IDK, maybe I am being ridiculous in my thinking, but I honestly would not pay over 45.00 for an old LifeLike N scale engine. Am I wrong in my thinking? I have seen eBay prices jump way up on some of these old Lifelike trains, and many that are listed state they are untested. Anything in the upper 80.00 and over mark I just pass right by the listings without a second thought. I recently purchased a brand-new Kato EMD FP7A DCC ready for 79.00 on Amazon. I have no problem tearing down a Lifelike unit that needs work, but not at the prices I am seeing now. IMO this listing and other like it are a joke. N Scale Life-Like GP18 Diesel Engine Loco Train No.7121 Nickel Plate Road #709 | eBay Any thoughts on this?
That's a hard call and sort of depends on your definition of "old LL engine" . A lot of old LL engines are every bit as good as new engines from Atlas......in fact, Atlas bought out LifeLike from Walther's and the current FA/FB and RS2s that Atlas is selling are LL designs. Many LL engines are DCC ready. I have put drop in boards in GP18/20s and RS2s and DCC sound boards into C-liners, and the LL/Walthers SW1200s also are DCC ready. ALL the LLs I have are great runners. But a lot of old LLs aren't DCC ready........they run well, but aren't what would be considered DCC friendly. The one you posted is an old design, easily identified by the open pilots, so $120 is a bit steep, but you have to remember that a lot of people selling on ebay aren't "model RR knowledgable" and they just look and find something similar to what they are trying to sell, and that's the price they use. So they may find a Centralia passenger car, and use that price for the old Bachmann car they have.
I agree. The locomotive you link to has been posted on eBay for 7-1/2 months without a change in price. It's clearly overpriced. The Seller also has this early 1970's Minitrix gem posted at $72.99 plus Shipping.
I bought a lot of Life-Likes back in 2019-2020 in the $20 to $70 range and with how much things have gone up since COVID I'd say they probably would be $30 to $100 now. I was looking for engines that fit UP's roster from mid 40's to mid 70's so not necessarily ones that run well although most I tested on DC did run well. Most are sitting waiting on me to convert them to DCC. I paid I think $105 each for an Erie Built A & B (they had an original retail price of $160 for the pair). Paid that as they are hard to fine and probably much more than that now if you can find them and they felled a roster need. So in my case looking for very specific needs I realized I might be paying more than if I was looking for good running engines and not trying to fill a roster. Sumner
Hi Sumner, I also purchased a bunch of Lifelike locos back in early 2000, some I purchased as low as 25.00, not all were great runners, but they were all fixable and range from good runner to excellent runners. I have a few I will be converting to DCC. I understand paying higher prices for rare units, but most of the eBay listing are common finds. Are the units you purchased Proto 2000?
Yes, many of these folks haven't a clue. I purchased a bunch of Lifelike back in early 2000 and I am glad I did so. I got them all on the cheap. Proto 2000 will fetch a higher price and the rare units will always sell higher, but eBay is loaded with common variety Lifelike selling at much too high a price. I don't mind buying poor running Lifelike units, as I like to fix them, but I will not pay over 45.00 for an untested unit. As a seller on eBay, I would never list an untested item at a premium price, but that's just me.
As I have noted elsewhere, previously multiple times, it just looks bad and for new folks scares them away from our hobby. There is far too much overpriced stuff. A lot of which is simply sucker fishing attempts.
Not sure without researching what I got. Proto or non-Proto or good runner vs. poor runner is second to my wanting to get anything that I can find that UP had during my time period. To do that I have Bachmann, Con-Cor, Kato, Atlas, Atlas/Rivarossi, Intermountain, Walthers/Life-Like, Minitrix, scratch-built shells and resin/3D printed shells. Looks like I have 30 total Life-Likes and probably the average price back then was around $40 doing a quick look of the roster. A number of the ones that I have duplicates of I'll probably sell at some point and a number probably won't be run much but want them as they fill in a roster need for what UP had at my time period and no one else makes them. I'm glad I was able to get about everything that was commercially available for my needs before COVID. I still pick up an occasional loco (ones I'm addicted to ) but only if the price is what I'm comfortable with. Trying to get as much as you can or pay as little as possible is only human nature it seems Sumner
Before I purchase any N-Scale engines, I ALWAYS look at the SPOOKSHOW review of said engine. Mark tells it like it is, NO pulled punches. HONEST reviews. PERIOD. This is applied to any engine I purchase, FeeBay, NScaleYardSale, AMAZON! [NEVER[Too many good local Hobby Shops near me}] If you want to find GOOD Hobby Shops, mail order or walk-in, pick up a copy of Model Railroader Magazine. There 100's of places looking for your business. By the way: http://www.spookshow.net/index.html
I recently sold a number of the late 90's/early 2000 era Life Like locos (E8's, PA's, FA's, GP-18) here and on the NScale Yard sale forum. All were sold for between $35 and $45. The $35 locos had the original Rapido couplers and the $45 locos were converted to Micro Trains. Some of us understand what a fair price is and we're not out to rip off fellow modelers. I prefer not to sell on eBay because many are looking to buy cheap and resell at ridiculous prices. If I put something on eBay, it will be as a buy now/make an offer where the price is listed a little over what I'm looking to get so there is room to bargain.
I've noticed a trend, that is most likely caused by the manufacturers preorder/limited run policy. Stuff is selling for 2X (or more) what the list price was. This started with Walthers stopping production on a lot of their Cornerstone kits........suddenly kits that were originally $50 were suddenly showing up for $200-300. I've seen quite a few Fox Valley Hiawatha sets listed at $900 to 1200. Can't get a new one, so if you want one, you gotta pay the price. Virtually EVERYTHING is becoming a collector item since if you didn't preorder one, you aren't going to get one unless you shop on the secondary market. Even some of the older stuff is at premium prices, like the Atlas 94 ft tank cars......I've seen those going for over $100. I have one in my drawer that has an original $5 price tag on the box.
The 'buy it now or else' policy of manufacturers is causing this hobby all kinds of grief. From turning people away due to ever increasing secondary market costs, to the the irritation of needing to scramble financially and somehow pre-order, or never have it. A hobby cannot grow with limited products. It's a self-stifling concept, doomed to fail. The costs of actually necessary goods keeps on going up, (food, clothing, shelter, healthcare...), limiting funds for participation for too many, or even ending it. Then there is the CONSTANT pre-order and wait forever/vaporware situation. Those who are senior citizens, a good sized chunk of the market, cannot sit forever. But apparently we are all supposed to just quietly, meekly shut up and wait. I dearly miss those days of being able to walk in to a nearby shop, get what I needed, (and even make an impulse buy, as it was right there in front of me, AVAILABLE), then going home and enjoying it.
Amen to that, brother! One could also go and actually see a real person to get help or complain about a defective product. They used to call that customer service. Brick and mortar forever!
A well stated post @BoxcabE50! I'm not clairvoyant, so have never pre-ordered a product. I have no idea what my finances will look like when it finally appears a year or more later and in the case of a locomotive, have no idea how well it might run.
I realize that this isn't a "massive demand" thing, but you would think the manufacturers would watch this sort of stuff. The tooling is already there, so if you see your past product selling for 4 times what you originally sold it for on a regular basis, why wouldn't you do another run of the product. You could sell it for twice the original price, and the customers would be happy ( well.......maybe not happy) to buy it because it's half the price they'd pay to buy one from the old run.
Not just to re-run an item, but to do so in a very timely fashion. Not this wait for years "pre-order" garbage, for us to guarantee them sales and profits.
My $0.02 worth. From what I have seen, most pre-orders are a year or more out. Questions come in to mind. Like what others have posted; what if I find the same thing somewhere else? What will my bank account look like then? Ya, I keep a minimum balance but there are times. Also have heard when you cancel something, there could be a card hit just for that. So, I do not pre-order. Just think, if nobody pre-orders do you think that they will go out of business? Geesh, if it is over a year, why not look into building ( scratch ) your own. It is not an insurmountable task. Think of the joy you would get just telling folks ... I built that! I can see manufactures not wanting to do a 'one of' and would wait until many units were requested. Changing tooling is time consuming and a pain. If it were me, I would do that 1st run probably at double what I thought would be wanted. If it does not sell as expected there always is the discounted price lane which in most cases still meets/beats costs and you keep your customers happy. Space is probably at a minimum, but how much space does it take to store 500 ( or more ) additional units? Limited Run is pretty much a marketing tool which makes your brain think - 'I gotta have it', or the latest and greatest now days 'Due to supply chain problems, this widget could going out of production' or the like. Ya... Later
One thing to keep in mind when comparing those old prices to today's Ebay prices is inflation. For instance I like N Scale Con-Cor U50's and have some of the original 1974's and the later 1998 Rail Baron's. The 74's sold retail at $50 which would be $320 in 2023 dollars. The '98's sold retail for $120 (weren't much different than the '74's, mainly a 5-pole vs. a 5-pole skew-wound motor) and would be $220 in 2023 dollars The most I've paid for either was $150 in '21 for a Rail Barron and $64 in '23 for the older model. There have been a bunch listed lately at $199 'buy it now' that haven't sold but keep getting relisted. The UP U50's go for more and some other items like the Con-Cor 4500 GTEL's (same frame different body) and the same two versions go for more but the most I've paid for one was $150 and the least was $105. The majority of eBay engines I've bought look like they were never run so I'm getting them for less than I would of paid back then and some of the models that are not sought after as much as the ones above I got for a lot less in today's dollars. This also shows that the price of new engines have actually come down in price in a lot of cases compared to 1970's to 1990's dollars. I do realize that a number of us older guys, me being one, are on a fixed income now and have less coming in based on the value of today's dollar vs. what we were making in the '70's through the '90's. That can for sure make a difference . Sumner
Yes, inflation is a factor as far as price goes, but the real driving factor is availability. If you can't get it, you have to pay the market price. The high pricing is above inflation increases and extends to items that are less than a year old. There are still good buys out there though........I picked up one of the Hoawatha sets I mentioned earlier for $350, which included 2 extra coaches. I think that's higher than what my original set cost, but compared to the $900-1200 I frequently see, it was a screaming deal. Another of my favorites is the old Kato Milwaukee Road passenger sets in the UP paint. They are frequently $400 for the 4 car set and $600 for the 6 car.......That's $100 per car. I'm not aware of anyone charging that much for new releases........and the Kato cars are totally incorrect. At that price I could buy one of the new Kato Olympian Hiawatha sets (which are correct) and have someone paint them. But the Kato sets are there, and you can buy them and have a ready to run train in that paint scheme, and the sets always seem to sell. I'm personally waiting for Kato to release that paint scheme on the current ( correct) cars.........I can't imagine them not doing it. They paid a lot of money to tool those cars up, and they are Milwaukee specific, so they can't use them for anything else. (actually they already released some of the cars in road names that bought some of the Milw cars) Which brings up the preorder thing............if it's something I HAVE TO HAVE, I will preorder, but I'm very selective about where I preorder from. My prefered location is online (I no longer have a local store) and takes my CC info, and charges me $.01 up front. I then have a deduction in our checking account ledger that says "train stash" so the full amount disappears but it's still there if needed. Never had to at this point. That way even if several preordered items all show up at once I'm covered.
