I’ve always wanted to purchase some sort of belt fed machine gun. I’m wondering if, in this economy, are prices on MGs dropping? Is now a good time to think about picking one up?
Thoughts/speculations?
Any time you introduce an artificial condition to a market, prices will not reflect rational market conditions.
To speculate that prices will drop while demand increases, would be foolish, in my opinion.
M_P
Obviously there is a fixed stock of them so they should go up in value in the long run.
I have no hard data, but just eyeballing subguns.com and other common MG sales boards over the last year or so, it “seems” like prices have at least flattened out and maybe even dropped a small amount, presumably due to the economy and MG owners losing their jobs, losing money on other investments, etc. and having to liquidate them.
i’ve sort of been looking at M16s recently, and it does seem like prices have dropped a little. demand for these things will never die, so they likely to stay prohibitively expensive for as long as they’re legal… however, just like ALL things gun related- people did a lot of buying they couldn’t afford in the last year, and are trying to sell. gun broker is flooded with all the stuff you couldnt find in the last year, and nobody is buying at inflated prices. this means prices are going to fall- on everything. the people that bought m16s and mp5s and so forth are in no better shape than anyone else, and those prices will fall, too, as people desperately try to avoid forclosure. in fact, as i type this, seems to me machineguns just might go down substantially- people who could afford a $15k m16 a few months ago aren’t elligeable for the Obamanation’s forclosure prevention program, most likely.
just might be gettin me a m16 sometime soon… 
I’ve never quite understood why those guns command such prices. There seem to be tons of them for sale all the time, they’ve been around as long as the M16 so there ought to be plenty of them around, and they are basically overgrown pistols.
i’m not really into the MP5 either… i put a few magazines through one a few months ago and wasn’t really impressed. in fairness, a few magazines sure as shit isn’t enough to conclude anything, but i don’t have any complaints about an FA M4… so why pay more for something that may or may not give me jollies?
i found muzzle control to be a pain in the ass, and kept mentally/reflexively reaching for a VFG that wasn’t there… didn’t care for the LOP, and, naturally, the controls were alien to me. altogether, i’d much rather pay half as much for an M4/M16. ammo sure is cheaper, though.
there’s that- but a full auto commando is plenty sexy for me.
Cheaper ammo? Maybe it’s just the whole appeal of having a SWAT/Operator weapon. WooHoo! Wannabe mall-ninjas and their toys! 
If I could afford a good full-auto lower I’d be all over it. I can’t be a true Mall Ninja until I have one to go with the rest of my kit.
There’s absolutely nothing wrong with wanting an mg of one type or another “just because.” If you can afford it and want it, buy one. I just meant that someone might want an MP5 because the “cool special ops guys” have 'em, so I want one too. Nothing wrong with that either. :o
i think the fact of the matter is this applies to absolutely everyone, to some degree or another. even the “cool special ops guys” themselves.
we all love HSLD gear… it’s damn fun.
i think i’m a pretty well-grounded and level-headed guy. i don’t tell war-stories, i don’t know what color the boathouse is at Hereford. but you should see me hunting- might as well be heading up the Nung to pay a visit to Col. Kurtz. why? it’s fun. camo’d up, ammo’d up, enough food to last a week, 20 miles from the nearest road… with the intent to kill.
a buck.
would i take a FA M4 if i had one? sheeeit… would there be any other option, at that point?
I think there has been a drop in the collectible firearms market in general. If you have money, there probably won’t be a better time than now to pick up something NFA.
not trying to derail this thread but…
the people do. the .gov can have em, so we should be able to as well. i believe that not being able to easily procure a full auto weapon is an infringement on my second amendment right.
I should be able to go down to my local gun store, and walk out with a fully automatic, suppressed, short barreled m16 w/ stand alone m203 and HE rounds with nothing more then a background check to make sure im not a felon.
why? because the power should be in the hands of the people.
i guess im a little radical 
yea, you are. furthermore, in my opinion, the background check itself is an infringement. that’s a condition put upon a RIGHT- you must do this, or you get no guns! bullshit.
i’m not even opposed to “felons” owning guns. call me naive, call me a country boy who doesn’t see what the city-streetz is like, but once you do your time, you need to get all your RIGHTS restored. if someone isn’t safe enough to buy a gun, they’re not safe enough to be on the street. if they’re safe enough to be on the street, they’re safe enough to own an arsenal of machineguns.
because… get this… if you’re on the street, you can get a gun, and cant any laws keep that from happening.
rather than derail this mother any more, perhaps the conversation should be taken here: https://www.m4carbine.net/showthread.php?t=33928
i understand you can, i guess what i was getting at is that the process is a little difficult, and you cant own a new manufacture machine gun, which aparently are affordable.
Really??? Wow! I thought we had it bad down here in the Philippines… You can get one here brand new for 8K max.
You can even get a Daewoo K3 (Patterned after the M249) for a bit less…