What A Madness !!

[NZMark]

Nice to know my strap collection just trebled in value...as well as that of a few other collectors.
Mark.

[90th Light]

DAK / Tropical is very much flavor of the month at present and sadly WAF for all its good intentions is partly to blame. There is a very strong group of collectors on this forum and beyond who are competing and scratching their eyes out to get this stuff. Hence interest in DAK / Tropical is growing as more and more collectors are taking up the chase and as a result prices are increasing. There is only a limited supply of DAK / Tropical (there always has been even during the war) so it stands to reason and basic economics that prices will rise and continue to rise until we reach a point of elasticity where only the truely rich can afford to buy. May-be the price on these boards shows that we have reached that point ???

The danger in all of this, is when the fashion, fad or trend changes or loses momentum. Several things can cause this to happen such as a change in taste by those who collect but the more obvious one begging to be asked in all of this, who is going to buy these off you in 1 year, 5 years, 10 years or 25 years ??? What price will they pay ??? and will you recover the opportunity cost of having approx 1100 Euro tied up in a set of DAK NCO boards ???

Now I know a lot of you will say that you are not in it for the money but instead its all about the history and yes I agree but there is a little bit of dealer in every so called collector just the same as there is a little bit of collector in every dealer. Money is nice stuff esp. when you need it and it is nice to know that we can sell at least for the price we paid. Sad thing is, that in today's rising price of petrol and food etc, we need to get more than what we paid to get our money back. I mean you paid how much petrol for those boards at 1100 Euro so you want at least that much petrol back, right. The other challenge is the collectors who say that dealers and the prices they charge are just pure evil until it comes to the time for them to sell something and suddenly those evil dealers prices are the benchmark and the basis of all pricing.

There is sadly one final major challenge to all of this which we are yet to gauge and probably the biggest challenge in this for all of us. The Western world as we know it is getting poorer. Wealth, jobs and progress is flowing out of the West towards to East at present. What this means, is if things keep progressing on the global basis of progress which they are at present then people in the East, 25 years from now will be able to pay a lot more for a house, car, food and hobbies where as people in the West will not be able to pay any where near as much as they can now. We are already seeing the correction of prices in several areas as this economic reality starts to bite. Even some areas of Third Reich Militaria are starting to show correction. DAK / Tropical however at this stage, seems to be bucking all trends but for how much longer ???

Will I still collect DAK / Tropical ??? Hell yes, love the stuff but I collect several areas and have found that you do best in more than one way to buy when everyone is selling and sell when they are all buying.

Will the new money of the East pay high prices to collect original German WW2 DAK / Tropical uniforms and the associated items. Will even our children want to pay such prices let alone be able to ???

Are the current prices being paid the high of the market for DAK / Tropical or is there still more to come ? After all nothing ever defies economic gravity so who is going to keep paying these prices in real terms ???.


Chris

[nzef1940]

Me no understand economics, only have a degree in Commercial law & accounting.

[90th Light]

Me no understand economics, only have a degree in Commercial law & accounting.

Well who ever pays Euro 1100+ could be in for an economics lesson then again I suppose it is only a matter of time before we see Euro 1500+ as the norm ???

however a big earner like you with your degree in law & accounting and pulling nearly a seven figure salary is not buying such items any more at those prices so who is

Thats the risk now, when the guys like you with big money stop buying then who does and what happens to the prices paid for DAK ??? There could be buyers at Euro 500 but at Euro 1500 ? How ever in some other areas you can not even get Euro 500 any longer. Not that this has happened to DAK/ tropical yet ! Will be interesting to watch and see.

Not me that's for sure, the bank say my house is on the way down and no more mortgage money to spend on such things. There are better things to buy and collect at Euro 1100+ as well

Elastic demand and getting very horizontal at that.

Anyway, the way you drink its amazing you could remember any thing in an exam at all to pass any thing as a student Economics or non-Economics. Then again being a serious binge drinker is all part of getting a degree in this country now is it not

Bright "Dr Eco" Chris

[Johnny R]

7 figures? Come on now Dr. Eco, hug a Puka mister, only criminals and politicians pull that in.. The Chinese will own everything in 20 years anyway.

[90th Light]

7 figures? Come on now Dr. Eco, hug a Puka mister, only criminals and politicians pull that in.. The Chinese will own everything in 20 years anyway.

Hello jhodgson, well I agree that he is not there yet only in the 6 figure bracket but he is a "bright boy" and believe me he is on his way to 7.

Criminals and politicians ! who do you think his drinking buddies are ? Except me of course, someone has to be the under-paid Saint in all of this

There is a huge vacuum going on with professionals in New Zealand at the moment. Europe and the USA are pulling professionals out of Australia and NZ
Australia is pulling professionals out of New Zealand. Hence the average salary being paid is rising and those who are partners in firms are commanding a higher and higher profits in our society thus they will pay more to get top staff. Real shortages have developed and are starting to hit home. You will however get worked to death for it.

Can not think of any in these upper income brackets in NZ who collect DAK/ tropical German militaria and that is my point. Who is going to buy in the future if you pay 1100+ for a pair of tropical NCO boards now ? I know the stuff has gone up and up over the years and I know that DAK is one of the real rare areas of Third Reich to collect but you reach a point in every market where the worm turns for a range of reasons. This has to happen at some stage and just because it has not happened in the last 40+ years for Third Reich militaria does not mean it can not happen esp. given the buying power of America at present.

I know we all collect the stuff for the history and not the money but lets see how some of of our historians react when the perception is that prices are on the way down. May-be we will not be as fickle as the financial markets and the real interest in the stuff will prevail

I want to stress however that we are not at the price turning point yet. In fact quite the opposite, prices for DAK/ tropical are going up and up and up and up. We are feeding off one another as more and more people post on this forum more and more people are getting interested and starting to buy. Every-one is hunting for that "one-looker" to post, impress and share in the learning, appreciation curve.

What I am saying to all reading this is be careful, Euro 500 for a set of NCO tropical boards is bad enough but probably the norm now but 1100+ ???
I mean who is going to pay Euro 1500+ and keep in mind that if you just paid 1100+ for a set of boards then there is a time value to your money.

May-be more 6 & 7 figure salary guys could step forward and give this market some reassurance that this is the way to go but I suspect that they are too busy buying under-valued stocks at present and bargain priced real estate as many others suffer the fate of being forced to sell having bought at the wrong time and on the high of the market.

There is one concession in all of this however, as the inflation bug really starts to bite in the price of oil, food, energy and commodities then making investment in items which have a fixed/ totally limited in supply can be a good hedge against the loss of buying power in your dollar. In this case then may be original DAK/ tropical boards will be good investment and 1500+ will become the norm. Get them while they are cheap. Money is often made from the passion of what you did and not trying to make money. Problem with this is however that as we pay more and more for our food & petrol etc then who has the spare cash to buy DAK/ tropical ???

They will always be a great piece of history however regardless of the price. Nothing can take that away from them provided they are the real deal,

Chris