The Craziest price for a Yema N8 yet !!

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The Craziest price for a Yema N8 yet !!

Post by Seiko7A38 »

It may come as a surprise to some readers, even members of the old forum, that the third most visited thread was the: Yema N7s and N8s spotted on eBay, LeBonCoin and Yahoo.jp thread. Over its nearly 9-year lifespan and 42 pages, it managed to garner some 163,450 page views. That surprised me too, because although the subject is a particular area of interest of mine, I can't say I'd really noticed before. Like other similar long-running threads, it took quite an effort to maintain and at this stage, I have no plans to continue where I left off.

Well, that's not strictly true. :P

Unfortunately, like so many other threads, the subject of unrealistic speculative over-pricing reared its ugly head on a few occasions. Most recently in December last year, when Italian eBay seller strega_68 listed a NOS Yema N81W63, with an absolutely ridiculous 'pie-in-the-sky' Buy-it-Now price of $2000 !! :lol:

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Extremely-Ra ... 4499037748

Yema-N81W63-Gold-Blue+SilverFace-eBay-Dec2020-Another-Listing.png
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Naturally, I commented in my typically sarcastic manner. Although I knew that eBay seller strega_68 had been a forum member for a number of years as 'Giovanni', he'd never posting anything before. In mid-January he woke up to the fact that I was taking the mickey (putting it politely) and quoted my original post at the top of page 42. He didn't stop there. He repeated his protests a number of times, but I deleted his subsequent posts and sadly ended up having to ban him. That's also the reason the thread remained locked.

I suspect Giovanni was initially just trying it on, as usual. But he clearly had no idea of realistic values of these watches (which I did try to point out, citing recent examples). So after stomping off in temper, he promptly ended the listing (as allegedly no longer available) and re-listed it with the Buy-it-Now price arbitrarily reduced at a stroke to 'only' $1500.

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Extremely-Ra ... 4572632611

Yema-N81W63-Gold-Blue+SilverFace-eBay-Jan2021-Re-Listing.png
Yema-N81W63-Gold-Blue+SilverFace-eBay-Jan2021-Re-Listing.png (218.78 KiB) Viewed 6420 times

Needless to say, it still remains unsold. :roll:

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Re: The Craziest price for a Yema N8 yet !!

Post by Seiko7A38 »

Over the 9 years the thread ran for, I saw a few borderline crazy prices asked for Yema N8's. :shock: This post of mine from page 9 of that thread, about yet another listing by a notorious profiteering French eBay re-seller, for a certain familiar (much re-listed and re-sold) Yema Spationaute III 38mm reduced, dates back to April 2014.

YemaSpationauteIII-38mm-eBay-April2014-Listing-1499Euros-Post.png
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There may have been others besides, but best I can remember, Giovanni's original December 2020 asking price of $2000 for his NOS N81W63 held the undisputed record (for stupidity). That was until now ....

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Re: The Craziest price for a Yema N8 yet !!

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At the weekend, I ran my full worldwide eBay search on 'Yema', as a 'catchall' to check if there was anything of interest that my regular saved searches had missed recently. Are you ready for this ? :o

This used Yema N81W63 was listed 3 days ago, by a deluded Canadian eBay seller, with an incredible Buy-it-Now price of $7400 CAD. That's equivalent to £4220 GBP. For the impecunious potential buyer, there's an option to buy it 'on tick' from £200 per month for 24 months (which works out at £4800 !!). :lol:

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Rare-Vintage ... 3939320813

Yema-N81W63-Gold-Blue+SilverFace-eBay-Feb2021-Listing.png
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A few observations on the seller's description:
As I've already demonstrated (in the old forum thread), these particular Yema N8's are anything but 'very rare'.
The seller appears to be ignorant that 'a small blue gem' set into the crown is commonly known as a cabouchon.
They claim that the leather band is 'all original'. It's not. It's a 20mm strap squeezed to fit the watch's 19mm lug width.
Indeed, if you check their last photo, the underside of the strap can clearly be seen to be embossed with LONGINES. :roll:

Yema-N81W63-Gold-Blue+SilverFace-eBay-Feb2021-6.jpg
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But my favourite bit is this sentence:
Yema-N81W63-Gold-Blue+SilverFace-eBay-Feb2021-Description-Line.png
Yema-N81W63-Gold-Blue+SilverFace-eBay-Feb2021-Description-Line.png (2.67 KiB) Viewed 6366 times
"Virtually" ?? :? I'm wondering how this dreamer came up with their valuation. :lol:

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Re: The Craziest price for a Yema N8 yet !!

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Not surprisingly the Yema N81W63 above (retaining the same eBay item # 143939320813) remains steadfastly unsold. :lol:
Meanwhile ....
Seiko7A38 wrote: Sun Feb 07, 2021 9:29 pmSo after stomping off in temper, he promptly ended the listing (as allegedly no longer available) and re-listed it with the Buy-it-Now price arbitrarily reduced at a stroke to 'only' $1500.

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Extremely-Ra ... 4572632611

Yema-N81W63-Gold-Blue+SilverFace-eBay-Jan2021-Re-Listing.png
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Needless to say, it still remains unsold. :roll:
In his habitual manner, Italian eBay seller strega_68 continues to end (usually as allegedly no longer available) and immediately re-list his almost as ridiculously over-priced example every 30 days, sticking stubbornly to his 'reduced' Buy-it-Now price of $1500. :roll: Though just to vary things a little, he conveniently loses it every now and then ....

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Extremely-Ra ... 4632328427

Yema-N81W63-Gold-Blue+SilverFace-eBay-March2021-(re-listed)-Ended-Lost_or_Broken.png
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Evidently, Giovanni is also prone to making the occasional error. :lol:

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Extremely-Ra ... 4677704484

Yema-N81W63-Gold-Blue+SilverFace-eBay-April2021-(re-listed)-Ended-Error.png
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Here's the latest re-cycled re-listing which appeared at lunchtime today. By my reckoning, his 5th re-listing @ $1500. :roll:

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Extremely-Ra ... 4720722713

Yema-N81W63-Gold-Blue+SilverFace-eBay-May2021-Re-Listing.png
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Re: The Craziest price for a Yema N8 yet !!

Post by Seiko7A38 »

I hadn't bothered posting an update before, but the deluded Canadian eBay seller had ended his long-running listing for the world's most expensive Yema N8 a fortnight ago, in the time-honoured fashion, as allegedly no longer available. :roll:

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/143939320813

Yema-N81W63-Gold-Blue+SilverFace-eBay-Feb2021-Ended-NLA.png
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It hasn't re-appeared since. :| What reminded me was, while checking my eBay watching page, I noticed that Italian eBay seller strega_68 had ended his latest re-listing earlier this morning, because of yet another unforced error. :lol:

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/124845620585

Yema-N81W63-Gold-Blue+SilverFace-eBay-August2021-(re-listed)-Ended-Error.png
Yema-N81W63-Gold-Blue+SilverFace-eBay-August2021-(re-listed)-Ended-Error.png (55.59 KiB) Viewed 5833 times

Given his track record, I'm fairly confident it'll be back on eBay, re-listed for the umpteenth time, anytime soon. ;)

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Re: The Craziest price for a Yema N8 yet !!

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So predictable. :roll: After at least 7 unsuccessful re-listings @ $1500, deluded Italian eBay seller strega_68's ludicrously over-priced (and not even remotely 'rare') Yema N81W63 is back on eBay again, re-listed as of yesterday evening, with the Buy-it-Now price reduced by a paltry $100 to $1400. At this rate, he may get down to a realistic price by 2025. :lol:

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Extremely-Ra ... 4896466136

Yema-N81W63-Gold-Blue+SilverFace-eBay-Sept2021-Re-Listing.png
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Re: The Craziest price for a Yema N8 yet !!

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Remiss of me not to have followed up on the previous post. I can't remember how many more times the deluded Italian eBay seller re-listed his stupidly over-priced Yema N81W63, but he must have eventually given up trying to flog it. :roll: Needless to say there's no trace of it in eBay history. Evidently it has remained unsold, because it re-appeared on eBay yesterday evening, with the Buy-it-Now price reduced to 'only' $800 (from his original risible $2000 in December 2020).
That's still at least 3, if not 4 times what one might realistically expect to pay for such an example - even NOS.

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Yema-Paris-S ... 5536317347

Yema-N81W63-Gold-Blue+SilverFace-eBay-Nov2022-Re-Listing.jpg
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The wording of the listing is slightly different; surprisingly he's since dropped 'Extremely Rare' form the title and the three photos are new, but it's clearly the same watch (the s/n 1078 can be read through the red case-back protection). Apart from the reduced price, there is one other difference. The eBay seller ID is now angeli_65 rather than strega_68. IIRC, that account originally belonged to Giovanni's wife, Francesca. Their stated location of Volpiano is the same.

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Re: The Craziest price for a Yema N8 yet !!

Post by Seiko7A38 »

I had to chuckle to myself yesterday evening. Giovanni's Yema N81W63 is back on eBay again, just in time for Christmas.
He's still using his wife's eBay account and has reverted to using two of the three photos from the original eBay listing in December 2020. The price is down $100 from last year's $800 to $700 - still three times what it's realistically worth. :roll:

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/YEMA-BY-SEIK ... 6243637745

Yema-N81W63-Gold-Blue+SilverFace-eBay-Dec2023-Re-Listing.jpg
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