Buying books from friends

Buying books we love

Buying books from friends can sometimes be fraught with danger, as my old man would always tell me. Never work for relatives, I’m not sure why he told me this, maybe it was when he was in the Army he used to send his money home to his mother, but after his discharge, his mother told him no matter how much money he gave her, it wouldn’t have been enough. Another one of his many simple anecdotes.

Old Times & Buying books

A month or so back an old friend from the 70′s & 80′s called me & asked if I was interested in buying books about motorcycles & car books from another friends collection, very nice used books that he wanted to sell. At the time I mentioned a couple of classic authors that maybe in this book collection. “No Jim there isn’t any of those books in this collection.” We made arrangements to meet in the next week. I go back to work sorting books, specials to the net or shop then the next lot to charity or the dump. That’s what it is like buying books for my shop and buying books for my website.

Buying books wheat & chaff

On the agreed day in walks a friend from long ago, here are those books you will be buying. Three boxes to look through, upon opening the first box, right on the top is one of those books easy worth three hundred dollars. I go through the rest of the books, most being of the motorcycles of the sixties, British motorcycles the odd racing & vintage & auto mobile books. But none are of the same quality as the Phil Irving book a pity but you can only judge the books in front of you. Friends or not you have to cast a hard eye over the books. We quickly agreed on a price for the star book, and I will work out a price to buy the rest of the books when he comes back through next week.

Motorcycles, Auto racing & Buying books

Over the course of the next week I go through the books and price them only to find no real standout books, but good honest motorcycle & car racing books. But after some deliberation I decide on a figure that I think is fair all round to buy the books even though he was a close friend I still have to make a profit. When I give him my final quote & money. We have a chit-chat about the old times riding bikes, and catching up on some of the other riders of those days. I haven’t ridden a motorcycle for over twenty years.

Happy Days & Buying books

On this occasion buying books from friends was a good experience all round. He got top dollar for the stand-out books and a more than fair price for the rest of his used books. This turned out to be a good book buying experience. As always the best books go quickly but take a look at our motorcycle books there maybe a book you want to buy.