Finally a topic I feel very confident on - I've flipped many hundred guitars, and owned a bunch of "true" vintage ones. Fender Strats from 1957 - 1963, Gibson Les Pauls from 1957 - 1960 (though no "true" bursts, and probably not something I'm going to own unless I hit it big...), and tried a bunch of very, very expensive vintage guitars.
I've seen a bunch of articles the past years, in websites like WSJ, where they've started to ride the vintage guitars/amps "investment" wagon. I know the vintage community hates this notion - because for every Joe B that actually plays the instruments, there are probably 10 collectors that just stow away the instruments in safe storage.
Furthermore, you need to either be incredibly experienced yourself, or find some person that really, really knows their sh!t. Fakes can of course be a huge problem, especially if they're high-end replicas from over the years.
But IMO the biggest risk would be pieces that simply aren't original. There's quite a difference between an original burst, and some conversion burst. Both only one of them will yield extraordinary good ROI.
>But IMO the biggest risk would be pieces that simply aren't original. There's quite a difference between an original burst, and some conversion burst. Both only one of them will yield extraordinary good ROI.
This is what I was going to ask you: what about the modifications?
One quite famous LP is the one from Jimmy Page, and I think that when he bought it either it came with a wider neck, or he changed it after getting it - one thing is sure, it wasn't the original neck. Plus he had many other mods. This would devalue a lot the guitar no?
If that happens, and it belonged to a super star, then it will get the value as an item from the super star, and not the item itself?
It's just odd the perceived value of collectibles - some people value the story behind items, others love the story of the item itself, others do it because they think it's a good investment. But when it comes to guitars, despite the history of Gibson, I'm pretty sure any '59 LP that reached 2020 must have a hell of a story to tell, with mods or no mods - unless it stood in a former studio player attic getting dust.
Mods, on very old guitars, are almost unavoidable. That's why you see original parts going for thousands of dollars on Ebay etc.
Often times a pickups has been re-wound, pots have been swapped out, or what not. If you own a bone stock burst these days, you'll take it to luthiers that specialize on this kind of stuff - but back in the 70s, people didn't really give it much thought. Sure, they were valuable and collectible already back then, but not to the degree we see today - so people just modded / repaired them without much thought.
If some celeb has owned a guitar, then there's some inherent "bonus" on that - or at least, the value won't drop.
Now, if it's some regular Burst with no celeb history, that has new pickups and tuners - then that's probably going to take a good hit on the price.
I've seen a bunch of articles the past years, in websites like WSJ, where they've started to ride the vintage guitars/amps "investment" wagon. I know the vintage community hates this notion - because for every Joe B that actually plays the instruments, there are probably 10 collectors that just stow away the instruments in safe storage.
Furthermore, you need to either be incredibly experienced yourself, or find some person that really, really knows their sh!t. Fakes can of course be a huge problem, especially if they're high-end replicas from over the years.
But IMO the biggest risk would be pieces that simply aren't original. There's quite a difference between an original burst, and some conversion burst. Both only one of them will yield extraordinary good ROI.