I'm not so sure than JM would pay VAT at the point of sale. Maybe it's only on his commission of 20% which is also never factored into sales by people using a guide.
Remove
20% commission
20% VAT
10/15% per drop in each level of condition
and there you have it. Most offers I put in nowadays are around this level. Much to some sellers chagrin I have to say. "But I paid more than that for it!".....well Matey..."you paid too much!" Of course this strategy only works for people who are in the collecting game for the duration and long haul, as we can sit back and wait until that right copy at the right price comes along. If you're a returnee DJ whose desperate to play what that guy in the next town's playing then...get your plastic out. As more than a few have discovered. God Bless 'em
There's obviously a number of different categories of record buyers nowadays. Some feed the dealer market and use that environment to source their 45s and some don't. The dynamics of collecting have completely changed with the advent of the internet and then the guides. Just the way it is. The ONE factor that people continually choose to ignore, maybe because they don't want to identify themselves with it, is the market of the Saturday Night working men's club "DJs". They drive the market, they pay these prices, they are at the heart of the escalating prices. Buying a 45 at just below "book price" and assuming you got a bargain is nuts. Then after thrashing your once nice styrene copies to death for a year for 50 of your Mates at your venue and then adding 25% on to it whilst attempting to sell them on is even nuttier!
I've no doubt that as the dynamics and demographics change once again that all those classic 45s I decided to gamble with and sold over the past decade or so at twenty/thirty times what I paid for them will undoubtedly find their way home at some stage at prices similar to what I originally paid. That's my theory anyway.
Regards,
Dave