There seems to be a lot of very good used equipment going up for sale lately. I’m curious what everyone is seeing as the best Used Values in the market right now.
For me, the used buys I’ve seen consistently are:
Hugo 2 DAC/amp - approx $1.2k
FiR M5 IEM - approx $1.2k
Hiby RS6 - approx $800
At basically half of original price, these are performance monsters at the used price.
What killer used values are you seeing?
I generally keep my scales as a pennies on the dollar value as everyone’s items are going to vary. Newish and high demand items are seldom seen at 66¢ on the dollar but that’s what I consider my “good value” pricing. Anything that’s been around the block and that you’re specifically looking for I set my good price for at 50 to 55¢ on the dollar. Lastly bargains at must buy pricing if it’s something that you’re interested in but it may be old, or just not popular or somewhat beat up I set my good value price at anything around 40¢ on the dollar or less. You’d be surprised at how many things can fall in the category that I’ve
The rest is just stuff you want/need but you know will never come down because they just always sell for 80 to 85¢ on the dollar. You just have to buy the bullet and get it… or someone else will.
Susvara for less than $3.5K
Focal Utopia, Final D8000 Pro, Hifiman HE1000SE for little over $2K
HD800S, Arya v2 or SE, LCD-X 2021, Clear MG all dropped below $1K
Headamp GS-X mini is a little over $1K
All of these are really good imo
An L&P P6 Pro at $1.7-$1.9k lately is pretty crazy value, imo.
HD800s at $750-$900
OG Clear at $600ish
Good point.
Hugo 2 used / new = $1.2k / $3k = 40c on the dollar
FiR M5 used / new = $1.2k / $2.8k = 66c on the dollar
Hiby RS6 used / new = $800 / $1.4k = 57c on the dollar
These are killer prices for these cans!
I’ve started to see LCD-5 fall towards $2.5k, rare, but if you can get it it’s a great deal.
Hard to find a better amp at this price!
This price absolutely wrecks other cans in the approx $500 range
Agreed on the OG clears, though they are a bit amp picky, so you have to factor that in.
Exogal DAC’s are a steal at the prices they currently trade for a bit over $1000 list was >$3K.
Lampizator Pacific at if you’re willing to ship from Poland $15K for a balanced unit list >$30K.
If one ever comes up again…
Linnenberg Satie DAC (discontinued in US, released 2019)
used / new = $3.5k / $10k
Don’t think there’s a better resolving DAC or DAC/pre combo around its used price used or new that can even come close. If there is, lmk cause I’d want to try it
I’ve yet to see one that low but even for the $2.9K I think it’s good value if you like what it provides.
Oh also,
Sennheiser ie900 even new I think it’s a good value, but it took quite a bit of work to get it there. So I’ll place it on the picky side of things
Saw some LCD-2C’s going as low as $400-425 used around Black Friday because Audeze was selling new B-stock at $450, so the market briefly adjusted to beat that.
That deal is gone, and used prices have risen.
Nobody should pay more than $1K used for LCD-X 2021. Hell, they’re only $1,200 new, and Headphones.com is selling open box for $950.
I got mine used about two or three months ago for $870. FANTASTIC headphones. My favorite ever.
On the portable side of things the lotoo paw gold touch can be had for 1.3-1.5k which I think is an amazing deal for the complete package of totl sound and great software ui/ux you get.
P6P dropping down to 1.8k or lower is very damn good performance per dollar when it comes to pure sound, but gotta suffer through the horibble ui/ux 
U12t will continue to be a great iem deal at the 1.1-1.2k range you can find them for.
And of course Utopia dipping below 2k pricerange since the newtopia dropped is an killer deal so is HD 800s for 800-900 range
I’m glad we are sharing our good deals. It gives our community a better idea on what is a good deal vs another.
With that being said, I would say to be careful to compare against MSRP too much. We need to have a better idea on true value of an item. I feel like I got burned recently by this and took a loss on an item.
My example is the Modwright KWA-150SE power amp and the company recently made a huge price hike to $12000, with other gradual price creeps as he was getting more popular. When I purchased the item for $3750 (at 31% value), I thought I was getting a steal. When I wanted to sell it back at a similar price, there were crickets. Nobody had any interest, even when I dropped it significantly. At the end of the day, I needed to sell it via consignment and it costed $200-300 shipping every time I needed to move it back and forth. It was the only item that I lost hundreds of dollars on a short term own.
Another example that can go either way is my recent acquisition of Raidho D1 with stands at $4750 compared to MSRP $26000 (at 18%). Their MSRP pricing is quite contentious and I hear rumors that dealers purchase at 40% MSRP or so. It certainly made a huge jump in my 2ch performance, so as long as I keep it long term, the ridiculous pricing worked in my favor.
Anyways, just wanted to share some experiences. Definitely do your homework per item.
Very good point @Veritas. If you can’t flip it immediately for the same price, maybe it’s not as good of a deal as you think.
Another interesting thing I came to appreciate this year is used high end devices usually can get maintenance/repair. Depending on size of device, company, and location, shipping and repair cost could be prohibitive. But someone that can be checked ahead of purchase and factored into purchase price.
For me I did this with my FiR M5 IEMs. For $150 I had them shipped, cleaned, re-terminated, and tested. Nice to own gear that isn’t “disposable”.
For very high end stuff where you think it might need to be inspected/repaired (say a turntable) you need to be especially careful of this. Used Basis turntables can be had for pennies on the $$ but Basis will charge you $2K just to look at the turntable, and the costs go up from there. And not everything can be fixed.
Not all manufacturers are like that, but if something is a real steal there is probably a reason for it. The Exogal I pointed out above I think is a tremendous value based on what you get and the price, but Exogal went out of business this year, so if it dies your SOL. The prices also aren’t likely to go back up.
Understanding historic pricing is worth the time it takes, but it can be very difficult to identify for infrequently sold stuff.
Honestly though, once you’re buying gear at the $5K plus used pricing, you better know WTF it is you’re buying and why or else, yeah, there’s a good chance to get burned and take a shellacking when trying to resell.
