doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Purdey(s) find of the year?

Here's a flip-side.
This happened to me about two months ago and has caused my wife to cease speaking with a neighbor. Our across-the-street neighbor is what i refer to as a pretty mid-50's lady, NYC barrio-type accent, with a streak of independence and vigor, who was married to a wonderful gentleman about 15 years her senior. They met at a local bar here after he'd retired from a career in Wall Street. I've taken him shooting revolvers in the past. Genuinely great guy. But he liked to drink often and passed away suddenly in January from liver cancer. Soon thereafter a "friend" started to move in, who remarkably looked like a younger thinner taller version of her deceased husband. I don't mention all this to slight her, but to give you some color! We've only spoken to her some dozen times and been invited over once for a Xmas party.

So about two months ago she visited and we expressed again our condolences. She complained that her deceased husband had left her in a bad situation and that she had had to do a lot of "cleaning up" from the mess. She asked if i could come over and look at "his guns." I agreed and walked over with her. As we walked up the stairs she told me she needed money and wanted to sell them quickly, and again that she needed the money and perhaps I would be interested in buying them.

I sit in her office bedroom and she presents me a Winchester 101 O/U skeet in case, exc++ condition. She then presents to me a beautiful pristine Colt Diamondback 38 spcl revolver. I honestly didn't know the values of these guns however knew for guessing they were somewhere around $1000 apiece but I was quickly realizing I was in an excellent position to buy them low if I wanted. Of course I wouldn't disrespect her deceased husband and her situation, and so my angel told me to do the right thing and I first said I didn't know the values and then thanked her for the offer to purchase them, but excused myself saying I would need to talk to my wife first (yeah, right!). I told her I would get her values in a day or so.

I checked all the usual internet auction sites etc. I wrote up a 2-page document sharing my honest findings of the spread and what was asked and what she may reasonably expect for a quick sale. I also told her she would likely lose profit by selling directly to a gun store or sending these to auction. I also told her about consigning. And about simply selling directly to an in-state resident to maximize the gain. I explained these all take time, whether listing the items on a website (which I offered to help her with) or to shop around for the best price, or to wait on a consignment sale or a pawn shop sale what have you, and especially a brick-mortar auction house. And I mentiond that she could also ask me again if I wished to buy them in that I would check with my wife and give her an offer.

I placed the letter in her mailbox, fully expecting she would contact me to thank me for my help and honesty and IMPORTANTLY I felt she might ask me if I wanted to buy them for a reasonable price. I was prepared to pay 80% of their "value" (as deemed by the average gunbroker site or sumsuch valuation to my best ability...).

I never heard back from her. Until when my wife stopped her in the street one day driving by to chat, she saw me, and only out of embarrassment then did she thank me for the letter.

We saw her about two weeks ago and I asked what happened to the guns? She told me she consigned the guns to (what I know of as one of the most expensive) gun store in the tri-county area! I was shocked a little - felt like she used my letter to shop the best price (which was the intent right?)

In this situation, my wife and I both felt I was taken a little advantage of to do all the homework to maximize her profit. It was obvious she did not need the money right away since those guns are going to sit for a very long time in that store's shelves. On the other hand i did do my duty and helped her, but again i can't help but feel used a little for not having been asked to buy them again. If she had appeared to have been cosmetically more loving of her deceased husband when he was around and had spoken more well of him, I probably would have cheered her for trying to get the very best top dollar price for the guns. I guess in the shadows of my mind I believed I might have yet still been able to have gotten a fair deal on some nice guns, but lost out to the profit-motive in all of us. It's a conflicting thought!