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2447NST has Early Case and Hands
In Response To: Re: Benwatch . . . Likes to "Pass the Trash" ? ? ? ()

I'm not sure how widespread this is. There are honest vintage watch dealers and dishonest ones, just as there are good and bad folks, in any other group of people.

And, of course, the real questions are matters such as:

  • what did the seller know? [obviously, the one who replaced the dial knew a lot]
  • what did the seller tell his customer?
  • what did the customer ask?
  • etc., etc., etc.
I have seen some of these watches go from one dealer to the next, with the price increasing all along the way. Sometimes, as the watch gets passed around, we get further from the truth [which may have been known only to earlier owners].

As someone pointed out last week, when we were providing advice about buying vintage watches, the most important idea is that you are buying the seller, even more than you are buying the watch.

Here, however, even if you didn't know the dealer, or the exact history of this watch, a few minutes of research would have established -- to an absolute certainty -- that this rare Carrera was actually a rare dial, transplanted to a very common Carrera. My value . . . $2,000 for the watch (without dial) and some hundreds or even low thousands for the dial. One thing for sure, the fair market value was not $11,000!!

Jeff

++++++++++++++++++++++


: Jeff,

: How widespread is this practice? It mirrors what shady
: "restorers" do with classic cars - like passing off a
: base motor midyear Corvette as a big block or a fuelie.

: What recourse would the unfortunate buyer have in the case you
: mentioned? I find it particularly egregious that in both
: listings for the sold 2447ns and the 2447nst Benwatch couldn't
: even get the dates right -
: http://benwatch.net/heuer/31_carrera-2447
: http://benwatch.net/heuer/141_carrera-2447-nt

: Those are both clearly second execution dials!

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