“What’s This Worth?” Thread

[mmmguitar]

Reverb published a spotlight article on the Fly, yesterday. It has some cool quotes from Ken. We’ll see if this does anything to move the storefront’s twenty eight Flys and twenty five NiteFlys, or inspire more owners to throw theirs onto Reverb’s congested chopping block.

Update: A day later, the Koa listings on Reverb are gone. Somebody appears to have purchased the $27,400 listing (P0808175 13 of 25).The $26,995 listing (P0804291 6 of 25) is merely “ended.” Update: Rob relisted it for $23,495 on the 17th. I pray letting it go for such a sharply discounted price doesn't cause him any undue financial hardship.

The $16,250 listing (serial withheld by seller, but shared as “P0908xxx”) was marked “unavailable.” As was the $16,495 eBay listing (P0807006 7 of 25) by our guy banned from Reverb. Update: The $16,250 Reverb listing was republished on July 21st, lowered to $12,249 on the 25th, then down to $10,797 on August 8th.

Being as at least two of those hot potato listings were by speculators responsible for the ‘20-‘22 bubble, let’s see what some of these Koa Supremes resold for in previous years:

Four years ago, P0808234 (17 of 25) was mildly flipped for $5,000 after having been bought for $4,500.

A Koa Fly “Standard” (no piezo) was listed for $2,750, seven years ago. A year later, it was resold at a loss for $2,350.

Serial P1002010 (25 of 25) was signed by Adrian Belew and sold by Wildwood Guitars.

[jb63]

https://loviesguitars.com/product/parke ... urst-ohsc/

that's what its worth, apparently, if you don't play it and wait.

[mmmguitar]

Less than an hour after jb63 posted the Tobacco Supreme, the listing appeared to have been cloned by a Reverb scammer. They then cloned a listing for a '07 snakeskin Mojo from the same site..

I suppose all we can do is caution people to do their diligence when dealing with zero-feedback sellers and "too good to be true" prices on Reverb/eBay/etc.

If you're considering pouncing on a deal, check recent sales to be sure you're not being baited with a clone listing.

[vjmanzo]

Reverb published a spotlight article on the Fly, yesterday.

It’s strange that Reverb posted a new article on Flys at the same time that their site is beginning to have a problem with scam listings for Flys.

[tronathan]

And at that moment a clean refined fly with all the fixings appeared on reverb for under $1200, from an unknown seller out of Switzerland, and disappeared within 5 minutes. Wtf? Was it a scam that got flagged, or someone’s miracle? It seems that it’s not really possible to rip someone off via reverb if you don’t get paid until the buyer receives and gives the thumbs up…

[mmmguitar]

Listing referenced above.

Wow, only $23 to ship from Switzerland. They must save postage sledding that Fly down the Matterhorn.


And here's the Tobacco Supreme Reverb listing for Lovie's that was cloned - Suggesting the store being highlighted here immediately prior to the cloning was just a coincidence (easier for a scammer to clone a pre-existing Reverb listing 1:1).


In perusing the recent listings, you'll find a few seller accounts disabled/banned:
https://reverb.com/marketplace?query=pa ... _sold=true

So...we have another reason to ignore Reverb, and another reason to recommend trading gear here, instead.

In more mundane news, we also had a rare 7 string MaxxFly pop up and sell for $4,100.

And...our $150 backplate seller is back with a $10 shipping charge tacked on; so his margins won't have to dip below 1,000%. He also sold a set of pre-refined guts and knobs for $1,085. Somehow, I'm not expecting the donor '96 Deluxe the chop shop harvested all that from to be sold with a corresponding $1,085 discount.

Hmmm...

[mmmguitar]

I was filling out the report form for this clone listing of an '05 Deluxe in Ice Blue Burst (Previously listed in Cambridgeshire) when the listing ended. I'm hoping it was flagged, rather than sold.

We have an English listing for my white whale, the Adrian Belew model (serial P0808330 but finished March 2nd 2009). Alas, the seller has the listing set up so that it's "unavailable to ship" to US buyers (VJ had to alert me to it). The final sale amount would be north of $10,000.

In addition to exhibiting the leaning posts issue, someone has actually devalued the guitar by drilling for an S1/S2 program selection switch far enough from the other controls to remind me of Lemmy's facial moles. And I can't help but laugh at the passive-aggressiveness Adrian showed in signing the spare backplate twice.

[Jupiter]

https://www.ebay.com/itm/185992914233?m ... name=11021
https://www.ebay.com/itm/266338868728? ... name=11021

I know I am getting blind, but I am pretty sure I see the same guitar under two different auctions from two different sellers.

[mmmguitar]

The cloned Japanese listings on eBay have been a trend for years. What complicates matters is the common practice in which a single guitar may indeed legitimately be on consignment through a network of franchised storefronts for the sake of increasing visibility (and making the commission earned for the parent company more likely); which is what gives scammers room to keep doing this.

Speaking from experience, the only upside is that the legitimate Japanese eBay storefronts often have a franchise webstore linked off their eBay page whereupon you can both confirm the authenticity of the listing and bypass eBay entirely to purchase the guitar directly from Ishibashi, TCGakki, Ikebe Gakki, etc. for a better price.

Back to the clone listing trend: the fraudulent seller of this purported '95 Deluxe in the desirable pearl white color fooled a buyer with an increased asking price. The other two obvious signs of a fradulent/clone listing (new seller with zero feedback) were there.

We also have a German Reverb seller out-Rob-ing Rob with his $23,414.96 Butternut Fly listing. "What makes it worth $23,414.96", you ask? That's your job to answer, Moneybags!

As of July 27th, we have a Reverb listing for a natural '05 Mojo (3370707MM) the seller has ripped most of the components out of and, at $2,800, deliberately priced several hundred above competing intact specimens on the same site. What I found noteworthy was that he considers being "pretty sure" he has the Powerchip and on/off/on switch "somewhere" to be a selling point, while still somehow not as enticing as including the "coveted Hangar Helper" (bullwinkle). Being a high-priced beater/parts listing, I'm curious to see how many offers it receives. Update: Asking price dropped to $2,500 as of August 7th.

[sindrist]

Finally there is an explanation on how those new reverb scams work, posted by a member in the facebook group.

In the first five minutes of this video, the rest of the video being babble:
https://youtu.be/r17391B0cs4

[mmmguitar]

As of its resolution a few minutes ago, I can finally share that I just had a Reverb scam refund processed, myself:

The short of it is that the swindler was ready to publish their clone of a live listing the moment it sold; and I fell for what a second look would have told me was obvious bait (it may as well have been Bugs Bunny in disguise). But I had already clicked "Buy"; so I knew I'd have to spend the following days going through the motions. In my case, my using the 0% APR financing option offered by PayPal at checkout meant that the process lasted from July 15th to August 1st. I expect it would have resolved sooner, had PayPal not been congested with identical claims amidst this ongoing Reverb scamdemic.

July 15: I initiated the Reverb refund request and filled out the "report seller" box with a link to the listing which had been cloned.

July 16: Reverb support informed me that they had banned the seller's account, and that I would need to open a transaction dispute in PayPal. The rep assured me that they would be regularly messaging me while following the developments of the Paypal dispute. And indeed, they did.

Upon opening the PayPal dispute with the info I had at the time, PayPal generated an "estimated resolution date" of August 5th; with no option to submit additional info.

July 20: The sole communication I received from the "seller" was when they submitted fraudulent shipping confirmation to PayPal. No reply field or other option to respond was generated. The tracking info showed the processed parcel as weighing much less than a guitar, having been shipped from within my own city, and delivered to my home address within the span of a few hours, four days after the PayPal dispute had been opened. The only mail delivery I had received that day consisted of a generic junk mail flyer with no UPS processing label.

Aug 1: PayPal finally got around to reviewing the case (despite having initially quoted five days for case review); and requested I submit any additional, pertinent info I had. This was a mere formality: For as soon as I submitted my multi-paragraph, Matlock-style closing argument, the dispute was ruled in my favor. I received automatically generated emails from Paypal and Reverb and, though Reverb's support department ultimately never had to do anything, several reps had been emailing me the expected platitudes while we all waited on PayPal, then emailed me again upon the resolution to congratulate me and apologize for the inconvenience.

Though completely bloodless, in my case (it wasn't even my own money tied up in this), I understand others will find the experience more stressful; and I'm only sharing my own as pretense to say that I'm happy to answer any questions from those finding themselves inconvenienced in the same way - It seems these scammers have caught on to how stupid we Parker fans are.

[ubik55]

As of its resolution a few minutes ago, I can finally share that I just had a Reverb scam refund processed, myself:

The short of it is that the swindler was ready to publish their clone of a live listing the moment it sold; and I fell for what a second look would have told me was obvious bait (it may as well have been Bugs Bunny in disguise). But I had already clicked "Buy"; so I knew I'd have to spend the following days going through the motions. In my case, my using the 0% APR financing option offered by PayPal at checkout meant that the process lasted from July 15th to August 1st. I expect it would have resolved sooner, had PayPal not been congested with identical claims amidst this ongoing Reverb scamdemic.

July 15: I initiated the Reverb refund request and filled out the "report seller" box with a link to the listing which had been cloned.

July 16: Reverb support informed me that they had banned the seller's account, and that I would need to open a transaction dispute in PayPal. The rep assured me that they would be regularly messaging me while following the developments of the Paypal dispute. And indeed, they did.

Upon opening the PayPal dispute with the info I had at the time, PayPal generated an "estimated resolution date" of August 5th; with no option to submit additional info.

July 20: The sole communication I received from the "seller" was when they submitted fraudulent shipping confirmation to PayPal. No reply field or other option to respond was generated. The tracking info showed the processed parcel as weighing much less than a guitar, having been shipped from within my own city, and delivered to my home address within the span of a few hours, four days after the PayPal dispute had been opened. The only mail delivery I had received that day consisted of a generic junk mail flyer with no UPS processing label.

Aug 1: PayPal finally got around to reviewing the case (despite having initially quoted five days for case review); and requested I submit any additional, pertinent info I had. This was a mere formality: For as soon as I submitted my multi-paragraph, Matlock-style closing argument, the dispute was ruled in my favor. I received automatically generated emails from Paypal and Reverb and, though Reverb's support department ultimately never had to do anything, several reps had been emailing me the expected platitudes while we all waited on PayPal, then emailed me again upon the resolution to congratulate me and apologize for the inconvenience.

Though completely bloodless, in my case (it wasn't even my own money tied up in this), I understand others will find the experience more stressful; and I'm only sharing my own as pretense to say that I'm happy to answer any questions from those finding themselves inconvenienced in the same way - It seems these scammers have caught on to how stupid we Parker fans are.

Wow that's quite an ordeal to have gone through! That's hilarious that they tried to trick you with a fake return, the gall of these people!

I have a short funny story about a weird Reverb experience that I had. About 8 months ago if any of you remember on Reverb there was a Mahogany finish 90s era Fly Classic listed by a seller living in Indonesia. I ended up purchasing the guitar after he accepted a pretty fair offer from me. I paid and exchanged a few messages with the seller. He had okay english speaking abilities, not great, but we could communicate and he seemed legit. (he had 2 positive feedback ratings)

Well a few hours later the guy messages me and says he "needs my ID Card" because "CKN Cargo Expedition" needs it. I responded telling him I've bought internationally before and have never been asked such a thing, and refused. He then said it would be impossible to ship until I gave him a copy of my ID Card. I had already been watching Trogly on youtube for a few years at this point, so yea my base state is usually to be a bit paranoid/skeptical. So after thinking about it for a bit I basically responded and said I wanted to cancel the transaction and get a refund.

After a bit of a wait, he responded and basically said "fine i will refund" which he did, I got my money, but then he left a negative feedback on my account. I was pretty upset, so I submitted a support ticket to hopefully get the negative feedback removed and to just warn the Reverb staff that this guy was going around asking for copies of customer's ID Cards. I thought he was a scammer of some kind. The first Reverb employee that answered my support ticket was very polite and immediately removed the negative feedback, and assure me they would "look into the matter."

The next day I got a second message from a different Reverb employee who informed me that they looked into it and that apparently Indonesia's postal service actually does in fact require additional info from international receipients when dealing with shipping large or expensive items. They did admit though that the seller wasn't communicating as well as he could have, really he just needed either my social security number or birthdate (I can't remember exactly) and didn't actually need a picture of my ID Card like he had implied when messaging me the day before.

So yeah basically it was a legit Fly Classic listing, and someone else immediately bought it, so I missed out and had to learn a hard lesson. So yea if buying from Indonesia, expect the seller to ask weird questions I guess. It doesn't mean it's a scam!

[Gregsaab]

I’ve recently grown a keen interest in Abasi Concept guitars, particularly the emi 6. I am considering selling a few items to cover the fairly hefty cost, one of which is my Mojo.

Out of guilt, I listed this same guitar on Reverb last year after picking up my second Deluxe. When it sold, however, I couldn’t part with it and sent the buyer a $100 apology .

I’m curious what you guys would consider a fair price for the Mojo.

I would rate it between very good and excellent: there are a few paint flakes along the fretboard, a tiny chip on the back of the guitar, and it is missing the truss rod cover (think I lost it during a move). As posted elsewhere on this forum, I did have the fretboard repaired as it exhibited the delaminating fretboard issue. Patrick from iGuitarWorkshop did an amazing job correcting the issue - it has been rock solid. He put a seal on the paint flakes, as well.

Also, there had been a 1mm crack in the upper horn (front only) that I had corrected 7 years ago. The work was excellent, but if you look closely, you can detect the seam, but you definitely can not feel it.

The main reason that I am considering selling the Mojo to partially fund the emi is that I typically play sitting and try to have the guitar in an upright, classical-style position. Most electrics aren’t ideal for that given jack placement (especially because I solely play with a wireless transmitter).

Anyway, here is the listing - I accepted an offer for $2350 10 months ago, but, again, I am curious what this community deems a fair price for this example. Here is the original listing: https://reverb.com/item/62012930-parker ... t=62012930

[mmmguitar]

I accepted an offer for $2350 10 months ago

That seems plenty fair to me, given how transparent you are about the repairs and everything now working as it should. Just be warned that it seems to be more of a buyer's market, at the moment; with lots of competing listings sitting. I listed a few of my non-Parkers last week, just so I'd feel better in the event I talk myself into buying that Belew on Reverb. Given the lack of attention they've gotten, however, I won't be surprised if they sit all month (despite being priced "to move" when compared to recently sold examples).


As of the 9th, we have a '95 Italian Plum Deluxe (serial 269135BP) being flipped for $5,250 after the seller purchased it in April for $2,875.

We also have as Japanese retailer selling this '05 Deluxe in Silver with a delaminating fingerboard (serial 3250405BP) for $2,317.50

[n1netyn1ne]

Hello!

I've looked through this thread and it looks like it is just looking at listings on eBay and Reverb. Is this where I could get a rough idea of what my guitar is worth? Or do I just post it on Reverb for an absurd price and look at offers?

2010 RF522 in natural mahogany, which has more of a hand rubbed oil finish, i posted pictures on another post. I believe it was the first concept of it produced. Made in USA, radial maple neck, ebony board, sperzel locking tuners, Fishman piezos, came with Jazz/JB which I swapped out but can be put back, OHSC, warranty card, original wrenches and trem arm, absolutely never any damage, I'm pretty sure I'm only the second owner since I purchased it in 2012, has been Plek'ed years ago and remains playing perfectly like butter. Serial# 1011062.

[Patzag]

I just post it on Reverb for an absurd price and look at offers?

Lots of people do this and it really inflated prices for a while. I think these days it's a little more sedate.

What do you want for it? Add fees and taxes and post it on reverb or ebay.
Post here also in the classified area.

No one here can tell you how much it will sell for.

[mmmguitar]

I've looked through this thread and it looks like it is just looking at listings on eBay and Reverb.

Very apt (and kind of you to omit all the obvious instances of me ranting like an old grouch). I originally made this thread to contain arguments concerning "fair" prices which were derailing other threads, and I need to go through and categorize the pertinent listing details within the original post; so people can reference Parker SKUs without having to comb through the thread as you did.

The "NiteFly Radial"/RF522 sold new for $2,299 MAP (google turns up old online retailer listings). They're not very common finds on the usual reseller sites; with the few Reverb and messageboard listings I found showing owners asking between $1,700 and $1,900 for them. This TalkBass Classified from 2011 is an outlier in which the owner ended up asking only $1,000 for it. Hope this helps.

[n1netyn1ne]

Lol that is the one i bought all the way back when.

And yes, posting a listing with a price "that I'm looking for" is always a choice, but i wanted to ask here so I'm not contributing to the problem of inflating the price, as well as getting value from the expertise of those who see these guitars frequently.

Thanks for the info mmmguitar. And it is weird that after your post i found more reverb listings from google search than when i searched in reverb. I'll probably end up keeping it and putting p-rails or something in it for a more varied sound.

[jb63]

https://www.gbase.com/gear/parker-fly-c ... y-mahogany

[mmmguitar]

^Google's cached page snapshot shows a $2,500 asking price prior to being sold. 2000 Fly Classic in Transparent Cherry, serial 178020BMH.

I'll probably end up keeping it and putting p-rails or something in it for a more varied sound.

Yeah! I love a set of P Rails with triple shot rings (the absence of mounting rings is why I don't have a Fly with them). I'm wanting to try a set of Fluence McRocklins to see how their three switching options measure up.