to expect to pay less for something than when it was purchased 15 (!) years ago?

[NoMoreLimbo]

So, I am looking to buy a second hand bed frame. The owner claim they paid £1,500 for it when they bought it 15 years ago.

It is a beautiful wrought iron super king sized frame. BUT surely to be expected to pay £1,500 today is a tad outrageous?

What would you think was a fair price? It is in good nick and very pretty. I thought it was pretty standard to pay at least 30% less

It’s only worth what someone is willing to pay.

How much is something similar to buy brand new? I’m sure if it was £1500 at the start of the last decade, you’d be paying a heck of a lot more today.

There’s presumably something special about this bed (or else you’d be buying a new bed in IKEA like everyone else) - so yeah, it may well be a fair price for it.

Have you looked into how much it would cost to buy something like that new today? Might turn out that for what it is £1,500 is reasonable second hand because to buy a brand new one today would be more.

I have a similar bedframe of a similar age/cost.

No way would I expect anyone to pay that much for it second hand. For that price, why wouldn't they buy a new one, with a guarantee and delivery (and probably free disposal of their old bed)?!

I would expect to sell it for about £100 if I was selling, if that. Many reasons:

because it's used and has a few tiny dings and nicks

because I would want the extra space in my house

because someone would have to disassemble and move and reassemble it (and probably hire a van to do so)

because it would be hard to find any local buyer who wanted it at all at the exact same time I wanted to sell it.

Long story short: I think he's having you on.

In a sense they are offering it for less than they paid for it because of inflation - eg if inflation was a steady 2% each year for 15 years then they paid the equivalent of just over £2k.

But I agree with others, it's worth what someone will pay for it, so they are not unreasonable to ask that for it. You can either buy it or buy one elsewhere.

Depends on the 'lifespan' of the object I guess...electronic equipment? YWNBU. Houses / van Gogh paintings etc, less so .

A well-made bed frame would last a long time, so maybe they're not BU to want a lot for it, but then again if they need to sell they need to find a price someone is willing to pay.

If it's second hand but you can buy the equivalent new I would expect to pay less than half the original cost.

If it is unique and unavailable I would expect to possibly pay more than the purchase price.

It is 15 years old. It is a bed frame.

If I really liked it I would stretch to £200 max.

By the way, I just googled the superking metal bedframes available these days from the same posh supplier I got it from 14 years ago.

They're still the same price as they were then. So I'm not sure that "bedframe inflation" is necessarily a thing.

sounds a bit of a cf to me tbh, unless it is unique and gold plated, that is way too much i would look else where and buy something equally special, brand new and probably cheaper.

Yeh that’s nuts. You can get a new one for that.

Go elsewhere, this person has unrealistic expectations and that's their prerogative

You can buy a brand new bespoke wrought iron bed for less. Remember you still have to cost in a new mattress.

Unless an item was a remarkable antique and/or had a lot of craftsmanship in it, no way is it worth this much. I have a rule of thumb re selling my own used goods for money on ebay, which is "halve the purchase price (no matter how long ago it was) and take a bit off". That's if it's in excellent condition. If there are dints and wear visible on the item, then even more comes off.

I guess it's supply and demand, if there were lots of other similar beds available you would just go buy one of them at a better price.

It's at least 1000 overpriced. You can buy them new for under £500.

£1000*

You aren’t being unreasonable at all! You can buy new and get the benefit of a guarantee with a budget lower than that.

We bought a wrought iron bed frame from this company a couple of years ago. It’s amazing! So sturdy! They market them at super obese people AND they come with a lifetime guarantee for around £800 for a super king.

www.reinforcedbeds.co.uk/collections/reinforced-wrought-iron-beds

My husband and I are average weight but we needed something super strong having broken a couple already 🙊

I told the sales dude this (as a politely as possible) because I wanted to know if the a) the guarantee covered breakages that occurred due to non-sleeping activities and b) how much noise they make. He was very gracious and made some recommendations.

I absolutely love our bed.

I would be paying a fraction of the original cost for a 15 year old bedframe. Probably about £100-150.

I have sold a decent but ten year old bed frame myself as we wanted something different and to be honest I was more interested in somebody taking it away than in what they paid for it.

No more than 10% of the original price is the rule of thumb I believe, at least in the case of things like bed frames, it's different for technology.

We bought our beautiful restored Victorian iron bed frame from here.

wessexbeds.co.uk/12-restored-beds

Prices look exactly the same as when we bought ours 15 odd years ago, so maybe it's just what it's worth?

I'm surprised you're even contemplating it. Unless it's a very rare bed frame with particularly special properties (in which case maybe it is worth the price) why don't you just buy a new one or buy a second hand one elsewhere?

eBay and local auctions are your friends - I paid £40 for an iron bed frame about 7 years ago and it's still absolutely fine. Same with a lot of furniture..... especially in local auctions, it's nuts how little you can pick really high quality stuff for.

Fair price? £150-£200 if you really like it, any more and you can probably find something the same quality somewhere else.

Unless it's an antique or (maybe) made by a well known designer, then of course it's worth less. It has had 15 years of use! If a new bed frame costs the same, then buy that.

This is the MOST expensive 'pre-owned' wrought iron super king bed frame on ebay. It's only £499!

www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Golden-Iron-Metal-Super-King-Size-Bed-Frame-6ft-Superking-USED-IN-GOOD-CONDITION/273580819053?hash=item3fb2b0026d:g:ccwAAOSwQFNb4IHq:rk:1:pf:0