M8 price - will it fall like it is typical for digital?

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DC1030

DC1030
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I ask myself if the price of the m8 will go down like it did with all digital cameras.
when buying a contax tvs digital my dealer said "that is the first digital camera that will keep its value". one year later it was nearly half. will the same thing happen to the m8? an upgrade to my M3 is as simple as can be: just put a new film in it...
don't know, but buying an m8 is like having bought a M3 with a fixed ADOX KB 17 Film...
 
Yes .. why would it be different?
I expect dealerprices to stay about the same but 2nd hand prices (Like new in Box) is a different story .... it is not different with an M6 or M7 ... you can have those mint too for half the new price!
The good prices of 2nd hand Leica gear is a thing of the past since E-bay and internet sales ....... try to sell your Leica lenses . as soon as you leave the shop they are worth half the price you payd for it ... a bit less for the latest and most popular designs.
 
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Do you mean purchase new? No, it will likely rise...
Do you mean resale value? I would say about the same as a film M.
If you want an investment stocks or bonds are probably a better idea......
 
As long as every new generation of digital camera means a big improvement on the previous one, the price of the old stuff will fall inevitably. In the digital world, technlogy (still) advances pretty fast, faster than the mechanical/electronical approach of the 20th century cameras used to do. Nowadays, with every new generation camera the digital shooter will always want the newest model, and the older stuff will eventually be regarded as obsolete. I am afraid that Leica bodies will be no exception to this, though their high quality build may prevent a too steep price fall.
 
DC1030 said:
I ask myself if the price of the m8 will go down like it did with all digital cameras.
Click to expand...

The answer is NO.

Reasons:

  • It might fall in 1% per month steps for the next 12 months, but until ther's an newer, better digital rangefinder offering on the market the price will stay high.
  • Leica cameras always had a better resale value than japanese. Think about collector's value, and about all those M glass owners that can't wait to get a used M8. They'll pay 80% or more of the new price for a used one without turning a hair.
  • There is no competetive model except the R-D1, which kept it's high price for two years, before the M8 was announced.

Didier
 
I think the price will actually go up for a little while. With the demand for the M8 that I'm hearing about from the Leica dealers in NYC and surrounding metro areas, you'll be lucky to get your hands on an M8 for at least a year.

Anyone that pre-ordered and decides to sell should be able to get at least what they paid for it if not a little more. That's my prediction IMHO 🙂
 
In case you hadn't noticed, the price of "everything digital" usually does NOT go down -- if you make sure to compare "apples to apples" (e.g. retail prices of new merchandise, not new vs. used prices) and ignore speculative markups of "hot" new products that are temporarily in short supply.

What tends to happen instead is that as a new generation of technology appears, the price stays about the same but you get more "stuff" (bits, pixels, gigabytes, gigahertz, blinky lights, etc.) for the same amount of money.

The reason this has to happen is that marketing and distribution costs (which comprise a very large chunk of the final price) stay the same regardless of the technology included in the product.

So, manufacturers identify a target market segment and competitive set, and estimate the appropriate price tier needed to compete in that market -- then choose the technology content that will enable the product to be sold in that price tier. That math doesn't change regardless of what happens to the underlying technology: a given product needs to sell for X dollars to compete in segment Y, regardless of what's in it. If the technology and/or competitive climate advances, then the product needs a refresh, but it's unlikely the price tier will change.
 
The reason digitals have depreciated so fast and far up to now is because their manufacturers have made incremental upgrades every year or year and a half and buyers seem to be swallowing the bait hook line and sinker just like with computers. Until there is an M9 I don't expect that used M8s will depreciate any worse than film cameras did in the time before everyone was dumping them.
 
IMHO, its a matter of demand and supply, right now the demand is high and there is no supply, so if you have one for sale it probably would sell for more than the store price, six months from now? who knows?

The Nikon D200 is been around for close to a year, the demand was so great that supplies were always low, so in effect, the price has not dropped(one can not buy the D200 for half).
Most times the manufacturers cause the price drop themselves because they offer incentives and rebates. Of course that happens when there is plenty of supplies.
Kiu
 
Will the "new" MSRP price of an M8 decline? Not until Leica is ready to clear inventory, for a hypothetical M9, or just to keep the ball rolling. Just as they are offering $500 gift certificates now to clear MP/M7 inventories in the US. Figure 2 years at least, as with the Epson.

Will the value of a used M8 drop faster than current film M's, on a percentage basis? Not immediately, although it will probably drop equally once anyone can walk into a camera shop and get a new one that day. But that will probably be at least 5 months from now (I'm more optimistic about Leica's production plans for the M8 than most doubters). Until then, some folks may even pay a premium to 'line-jump' the waiting lists.

After 10 years, yes, I'd expect an used M8 to show more devaluation than a used M3 did after its first 10 years. Although by that time inflation and other factors start to screw up the calculations.

Personally, If I can ever pick up a clean used M8 for $500 or $1000 or $2000 as a second body - I'll be ecstatic!
 
Well, Germany isn't a zero-inflation country anymore. Payroll (wages and taxes) will continue to go up. Yes, Kodak's sensor price, and some of the other semiconductor prices will probably fall over time. It may balance out other rising costs. However, Leica probably placed an order for a lot of sensors, so could will be a while before they get a lower price.

But, the dollar is going to keep sinking against the Euro, so the dollar price will continue to rise, even if the Euro price holds fairly stable. (Well, at least until the US stops printing money to pay the bills in Iraq. At least the Chinese are still willing to buy US debt.)
 
I think Ben Z has it right. Digital cameras depreciate so quickly because they are replaced by a new model at an alarming rate. However, I think maybe that even the typical digital buyer might be getting tired of shelling out $1,000-$1,500 ever year or so for the latest incremental upgrade.

If you look at the highest price models, those tend not to be replaced as often, their prices doesn't change much, but when they are, the previous model does lose a significant portion of the original MSRP.

So until the Leica M8 is replaced, I don't think the price of this limited-production digital device to fall much, if at all. I would expect a decline on the used market.

And of course, much will depend on real-world reviews of the camera -- not meanderings of some Internet wannabe. If the camera is judged to be excellent, the camera will hold its value. If it turns out to be a dog, then the price will fall quicker than expected.
 
Bob S. When I mentioned inflation, I was thinking more along the lines that a 1958 M3 that cost $258 new is now worth $800-$1000 in 2006 money, so it increased in value by 3-4x purely in dollar terms. In 1958 dollars the value of an M3 today may be more like $80 than $800 - but that's what I meant by inflation screwing up value comparisons across several decades.
 
I agree that the biggest factor in the decline of DSLR prices is the frequent release of new models. An interesting question is whether erosion in M8 resale prices will mostly be dictated by Leica's own product cycle, or whether the shorter product cycles of the big industry players will also have a significant influence. Imagining a scenario where Leica, Canon and Nikon were to release cameras on the same day with comparable technical specifications, and then Canon and Nikon introduced successors every year but Leica's follow-up came three years later, would prices for the Leica over the three-year period behave more like those of a unique sui generis item whose own manufacturer had not issued a replacement, or would price erosion resemble that of the supplanted Nikon and Canon models?

How would Mac prices hold up if Apple only released new models every three years or so?

Keeping in mind that today's eager buyers are toward the upper left end of the demand curve, will Leica still be able to command nearly $5000 for a new M8 if it is a few generations behind in technology but still the Leica flagship? Once an M9 is on the calendar, of course, you would expect new M8 sales to drop dramatically.
 
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"Imagining a scenario where Leica, Canon and Nikon were to release cameras on the same day with comparable technical specifications...."

The most important technical specification for me is, of course, "manual-focus split-image rangefinder".

If the Canon and Nikon include that spec, then we're talking - if they don't, they can't possibly be "comparable".

But I realize a lot of people don't distinguish between RF and SLR cameras...
 
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