Willowmaster said:
Bart - the phrase "buyers remorse" comes to mind. I've known and heard of plenty of people that overpaid for items - especially in the heat of the moment. Auctions being a particularly good example.
It's hard to say anyone overpaid for something because you don't know what the item is worth to them--the same item can quite different values for different people. In my case, if I ran across that tractor and could buy it for $1,000 I probably would but there is no way that I would pay $2,500 because I don't need another tractor. On the other hand, if I had no tractor and needed one then I would be quite pleased to bring this one home for $2,500 because it would be a much better deal than any alternatives. There are a lot of people who spend that kind of money on big box store tractors that, in my opinion, aren't worth much of anything but for those people the psychic value of a flashy new toy in the garage apparently is worth the money.
There are also those amongst us who will fret endlessly about paying a penny more for something than they know someone else paid for a similar item. We've all heard stories about the guy who got a tractor for nothing from a widow who just wanted it out of her garage so does that mean the tractor is worth nothing? As I said before, the way I assess value is whether I will feel comfortable with what I got for the price paid a day or two later. I also rarely do a lot of "bargaining" on price because I don't really want to have sellers feel that I stole something from them. If there is a big difference between the offering price for something and the price I feel comfortable with I usually just pass on the deal or I might tell the seller I'll give you $x and let them see if they can get more for it if they think it's worth more. Over the longer term this strategy has worked well for me because people I've done business with in the past know that I am willing to do a "fair" deal and often give me first crack at things they want to sell. Of course there are others for whom the thrill of the deal is the main consideration and if that tractor were offered for $500 they'd want to negotiate it down to $400--and may lose the deal in the process.
This is just my long winded way of saying that you should just offer whatever you're comfortable with paying and you'll be happy you did the deal.
