THE GOVERNMENT SAYS THE RECESSION IS OVER

Economy is on the mend- Prices are Up and Down.  What am I saying? 

The government says the recession is over and we’re on the mend financially.  Well let’s see if I can agree.

I watched the Barrett-Jackson Collector Car Auction from Las Vegas the end of last week and even though they sold a significant number of cars that amounted to more then $5,000,000 in sales, the selling prices on several significant vehicles that went across the block were very soft in my opinion.  I saw  a Cobra (first generation 289 car) sell for $400,000, this car would have most probably  broached a million dollars 2 or 3 years ago. I watched cars on the opening night of the auction sell at prices that amounted to one half of what they would have been 2 years ago (I know night one is always a little soft and good deals can be made, but this one was mind boggling to me).  Likewise, there were soft returns for charity sales during the event.  Collector/investors just don’t seem to have the amount of disposable income they are use to.  Can you say decimated portfolios?

The collector car market is still active, but prices are soft, no matter what event promoters would have you believe.   I’m glad I’m not selling, but wish I was in a position to be buying some of these vehicles.  I’ve been seeing the same slow/weak trend in the travel/resort industry for the last couple of years.

I’m going to sound like a broken record here, since I have provided the same information in my previous post,  when I was musing on what is happening with the economy with regard to shooting sports.

The advised turn around in the economy doesn’t seem to have made a major difference in shooting supplies.  There is some ammunition availability in popular calibers showing up, but with marked price increases. The increases are being caused by a couple of factors: first is that the manufacturers still can’t catch up to demand, second is the costs of raw materials have been going up for more then a year, and most significant is the uncertainty of what the government is going to do to the industry.  

Also, I have found that as soon as an availability notification goes out from suppliers, the offering sells out immediately, the demand is that great right now.  I’ve also seen reports that large police orders are still running 3 to 6 months behind, and this is with the manufacturers running at full capacity to try to catch up with demand.  My latest notification on back orders, has the product reaching the supplier in mid December for order(s) I placed in April and May.

I tried again, to order some pistol magazines and still can’t obtain the high capacity variety for my Smith&Wesson pistols at non inflated prices.  Once again the supply was gone as fast as availability notification was sent out from a supplier.  I’m seeing seeing some of these magazines being offered at 50-100% more then MSRP.  This is shortage and price inflation is being fueled by fear of what the government may do with with high capacity magazines within the next year or so.

As I’ve mentioned before the cost and availability of ammunition, and/or reloading components, is making it extremely difficult to attend advanced schools or think about shooting any type of competition.  So all we can hope for at this time is that supplies of ammunition and reloading components catch up with demand and hope that prices will drop some when that happens.

Chewy and I will continue to monitor the different areas of the economy that we are involved with, to see if the economy is turning around (as we don’t see the end of the recession at this time) and hope that the recovery doesn’t take as long as it appears that it is going to at this time.  We also, wish everybody a speedy recovery of their portfolios when the economy does finally reach its true recovery point and hit an up swing.

Tagged as: ammo supply, collector car values., econ recovery