of cleaning it up and selling it at a profit to someone who doesn’t want to deal with the hassle of servicing etc. Is it wrong, no- it’s all a matter of perspective.

We have well known members here who buy watches on European auction sites cheaply, then sell them on this site for profit. Nothing wrong with that- but if you know what they paid versus what they are selling it for, you may get turned off thinking they are simply a profiteer. But that OF “flipper” may just be trying to build up enough equity to buy something very special and the only way they can do that is nickel by nickel- we don’t know their motivations.

We all want to buy low and sell high, it’s the goal of any collector who buys/sells/trades. If nobody gets screwed in the deal, I see nothing wrong with it. If you feel you are being screwed, back out. If you feel you have been screwed, don’t do business with them again.

 

I always say I want to flip my watches but I get to attached to them that I end up keeping them. Those are probably the biggest DON'T in flipping 101! I always have an excuse about why I won't sell it. Like I bought this Ollech & Wajs Selectron which was not working, I managed to get it serviced and now telling my wife that it's the watch that compete against Omega but lost. Lol, she's like whatever! But end of the day, knowing the watch you bought has appreciated is quite exciting (just not for the wallet).

 

I was once in a watch shop in Europe. The owner and watchmaker told me how he had bought a flieger watch from an old lady at a flea market for a few hundred euros in Germany - which he sold for a few thousand. He was proud of the deal but that would not sit well with me to be honest.

 

Many here have lived by the sword and died by the sword also. Several pseudo dealers that just got greedy and pooped in there own backyard. Banned and still dealing elsewhere.

People who buy and flip are from both ends of the spectrum here.

The collector
Sells to upgrade at about what he payed just to turn over all the beautiful watches to complete his collection. This guy will buy a 5 watch lot just to get one watch case. ( rarely seen anymore but some are still around )

The good guy.
Some one that just loves watches usually. Can be good for the forum as it brings watches that most collectors don’t see and I think paying for there ground work is reasonable.

The gets board easily
Usually just a member who sells a bit because he is a compulsive buyer more than a collector. ( 9/10 this guy has bought and sold 3 different Tudors )

The flip to buy himself better watches.
Has merits for the forum as in seeing more watches, but really your just paying for his watches


The bad guy.
Buy pump and dump. Usually the guy has 800 posts which is 200 posts to be able to sell and 600 posts selling his wares. To this guy we are just he’s audience. He will even ask us questions to gain knowledge to make more money for himself

I always spend the time on looking at who is selling and researching which of the 5 above he falls into.

 

Do whatever you want as it is your watch and I believe in free markets. Just own it though and don't post a Daytona you got at retail the week before and say "I tried it and it is just not for me".

 

Flipper sells a watch for price X... to a flipper... who sells a watch to a flipper for price Y... etc...
Price of the watch goes from X to Y = X+1000... from Y to Z = Y+1000 ... Now I get how prices skyrocket
Also:
https://omegaforums.net/threads/2021-the-hobby-is-dead.138433/

 

Or posting a watch as if they still own but flipped long ago, remember a certain Snoopy 3.[/QUOTE]

 

I fell into the “collector” category with records and hifi. I would buy entire collections based on a few pieces I wanted and sell off the rest for what I could get. If buying from a private party, I was very clear about what it was “worth” and what I was offering. They knew going in that I was planning to sell off the bulk but I clarified that I had to take on the burden of prepping for sale, brokering the sale, dealing with possible returns etc- they almost always took my offer and were happy to see it gone and get cash in hand. I never gave a “oh, I will love all of this like it my own” story.

I have a friend who is a gets bored easily. He has changed almost every component in his stereo system 5 times in the last 10 years. He is always buying and selling and would hit me up every few months to see if I had new gear he could play with. I’ve stopped selling pieces to him as it just got aggravating to feel good about selling him an excellent piece at my cost only to find out he got double for it a year later (he wasn’t doing it maliciously, he just got bored and sold it at market price).

I think there is another catagory which I think of as the ID/Superego compulsive collector/hoarder.
This person will go down the rabbit hole of specific watch or brand, buy everything they can get their hands on, spends every waking minute reading every word they can find on the subject, becomes an expert in the brand, then realized they bought 10 watches, all way too similar to justify, and feel the need to reel it in. The purge is agonizing for this collector, but they know they have to do it so they sell in waves…..guilty as charged.

 

[/QUOTE]

What do you mean?

 

This photo by taz101 in this thread:

https://omegaforums.net/threads/october-5th-2020-snoopy-celebration.112405/page-198#post-1831547

and my response:

 

I like this nuanced answer. There is also the guy who jumps in to buy the new LE and never unboxes it. Again, it's his watch to do with as he wants, but I don't really appreciate this type of flipping since it's just making money at the expense of someone who really wants the watch.

 

For myself I never really know how I feel about a watch until I get some time with it. Often it needs a service first. So it can take a while to get the watch wearable, and then see how it feels. Hard to predict the outcome. So I try to buy nice original watches, at a good price, in case it doesn’t end up being a keeper.

some watches I thought would keep forever, just didn’t connect, and vice versa.

it’s also secondarily driven by larger financial picture in the rest of my life, and how much I can afford to have tied up in watches at any given moment.

that being said, if I could get a nice watch at a price I know is below market, I have no problem potentially making some money. But I’ve tried it enough times to know they don’t tend to fall in your lap often, especially these days.

 

It is an expensive hobby. A standard service on a Speedmaster will set you back $900. A new strap... $300+. A colorful NATO to accessorize... $200. A good single watch winder....$300+. A nice travel case $100-$300. That is all just for a single watch! A lot of us in this hobby don't actually make enough income to support having so many amazing "high-end" watches.... so you need to do what you can to offset those costs some times

 

Any watch is worth what somebody is willing to pay for it, assuming there is no misrepresentation and the buyer is "informed".
There are good deals to be had here and sometimes astute people take advantage of them. I sold a very nice ($10k) watch a while ago on here. It sat on the private watch sales page for over a year, accordingly I kept lowering the price.
The watch was eventualy sold to a dealer in a seamless transactionon on the OF platform
I later saw the watch on his website with a markup of almost 100% it was gone in a week or so.
Strangely after it had sold I had numerous inquiries about the watch, which was probably a bargain that the OF guys missed.
At the end of the day business is business, just do it honestly and everyone should be happy.