by Bill Gaylord » Sat Feb 06, 2016 11:37 pm
These kits go for more than $125 and this seller knows it. This guy won't take it, but you can "luck out" with some sellers, at times who don't know the values, are listing in the wrong places, or are just being really nice. I would wait a bit until it becomes obvious that there are mass number of these out there, both never to be built and to overtake the number of prospective collectors soon. I've seen this happen, with kits like the Sterling Peashooter. People realize there are more of them out there than first thought, and that they continue to appear on the market to an increasingly disinterested ARF/RTF populus, often due to estate sales (unfortunately none of us live forever). Like the Peashooter, it's a really nice and unusual kit, but also seldom built, which makes it even less valuable in the sense that they tend to stick around, being that they remain in unbuilt form. A few years ago that P26 brought a good $60 or more, and you grabbed one up when you could find one. Now they're lucky to get around $30, and they're really worth more than that, but I believe the buyers are often realistic with themselves about the fact that they'll likely never build it, due to the complexity of the build.
Another kit like this, although not balsa, is the Kyosho T33. First, it's not even close to scale, and would look better if it was a P80 IMO. People think these things are gold, and still get more than they are worth, considering that there are highly scale foam RTF jets with the gear included these days, that go for similar prices. Some day someone like FMS or Freewing will come out with a nice park size P80, and these people will wish they had sold their will be then worthless T33s for realistic prices.