If you sold everything...

2F/2F · Jul 21, 2010

Just something I found myself thinking about this evening, and I am interested to hear other people's answers as well: If you were to liquidate your entire collection of photography equipment, how much cash would you have in the end?

I'll have to think about my answer later, as it will require some serious counting, and I have to go to sleep now...but I am guessing that everything I have is probably worth about 6 to 8 grand on the used market. Hey! If I sell it all, I can get a top-of-the line small format digital camera without a lens, and it will be considered unusable by art directors and stock agencies in three to five years!!! Sounds like a deal to me!!! (I guess I can get the cheapo 50mm lens and use a library computer...and prints? Well, who actually does prints anyhow?)

Curt · Jul 21, 2010

I'd do it if and only if, that's abbreviated as iff isn't it, John L. Kelley's 1955 book General Topology, anyway or is that anyways, I would do it iff I could make enough money to buy an 11X14 Ebony Folding View Camera with a Cooke Triple convertible lens and at least a dozen film holders with cases and all the Ebony camera accessories. That's it, pretty simple right. Anyone want to buy an 8X10 Calumet C1 Magnesium View camera for three thousand dollars, that would be a start. I think I would need about twenty or thirty grand to seal the deal.

In the end we leave it all behind when we die. What's death like? It's like before I was born.

flatulent1 · Jul 21, 2010

Not much. Nearly all my gear is 35mm film gear from the '70s and '80s, wouldn't be worth my while auctioning, packing and shipping; far easier to donate. Several Minolta MC/MD bodies and lenses, some FTBn and AT-1, an EF, some folders, almost worthless.

About the only items I have of any monetary value would be a 5D, 1V, 1N-RS, a pair of L zooms, and a nearly mint New F-1. Also some L primes in FD mount. Maybe $5k. EOS 3, M645 w/5 lenses, F4 w/ a pair of Nikkor zooms might fetch another grand. I might get something for three mint T90s, but not enough to pay for the heartbreak.

It might buy me an M7 and a pair of lenses, but I could never do it.

Andrew K · Jul 21, 2010

I don't want to think about it...or I might be tempted to do it...

then again I could get a new Pentax 645 digital plus lenses.........or a M9??

No - I've sold 2 collections in the past (one because I just had too much, and one because I needed the money...) - what I have now is not excessive (well - it's not to me - my partner will have other ideas..), but I wish I had the ability to put some of the collection on display.....

I think I'll keep what I've got

Brian Legge · Jul 21, 2010

Lets see...

Probably around $2,500 if everything sold at full ebay value. That includes a medium format SLR, 3 TLRs, 2 folding cameras, a pair of Nikon bodies, a few strobes, a Leica and a handful of fixed lens rangefinders.

I've got some redundancy for sure but selling everything wouldn't buy me a M series Leica and a good fast lens. That is a bit eye opening; I've got redundancy right now but I cover a decent range of shooting options. Going to higher end equipment would require significant specialization.

Given the number of items though, selling it individually would be immensely painful.

darkosaric · Jul 21, 2010

Leica M6 + summicron 50, 2x nikon F3 with 4x 50mm, 1x 105mm/f2.5, 1x 200mm/f4, some toy cameras, polaroids, 2 enlargers from meopta, some cheap rangefinders. So beside leica - nothing too expensive. All is worth less than digital nikon D700 + 24-70 f2.8 + decent flesh

Steve Smith · Jul 21, 2010

About £7.39

Seriously though I could probably sell my RB67 kit for around £500 (I don't think I would sell it though). Everything else is on the cheap side of bargain.

Steve.

thisismyname09 · Jul 21, 2010

Probably just enough to buy a junky used car.

alexmacphee · Jul 21, 2010

I'm kinda planning to make sure my wife doesn't see this thread. I keep a spreadsheet with all my inventory in it for insurance purposes, and it has purchase price and replacement cost columns. The replacement cost (by tracking eBay and dealer prices) currently sums at just over £16k. I was relying on you guys to exceed this. My justifications for new kit are now looking exceedingly weak.

benjiboy · Jul 21, 2010

Certainly not enough to buy a top of the range full frame DSLR, but the reason I don't have one isn't because of the money, It's because I don't want one.

Rick A · Jul 21, 2010

What I've got isn't worth spit, except to you guys at Apug. When I die(or long before if my daughter has her way)my gear goes to the kids that still want it.

36cm2 · Jul 21, 2010

Posted wirelessly..

Just camera gear - about $3500. With darkroom included - about 5000. But I'd never sell my pop's Rolleiflex. That started it all.

Interesting thread 2F/2F.

Thomas Bertilsson · Jul 21, 2010

I think all of my equipment is worth about $2,000. But I have a very svelte collection, because I never believed gear would make me a better photographer, so I don't have a whole lot invested in it either.

- Thomas

mablo · Jul 21, 2010

I have an Excel file where I sum up all my acquisition costs, service costs and also give a rough estimate of the current market value for each item I own. I'm not a pro so I like to keep an eye on how much money I have tied up in my gear. My only Leica setup (one M-body, one Leica lens) is worth one third of all of my gear scanners included.

David Brown · Jul 21, 2010

2F/2F said:
If you were to liquidate your entire collection of photography equipment, how much cash would you have in the end?

I'll have to think about my answer later, as it will require some serious counting...

Well, that's just it. I can't even sit down and make a list of all that I own, much less its small value ... :confused:

removed account4 · Jul 21, 2010

i can't really put a number on it
but i know i could get enough to at least get a
brooks saddle for my raleigh roadster ...
other than that i don't really want to
think about it, seeing i have seller's remorse
when i sell stuff off.

nice thread 2F

Jeff Kubach · Jul 21, 2010

The camera 'stuff' I have is not worth much now, but it was many years ago. If I did sell it I wouldn't buy a digital camera.

Jeff

bdial · Jul 21, 2010

Like John, I don't want to think about it.
By the time I'd be ready to liquidate the cost of the process would probably exceed the value of the stuff.
Then, my luck would be that a day after the liquidation it would all be valuable collectables.

Got one of those conundrums already, don't need another.

Sirius Glass · Jul 21, 2010

2F/2F said:
Just something I found myself thinking about this evening, and I am interested to hear other people's answers as well: If you were to liquidate your entire collection of photography equipment, how much cash would you have in the end?

Are you out of your mind? This is like the questions of the ilk, "If both your parents were in the water drowning, whom would you save?". Neither, who would want to go through the rest of their life with their conscience bothering them.

A question for you, "If all your friends became celibate, would you become celibate?" Answer that one. :confused:

Probably $7,000 to $8,000 US maximum, which is not near the amount of enjoyment I get from it.

Steve

bblhed · Jul 21, 2010

Oddly the stuff that I have that I enjoy using the most is worth the least, all of that is worth maybe $100 total and that includes support gear for it.

Now my specialized gear, underwater, medium format, 3D, assorted 35mm cameras plus related equipment and lenses would come up to about $1000.

I am only allowed to have all the gear that I can fit into one camera case, and no more, my camera case is a footlocker size trunk with a few camera and film decals on it and has about 14 cameras in it. I was also informed that next time there will be stricter rules on the definition of "case".

Colin Corneau · Jul 21, 2010

Considering my last experience trying to sell something here, a headache.

ntenny · Jul 21, 2010

bblhed said:
Oddly the stuff that I have that I enjoy using the most is worth the least, all of that is worth maybe $100 total and that includes support gear for it.

My experience too. I don't have anything that's worth very much---a nice Rolleiflex, a 9x12 Bergheil in beautiful shape, a Contax IIIa kit, together worth a few thousand dollars, are the comparatively big-ticket items---but the main workhorses are scale-focussing MF folders and a Canon AE-1, worth next to nothing on the open market.

I wouldn't get rid of it, of course---apart from the enjoyment value, a lot of these cameras have family history. The Rolleiflex and Contax came from my dad, who seems to be gradually unloading his considerable pile of film gear onto me; the Bergheil was the snapshot camera(!) of my great-grandfather, who was a serious LF landscape guy but kept what he considered to be a small-format camera in the trunk of the car in case he came across something unexpected; the AE-1 belonged to my late father-in-law and has been documenting my wife's side of the family for something north of thirty years.

I've still got the Rolleicord that was my first "real" camera (before that I had a 110 camera when I was really little, but it's now lost to history, although my sister says she came across some of the prints recently to her considerable amusement). It's usable but needs a CLA; I'm thinking it's the camera I'll pass along to my son if he eventually takes an interest in having a good film camera of his own. We'll see what happens.

-NT

benjiboy · Jul 21, 2010

On further reflection the "Value" of my equipment is isn't what I can get for it, but what it does, It's a great thing to be happy with what you have, and I still have better equipment than I'm a photographer.

cfclark · Jul 21, 2010

Thomas Bertilsson said:
I think all of my equipment is worth about $2,000. But I have a very svelte collection, because I never believed gear would make me a better photographer, so I don't have a whole lot invested in it either.

- Thomas

I think I'd be in the neighborhood of what you have, and I'm trying to follow the same philosophy, despite seeing plenty of gear that I'd love to get my hands on (and at reasonable prices, too).

bblhed said:
I am only allowed to have all the gear that I can fit into one camera case, and no more, my camera case is a footlocker size trunk with a few camera and film decals on it and has about 14 cameras in it. I was also informed that next time there will be stricter rules on the definition of "case".

A surplus U-Haul truck can be a case if you really think about it.

Q.G. · Jul 21, 2010

benjiboy said:
On further reflection the "Value" of my equipment is isn't what I can get for it, but what it does, It's a great thing to be happy with what you have, and I still have better equipment than I'm a photographer.

I'm with you on that, Ben.
I get more value out of having and using the stuff than what it may fetch when i sell it all.

Consequently, i haven't the foggiest what it may all add up to.

If you sold everything...

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