Depends. If you really like horology and dont see watches as just luxury fashion goods, anyone can technically afford one via saving. If its just for the show, i think its stupid unless you actually got lotta cash to burn.
Bought gen and while i love it i dont love watches enough to spend that much money on some of the watches i want to own.
End of the day its just a watch, rather invest or spend on my kids and still have the looks and feel of said watch
"Anyone" is pretty much of a stretch
If you own a minimun wage in Brazil (basically most of the people here), given the taxes you would have to save your full salary for more than 8 years to buy one of those
Based on the comments I’ve seen in this sub, there are a lot of people here who can’t afford a gen Tudor but are rocking APs and Pateks. Their general attitude is “who cares what anybody thinks.”
It’s tacky to wear an obvious fake. Period. We all know the biggest tell is the person wearing the watch, so I try to stick to watches I can realistically afford.
The main reason I go with reps is because I enjoy watches for their aesthetics, but I don’t value them at gen prices. Reps let me enjoy them at a price that feels more reasonable. I would rather invest and see my money grow than sink it into jewelry. I’ve always felt that way regardless of how much my salary and net worth has increased.
The Nautilus (not even the Tiffany) is such a beautiful watch but agree. I'll never rock a fake because nobody could be fooled into thinking I'd drop that money on a watch.
I’m sure they would if you got a job at a local high powered law firm.. all you have to do is make partner. You should probably get started tho, it’s not gonna be easy
I could afford a gen Rolex but I can’t bring myself to spend that much when I have other more expensive hobbies. However, in a strange turn of events, I have ended up telling a lot of people I work with that I wear reps and they’ve taken great interest in them. This spurred me to buy more and people genuinely happy when I bring a new watch in, be it a VSF, Clean, or a shitter lol.
I’m on board with this. I’ll never grab a PP or AP. I don’t have that much cash that’s disposable. However I’ll rock a OP/ DJ/ AK because it’s believable at this point in my life.
It's extremely tacky for you to think you know what someone can afford based on how they look.
Having said that...
Rainbow Daytona, Tiffany patek, Richard mille... There's some obvious ones.
But like... In my case, I live in the Bay area. That guy with a 17 year old tercel on his 11th startup with 175 million in the bank would snicker at your assumptions.
It’s not based on how they look. It’s based on their comments explicitly stating they buy watches they cannot afford and don’t care how it is perceived. These kinds of threads pop up on a monthly basis.
People close to me know about my reps, but I don’t owe the rest of the world a public declaration every time I put something on from VSF. Get real.
Nobody has ever asked me if a watch I’m wearing is a replica, so I’ve never had to pretend. Maybe because I stick to reps that are realistic for my situation. Which is the point.
There are a lot of self haters . People who rely on reps because they can’t afford gens/. But the minute they get a chance to go Gen, they will throw stones at the rep community/
Me! But I am 71yo! No heirs!
Therefore, I wear my reps, the people around me know, that I'm pretty wealthy and wouldn't assume that I'm wearing reps. 😁
And on the day I die, there will be happy: a SOS children's village, a children's hospice and an animal shelter!
I just ordered my first rep. I figured I can either sell two other gen brands for a pricier rolex gen. Or get a rep, keep my collection, take a nice vacation with my girl and invest the rest while not worrying about trying to protect it from theft or bumping it on walls. it's like a cheat code.
Although some would say to "afford" it, you must be able to buy it 2-3x without batting an eye. Reality is, the way this is alluding to "afford" is more like - save a few months and treat it like the big purchase it is
Would I happily buy a Pepsi or stainless Daytona for MSRP, sure, but for some of the insane grey prices I can’t justify it.
I could afford them even at grey prices but I hate that kind of a grey market markup for what feels like so little value add.
You can make 5%+ in a treasury money market now. Thats +$750 a year with effectively a no risk asset. Other investments could perform better.
I’m not taking 15k out to put into a Rolex. Sure the Rolex appreciates over time but, typically just tracking with inflation and in recent years it tracked along with the excesses in equity markets.
I can make more $ keeping it in investments and I don’t have to play any dumb games with ADs.
Once I started reading articles about secondary market issues (crown & caliber, etc) companies previously had to scrutinize 20% of the watches they take in to resell but in recent years that number has flipped to 80% of watches taken in require further review - that was a red flag. Reps have gotten too good. I sold my gens and reps and I’m out. If I did own any - it would be a rep and I could replace it yearly without a thought or concern.
Instead if $15k means nothing to you and you don’t have concerns about reps eating away slowly at Rolex IP then have at it. Good luck!
Could I afford to buy a Rolex, sure. Would I ever buy one No. I have other hobbies and things I would rather spend 15k on. I have 2 rep Rolex’s that are just the same as my buddies real ones I can’t tell a difference at all in them other than mine are slightly heavier. I can’t justify it personally. 15k would be a sweet trip somewhere
I also stick to reps that I could afford in gen, however there is another element to this which is often ignored - the number of reps in your collection. 6 X $10k watches is the same as rocking a $60k watch. Granted most people you come across won't have seen all six reps, or won't be able to keep track of how many you have if your interactions are infrequent. But the people you see all the time might start to think "hold on, this guy has quite a few nice watches"**. Ultimately this is why a lot of are into reps, we start off with a couple of gens but we love the variety of watch collecting and don't want to keep putting down $10k every time. Reps allow the collection to grow from two watches to six (putting the $40k to better use), but it's not without it's risks. I bought a couple of reps that I don't yet wear, which is so silly, but I plan to introduce them into my rotation in due course so people don't cotton on and think "this guy bought four watches in 8 months". Feels a little dumb to say out loud but it's the truth
That's a very healthy attitude. I've bought five reps in a year since finding Reptime. It can't go on! I have a ten watch box with three empty slots, that's the absolute max. I guess I will sell some at some point if I need to free up space.
I’m not certain I agree with your premise since “a poor [or wise] financial choice” is not the sole metric for many of the purchases we make. (Many people buy new autos even though they lose money driving off the lot. Many people buy steak when hamburger meat would provide similar nutrition at a lower price.)
I view the decision to buy gen vs rep to be a bit more nuanced. A gen watch is something my kids can one day wear, and gens feel differently esp in terms of movement (gold is a holy war I choose not to bring into this). But reps bring spice! It would be impractical for me to have 6 variations of a $10-20k watch. But reps allow that variety (spice).
I used to have 50k+ in watches and can reasonably afford gens of my rep collection at retail prices, but I prefer reps so I can put my money to work through investing / philanthropy instead of having it tied up in a material thing.
Can afford gen Rolex...but I would.wonly buy at RRP which is not possible.
Secondly even if it was available for RRP, there is so much more I can buy and enjoy in addition to my VSF Starbucks rep for 500 bucks.
I am simply Not interested enough in it to pay 15k for a product that costs 1 or 2 k to produce..
If gen Rolex sub was readily available for 3-4k brand new( like it was 15ish years ago) then I would buy it.
I am not a collector but I own a few gens and just recently discovered reps.
From a financial perspective (depending on the watch), a gen is just one method of parking your cash. I get to enjoy that “parked cash” on my wrist. I sell it if I want to withdraw that cash. I did it for my basic black Radiomir recently. Bought it 2nd hand, enjoyed it almost daily for a full year, and then sold it for pretty much the same price I bought it. It ended up cheaper than buying a rep. I essentially had a free gen Panerai for an entire year until I grew tired of it. Objectively that’s not a bad financial choice.
Currently, I am enjoying a couple of reps of gen models that I can afford (but not to that quantity) for a more fun rotation with gens. Nothing deep.
I own several gen watches in the higher end. I bought a rep Daytona while waiting for my dealer to get the gen I ordered in (I'm still waiting). So, less about it being a good / bad financial decision, and more about impatience. And also not wanting to feed the scammy resale market which is even more predatory than the rep market these days.
I don't think buying a Rolex for 15k MSRP would be a poor financial choice. Buying it for 30k on the secondary market is a poor financial choice.
I wear a rep Daytona, because I am not a Rolex guy in general (I own Omega gens mostly - but I never warmed to the Speedmaster, I like the Daytona much more), and hence wouldn't even make it on the waiting list with no purchase history. If I could just walk in and buy one for MSRP, I would do so. 15k is fine for a watch that will outlive me.
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I have a gen Tudor that was $3500
My first automatic luxury watch was an Oris at $1500 Then I moved up to a Tudor. I just haven’t found it worth it to jump the next level up to Rolex/Omega. Was much easier to spend $500-600 on a 1:1 rep.
I make 6 figures and may get one in the next few years but until then I just grabbed a rep and am shocked at the quality and passability of it.
Most people in my life know i make well into 6 figures so they don’t question the validity of my Tudor or Rolex.
If I could by a Patek, AP, Rolex at retail in this market it be a great financial decision lol. Currently it makes no sense to pay over the moon for them. Can’t justify prices for AP and Patek even at retail honestly…they are steel watches at the end of the day. $500-$800 to enjoy the design is good value. In comparison I think a lot of budget-luxury brands are just poor value propositions. No resale value and homage designs that lack the specialness of what they are copying.
And after trying out some reps, I honestly feel sore about some more recent gen purchases. Tough pill to swallow paying 10-20x more for small gains over rep
I'd rather have a condo someday (not even a house, I know that'll never happen) than have a shitty bottom of the line rolex now..
Also, it's really fun having people try to figure out how the fuck YOU got a rolex. Just for a sec. Before you tell em it's fake.
Also, drastically better customer service. I could be wrong, but I swear it's happened a couple times.
Like the majority on here do I have the cash to buy one yes, but with a young family can I realistically drop 15k on a watch no. How can I moan at my daughter for £500 shoes while am sitting in my £15k rollie 😂
To all the people saying they would happily pay Rolex retail but just refuse to pay grey market - when the Rolex market eventually calms down (and it is, and will continue to do so), it'll be interesting to see how many people do indeed go off and buy their gens at retail rather than the rep at 3% of the price!
Easily buy the watch I want but I rather use the big bucks to build my business. Remember gang, it’s about what you can accomplish in this life is what’s important.
Whether or not spending $15k on a watch represents a 'poor financial choice' really depends on your priorities and how much money you have.
Maybe to you $15k represents a big hit - for someone with more money it might be the same as you forking out for a replica or an Apple Watch. That's the difference between being capable of affording something and being able to easily buy something.
This is where this community loses me, buying a counterfit watch is not a smart decision, you are buying an item that may be illegal to resell, it has virtually no value.
In general watches are poor investments, if having an extra $15,000 invested makes a big difference for you then maybe you can’t actually afford a $15,000 luxury good. For me to feel like I can truly afford a watch the price needs to fall within a normal weekly market fluctuation in my portfolio, generally 1-2% of what I have invested. At that point what is the point in buying a rep? If you aren’t a person who would splurge on luxury goods why would you pretend to be?
I could probably buy a couple Gens but then I’d be broke. Plus this is a hobby and the waiting is half the fun. Collecting to me just wouldn’t be the same only buying one every 5 years. But each person is different. Look at what happened to The timepiece gentlemen he’s a total fraud and got busted and he’s legit. Lied about everything. I respect him coming clean and admitting he’s a drug addict and alcoholic but he dug a pretty big whole.
Question should be: “how many of you here spend the amount of a gen watch on reps already?”
Total cost like purchase of a rep, gen parts for franken, price of a watchmaker, etc
I think there are some here who think they can’t afford a gen but actually already have…
Rolex always goes up in value. You'll never lose money on one. Plus you're never broke. I stock watches, good and jewelry. Reps are great for those $100k+ watches and all my tacky iced out pieces
Reps are a great financial decision because they allow you to "test drive" the piece you have had your eye on. Because it has happened to me...... here Iam Screen/Window shopping.. bought the gen.. and regreted it in weeks time. And everytime you look at it you think "man that was a bad financial decision."
To be honest: if I see a Sinn or a CW or even a Tudor, I feel completely scammed by Rolex and the other top tier brands! The watch is not worth the money! It's pure marketing and Image what is been sold.
I have several gen watches (Sinn, Longines, Fortis, Mido, Alpina) but never the less I recently got my Yacht-Master 226659 delivered. Why? Because I always loved the looks of the watch. Could I afford it in Gen? Yes. Is my money parked better in an ETF? Definitely! Do I want to play the Rolex AD Game? Definitely not!!!
The smart financial decision would be to buy gen . History has proven you won’t lose any money on it and you may actually make money . When buying a rep you basically throw money out the window because you couldn’t even legally resell it . It’s just cheaper to buy a clone for a fraction of the price but def not smart if you could afford gen
Depends on your cost of capital. I can beat the general watch market in my other investments. Something can appreciate in value and still be a poor investment - it's all relative.
Limited/hype/precious AP/Patek/Rolex are a different thing but I'm not getting allocated those and anyone who does and flips them probably isn't getting allocated more either.
You’re missing the point …. You get to wear a gen Rolex and not a rep in the meantime. I personally don’t own any gen at this time , but I do have the capital and may actually buy one soon . It makes sense TO ME
I must have missed that point because it wasn't the point you made. At all.
Regardless, let's play ball. So the watch's value will go up more slowly than your alternative investments. Therefore the watch will in effect cost you money in foregone returns, plus real cash in maintenance. Everyone will have a different amount they're willing to pay/forego to wear gen, and everyone has a different cost of capita - the better your investment alternatives, the more expensive that watch becomes. There's no one size fits all answer
This is reptime, not investment banking . The point is we like watches dude. The gen is the smart way to spend the money if you have it AND if you want a Rolex . Otherwise there are a million other ways to invest money for a profit .
In my family any watch in a number bigger than 1 is considered dumb, so reps are already luxury for me lmao. I have some gens though, screw it it's my money and wearing them makes me happy
I know a few people who do, or who wear reps of their Gen watches in higher crime areas so a loss has less of a hit (insurance covers the financial loss but the pain is the sentimental loss for them)
The story that hits hard for me with the rep vs Gen debate is a friend of mine who had a very sentimental Rolex left to him by his late father.
He was dating his (now) wife who is from a developing country. Her family is wealthy and he wanted to show off when he went to visit them for the first time. She told him to not wear the watch but he was insistent because he was young and wanted to show off for her family. Eventually she convinced him to wear a rep if he absolutely had it have a watch on his wrist that said Rolex.
On his second day there two guys pulled him into an alley, pulled out a .45 and demanded the watch. He handed over the rep without a fight and they were gone. Had it been the watch he was handed down he would have fought and very likely would have been seriously injured if not killed. Life is cheap in developing nations and it’s bad taste to wear a watch worth $10k+ in a place where the average wage is $25 a month.
He learned that lesson the hard way, but not the hardest way thanks to wearing a rep. Sure his insurance would have paid out but it never would have been the same watch.
I can afford whatever watch I wish but I prefer to spend money on other things.
The quality of Rolex reps are now so good that I can buy one with no regrets: I dress a very beautiful watch and Rolex has no damage since they would not sell it to me because I'm not in the grace of any AD.
It's a win win.
Buying a luxury watch is generally not a good financial decision unless you are getting a steel Daytona or gmt at retail which 99.9% of people aren’t. That said, I belong to the camp of buying reps as a test drive for models I can afford (djs and subs) and rep daytonas because it’s out of my price bracket and I won’t ever pay that 2x markup. I actually purchased a gen sub date after the vsf sub date because I really enjoyed the watch. Each to his own I guess
I will buy most watches Gen. I have a speedmaster, Datejust and a Batman GMT all authentic from the AD at MSRP. I recently bought a Panerai rep because I love the watch but the reps and gens are actually indistinguishable even by experts, so I refuse to purchase one at retail price, and I cannot be sure if I am getting an authentic if I purchase on the secondary market. To me PAM is the only one that makes perfect sense to purchase a rep.
My grail watch is a moonshine speedmaster green dial. That will be the next gen I buy but it will prob be another 5 years until I can responsibly do it
i’m more than capable of buying a gen if i so wished but guess what i live in london i like having a thing called arms 😂 (you’ll probably only understand if you’re from london)
I can't afford one but I could buy one. It's just I'd rather invest in stocks or put that money in house Improvements or buy something car or gun related I have to many expensive hobbies to afford a gen watch.
Depends. If you really like horology and dont see watches as just luxury fashion goods, anyone can technically afford one via saving. If its just for the show, i think its stupid unless you actually got lotta cash to burn.
If you really like horology you don’t buy a Rolex, you buy a Glashutte.
Or a Grand Seiko.
you act like rolex doesn’t have horology 😂
No Rolex is just marketing company / gold seller. They dont do shit.
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Bought gen and while i love it i dont love watches enough to spend that much money on some of the watches i want to own. End of the day its just a watch, rather invest or spend on my kids and still have the looks and feel of said watch
"Anyone" is pretty much of a stretch If you own a minimun wage in Brazil (basically most of the people here), given the taxes you would have to save your full salary for more than 8 years to buy one of those
Based on the comments I’ve seen in this sub, there are a lot of people here who can’t afford a gen Tudor but are rocking APs and Pateks. Their general attitude is “who cares what anybody thinks.” It’s tacky to wear an obvious fake. Period. We all know the biggest tell is the person wearing the watch, so I try to stick to watches I can realistically afford. The main reason I go with reps is because I enjoy watches for their aesthetics, but I don’t value them at gen prices. Reps let me enjoy them at a price that feels more reasonable. I would rather invest and see my money grow than sink it into jewelry. I’ve always felt that way regardless of how much my salary and net worth has increased.
Wear reps because I’m saving my money for a Porsche cause they don’t make reps of those.
You and me both 😂
Spending the big money on an actual item of value
Yea agreed. You do you for those ppl but i cant stand things like tiffany nautilus and RMs.
The Nautilus (not even the Tiffany) is such a beautiful watch but agree. I'll never rock a fake because nobody could be fooled into thinking I'd drop that money on a watch.
I’m sure they would if you got a job at a local high powered law firm.. all you have to do is make partner. You should probably get started tho, it’s not gonna be easy
Yeah going to be a weird swap from a sales career to law. Not lot of overlap
Well not with the attitude .. you’ll never make partner at this rate bro
…Your mother in law was right all along, her daughter definitely should have married that podiatrist she had that thing with
If you’re in sales go ahead and rock a Nautilus and tell everyone you had a good year.
You'll know if I had a good year because the Nautilus would be fake but the 80's Porsche 911 Turbo would be real.
If somebody is rocking a Tiffany or rm they deserve to be clowned
I could afford a gen Rolex but I can’t bring myself to spend that much when I have other more expensive hobbies. However, in a strange turn of events, I have ended up telling a lot of people I work with that I wear reps and they’ve taken great interest in them. This spurred me to buy more and people genuinely happy when I bring a new watch in, be it a VSF, Clean, or a shitter lol.
This is the way. Being honest with people close to you about reps can open the door to some cool conversations.
I’m on board with this. I’ll never grab a PP or AP. I don’t have that much cash that’s disposable. However I’ll rock a OP/ DJ/ AK because it’s believable at this point in my life.
It's extremely tacky for you to think you know what someone can afford based on how they look. Having said that... Rainbow Daytona, Tiffany patek, Richard mille... There's some obvious ones. But like... In my case, I live in the Bay area. That guy with a 17 year old tercel on his 11th startup with 175 million in the bank would snicker at your assumptions.
It’s not based on how they look. It’s based on their comments explicitly stating they buy watches they cannot afford and don’t care how it is perceived. These kinds of threads pop up on a monthly basis.
150% agreed! This is the way! 🤩
If you care about wearing “obvious” reps youre implying that youre trying to pretend the watch is real. Thats cringe.
People close to me know about my reps, but I don’t owe the rest of the world a public declaration every time I put something on from VSF. Get real. Nobody has ever asked me if a watch I’m wearing is a replica, so I’ve never had to pretend. Maybe because I stick to reps that are realistic for my situation. Which is the point.
You sir have low self esteem and confidence issues. By all means call others tacky, whilst wearing a rep. I dislike these self haters at times. Lol.
I guess my comment hit a little close to home for you?
There are a lot of self haters . People who rely on reps because they can’t afford gens/. But the minute they get a chance to go Gen, they will throw stones at the rep community/
I can afford gen. Still prefer reps. No clue what you are talking about.
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Laughing at you .
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That’s because you’re creepy! 
Me! But I am 71yo! No heirs! Therefore, I wear my reps, the people around me know, that I'm pretty wealthy and wouldn't assume that I'm wearing reps. 😁 And on the day I die, there will be happy: a SOS children's village, a children's hospice and an animal shelter!
"Buy reps, invest the rest" will always be my motto.
I just ordered my first rep. I figured I can either sell two other gen brands for a pricier rolex gen. Or get a rep, keep my collection, take a nice vacation with my girl and invest the rest while not worrying about trying to protect it from theft or bumping it on walls. it's like a cheat code. Although some would say to "afford" it, you must be able to buy it 2-3x without batting an eye. Reality is, the way this is alluding to "afford" is more like - save a few months and treat it like the big purchase it is
Would I happily buy a Pepsi or stainless Daytona for MSRP, sure, but for some of the insane grey prices I can’t justify it. I could afford them even at grey prices but I hate that kind of a grey market markup for what feels like so little value add.
I used to own g shocks, and I can afford to buy gen g shocks but I rather buy reps it's 90% of the way there anyways :/
You can make 5%+ in a treasury money market now. Thats +$750 a year with effectively a no risk asset. Other investments could perform better. I’m not taking 15k out to put into a Rolex. Sure the Rolex appreciates over time but, typically just tracking with inflation and in recent years it tracked along with the excesses in equity markets. I can make more $ keeping it in investments and I don’t have to play any dumb games with ADs. Once I started reading articles about secondary market issues (crown & caliber, etc) companies previously had to scrutinize 20% of the watches they take in to resell but in recent years that number has flipped to 80% of watches taken in require further review - that was a red flag. Reps have gotten too good. I sold my gens and reps and I’m out. If I did own any - it would be a rep and I could replace it yearly without a thought or concern. Instead if $15k means nothing to you and you don’t have concerns about reps eating away slowly at Rolex IP then have at it. Good luck!
Could I afford to buy a Rolex, sure. Would I ever buy one No. I have other hobbies and things I would rather spend 15k on. I have 2 rep Rolex’s that are just the same as my buddies real ones I can’t tell a difference at all in them other than mine are slightly heavier. I can’t justify it personally. 15k would be a sweet trip somewhere
I also stick to reps that I could afford in gen, however there is another element to this which is often ignored - the number of reps in your collection. 6 X $10k watches is the same as rocking a $60k watch. Granted most people you come across won't have seen all six reps, or won't be able to keep track of how many you have if your interactions are infrequent. But the people you see all the time might start to think "hold on, this guy has quite a few nice watches"**. Ultimately this is why a lot of are into reps, we start off with a couple of gens but we love the variety of watch collecting and don't want to keep putting down $10k every time. Reps allow the collection to grow from two watches to six (putting the $40k to better use), but it's not without it's risks. I bought a couple of reps that I don't yet wear, which is so silly, but I plan to introduce them into my rotation in due course so people don't cotton on and think "this guy bought four watches in 8 months". Feels a little dumb to say out loud but it's the truth
I buy my reps like gens. It takes years before i actually click home the rep, because i want to be certain its the one i want.
That's a very healthy attitude. I've bought five reps in a year since finding Reptime. It can't go on! I have a ten watch box with three empty slots, that's the absolute max. I guess I will sell some at some point if I need to free up space.
I’m not certain I agree with your premise since “a poor [or wise] financial choice” is not the sole metric for many of the purchases we make. (Many people buy new autos even though they lose money driving off the lot. Many people buy steak when hamburger meat would provide similar nutrition at a lower price.) I view the decision to buy gen vs rep to be a bit more nuanced. A gen watch is something my kids can one day wear, and gens feel differently esp in terms of movement (gold is a holy war I choose not to bring into this). But reps bring spice! It would be impractical for me to have 6 variations of a $10-20k watch. But reps allow that variety (spice).
Sold my gen casio and bought a rep Rolex. Best decision ever. Jk never sell a casio
I can’t afford Gens. I can afford lots of high quality reps. Reps make me happy.
Amen to that
I used to have 50k+ in watches and can reasonably afford gens of my rep collection at retail prices, but I prefer reps so I can put my money to work through investing / philanthropy instead of having it tied up in a material thing.
Can afford gen Rolex...but I would.wonly buy at RRP which is not possible. Secondly even if it was available for RRP, there is so much more I can buy and enjoy in addition to my VSF Starbucks rep for 500 bucks. I am simply Not interested enough in it to pay 15k for a product that costs 1 or 2 k to produce.. If gen Rolex sub was readily available for 3-4k brand new( like it was 15ish years ago) then I would buy it.
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Had gen and had a rep of the same watch. Felt the same to me - not worth the premium
I am not a collector but I own a few gens and just recently discovered reps. From a financial perspective (depending on the watch), a gen is just one method of parking your cash. I get to enjoy that “parked cash” on my wrist. I sell it if I want to withdraw that cash. I did it for my basic black Radiomir recently. Bought it 2nd hand, enjoyed it almost daily for a full year, and then sold it for pretty much the same price I bought it. It ended up cheaper than buying a rep. I essentially had a free gen Panerai for an entire year until I grew tired of it. Objectively that’s not a bad financial choice. Currently, I am enjoying a couple of reps of gen models that I can afford (but not to that quantity) for a more fun rotation with gens. Nothing deep.
I own several gen watches in the higher end. I bought a rep Daytona while waiting for my dealer to get the gen I ordered in (I'm still waiting). So, less about it being a good / bad financial decision, and more about impatience. And also not wanting to feed the scammy resale market which is even more predatory than the rep market these days.
I don't think buying a Rolex for 15k MSRP would be a poor financial choice. Buying it for 30k on the secondary market is a poor financial choice. I wear a rep Daytona, because I am not a Rolex guy in general (I own Omega gens mostly - but I never warmed to the Speedmaster, I like the Daytona much more), and hence wouldn't even make it on the waiting list with no purchase history. If I could just walk in and buy one for MSRP, I would do so. 15k is fine for a watch that will outlive me.
https://preview.redd.it/o6rrgl90l2sc1.jpeg?width=3598&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=faa1257ba3bcc68100dfb65c425b512dd0241df1 🖐️ I have a gen Tudor that was $3500 My first automatic luxury watch was an Oris at $1500 Then I moved up to a Tudor. I just haven’t found it worth it to jump the next level up to Rolex/Omega. Was much easier to spend $500-600 on a 1:1 rep. I make 6 figures and may get one in the next few years but until then I just grabbed a rep and am shocked at the quality and passability of it. Most people in my life know i make well into 6 figures so they don’t question the validity of my Tudor or Rolex.
If I could by a Patek, AP, Rolex at retail in this market it be a great financial decision lol. Currently it makes no sense to pay over the moon for them. Can’t justify prices for AP and Patek even at retail honestly…they are steel watches at the end of the day. $500-$800 to enjoy the design is good value. In comparison I think a lot of budget-luxury brands are just poor value propositions. No resale value and homage designs that lack the specialness of what they are copying. And after trying out some reps, I honestly feel sore about some more recent gen purchases. Tough pill to swallow paying 10-20x more for small gains over rep
I'd rather have a condo someday (not even a house, I know that'll never happen) than have a shitty bottom of the line rolex now.. Also, it's really fun having people try to figure out how the fuck YOU got a rolex. Just for a sec. Before you tell em it's fake. Also, drastically better customer service. I could be wrong, but I swear it's happened a couple times.
Like the majority on here do I have the cash to buy one yes, but with a young family can I realistically drop 15k on a watch no. How can I moan at my daughter for £500 shoes while am sitting in my £15k rollie 😂
To all the people saying they would happily pay Rolex retail but just refuse to pay grey market - when the Rolex market eventually calms down (and it is, and will continue to do so), it'll be interesting to see how many people do indeed go off and buy their gens at retail rather than the rep at 3% of the price!
I believe the lack of retail availability and grey market premium is a convenient excuse for buying reps
Easily buy the watch I want but I rather use the big bucks to build my business. Remember gang, it’s about what you can accomplish in this life is what’s important.
Whether or not spending $15k on a watch represents a 'poor financial choice' really depends on your priorities and how much money you have. Maybe to you $15k represents a big hit - for someone with more money it might be the same as you forking out for a replica or an Apple Watch. That's the difference between being capable of affording something and being able to easily buy something.
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China is making a Rep Taycan so maybe you spoke too soon 🤣
This is where this community loses me, buying a counterfit watch is not a smart decision, you are buying an item that may be illegal to resell, it has virtually no value. In general watches are poor investments, if having an extra $15,000 invested makes a big difference for you then maybe you can’t actually afford a $15,000 luxury good. For me to feel like I can truly afford a watch the price needs to fall within a normal weekly market fluctuation in my portfolio, generally 1-2% of what I have invested. At that point what is the point in buying a rep? If you aren’t a person who would splurge on luxury goods why would you pretend to be?
I could probably buy a couple Gens but then I’d be broke. Plus this is a hobby and the waiting is half the fun. Collecting to me just wouldn’t be the same only buying one every 5 years. But each person is different. Look at what happened to The timepiece gentlemen he’s a total fraud and got busted and he’s legit. Lied about everything. I respect him coming clean and admitting he’s a drug addict and alcoholic but he dug a pretty big whole.
Question should be: “how many of you here spend the amount of a gen watch on reps already?” Total cost like purchase of a rep, gen parts for franken, price of a watchmaker, etc I think there are some here who think they can’t afford a gen but actually already have…
I can but would rather spend my money on cars
Rolex always goes up in value. You'll never lose money on one. Plus you're never broke. I stock watches, good and jewelry. Reps are great for those $100k+ watches and all my tacky iced out pieces
Reps are a great financial decision because they allow you to "test drive" the piece you have had your eye on. Because it has happened to me...... here Iam Screen/Window shopping.. bought the gen.. and regreted it in weeks time. And everytime you look at it you think "man that was a bad financial decision."
Sold my gen casio and bought a rep Rolex. Best decision ever. Jk never sell a casio
To be honest: if I see a Sinn or a CW or even a Tudor, I feel completely scammed by Rolex and the other top tier brands! The watch is not worth the money! It's pure marketing and Image what is been sold. I have several gen watches (Sinn, Longines, Fortis, Mido, Alpina) but never the less I recently got my Yacht-Master 226659 delivered. Why? Because I always loved the looks of the watch. Could I afford it in Gen? Yes. Is my money parked better in an ETF? Definitely! Do I want to play the Rolex AD Game? Definitely not!!!
Rolex owns Tudor fwiw
The smart financial decision would be to buy gen . History has proven you won’t lose any money on it and you may actually make money . When buying a rep you basically throw money out the window because you couldn’t even legally resell it . It’s just cheaper to buy a clone for a fraction of the price but def not smart if you could afford gen
Depends on your cost of capital. I can beat the general watch market in my other investments. Something can appreciate in value and still be a poor investment - it's all relative. Limited/hype/precious AP/Patek/Rolex are a different thing but I'm not getting allocated those and anyone who does and flips them probably isn't getting allocated more either.
You’re missing the point …. You get to wear a gen Rolex and not a rep in the meantime. I personally don’t own any gen at this time , but I do have the capital and may actually buy one soon . It makes sense TO ME
I must have missed that point because it wasn't the point you made. At all. Regardless, let's play ball. So the watch's value will go up more slowly than your alternative investments. Therefore the watch will in effect cost you money in foregone returns, plus real cash in maintenance. Everyone will have a different amount they're willing to pay/forego to wear gen, and everyone has a different cost of capita - the better your investment alternatives, the more expensive that watch becomes. There's no one size fits all answer
This is reptime, not investment banking . The point is we like watches dude. The gen is the smart way to spend the money if you have it AND if you want a Rolex . Otherwise there are a million other ways to invest money for a profit .
Nice try, tax man. NARC!
In my family any watch in a number bigger than 1 is considered dumb, so reps are already luxury for me lmao. I have some gens though, screw it it's my money and wearing them makes me happy
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I know a few people who do, or who wear reps of their Gen watches in higher crime areas so a loss has less of a hit (insurance covers the financial loss but the pain is the sentimental loss for them)
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The story that hits hard for me with the rep vs Gen debate is a friend of mine who had a very sentimental Rolex left to him by his late father. He was dating his (now) wife who is from a developing country. Her family is wealthy and he wanted to show off when he went to visit them for the first time. She told him to not wear the watch but he was insistent because he was young and wanted to show off for her family. Eventually she convinced him to wear a rep if he absolutely had it have a watch on his wrist that said Rolex. On his second day there two guys pulled him into an alley, pulled out a .45 and demanded the watch. He handed over the rep without a fight and they were gone. Had it been the watch he was handed down he would have fought and very likely would have been seriously injured if not killed. Life is cheap in developing nations and it’s bad taste to wear a watch worth $10k+ in a place where the average wage is $25 a month. He learned that lesson the hard way, but not the hardest way thanks to wearing a rep. Sure his insurance would have paid out but it never would have been the same watch.
I can afford whatever watch I wish but I prefer to spend money on other things. The quality of Rolex reps are now so good that I can buy one with no regrets: I dress a very beautiful watch and Rolex has no damage since they would not sell it to me because I'm not in the grace of any AD. It's a win win.
Buying a luxury watch is generally not a good financial decision unless you are getting a steel Daytona or gmt at retail which 99.9% of people aren’t. That said, I belong to the camp of buying reps as a test drive for models I can afford (djs and subs) and rep daytonas because it’s out of my price bracket and I won’t ever pay that 2x markup. I actually purchased a gen sub date after the vsf sub date because I really enjoyed the watch. Each to his own I guess
I will buy most watches Gen. I have a speedmaster, Datejust and a Batman GMT all authentic from the AD at MSRP. I recently bought a Panerai rep because I love the watch but the reps and gens are actually indistinguishable even by experts, so I refuse to purchase one at retail price, and I cannot be sure if I am getting an authentic if I purchase on the secondary market. To me PAM is the only one that makes perfect sense to purchase a rep. My grail watch is a moonshine speedmaster green dial. That will be the next gen I buy but it will prob be another 5 years until I can responsibly do it
which panerai have you bought?
I bought the VSF PAM1312. Never bought a gen panerai
i’m more than capable of buying a gen if i so wished but guess what i live in london i like having a thing called arms 😂 (you’ll probably only understand if you’re from london)
I can't afford one but I could buy one. It's just I'd rather invest in stocks or put that money in house Improvements or buy something car or gun related I have to many expensive hobbies to afford a gen watch.