But I can't take the kind of depreciation hit that will come with these cams.
LOL. What is the going rate for a used RX-1?
You are right, I am logical.
First, cameras are not investment instruments. Stocks and bonds are better. A price drop is just bad timing. But it is also a different point of view. If I had waited until the price of the Pentax 645D to drop, I would have not had the 10,000 images I shot with it nor the book that was published with those images--I am not a camera collector. Before the 645D, I was using medium-format film cameras. The savings in film and processing costs paid for the camera. Naturally, your situation is different. But I don't mind also paying for the pleasure I am getting from owning this camera now. (BTW, this was not an easy purchase for me, I literally sold 200lbs of stuff over ebay to pay for this.)
Second, there is no Sony brand bias. Who here would not buy a Nex 7 because it is a Sony? There may be a few, but there are more that want the camera. The rarer the camera, that more interest. I don't have to sell the camera to find a buyer--the buyers will know the value. Would you buy something from the Pannon Camera Company? Probably you never heard of them, but there are a lot of folks that want a Widelux. I have always bought unusual cameras and have found I can get a good price for them, much more so than a low-end model that was made in larger quantities--which worked out well when I had to fund my camera purchases.
But why do I have to sell this camera? It makes amazing pictures and will continue to do so. I feel no need to "upgrade" with each new model. When I can make 5 foot prints, what advantage do I get with an RX2 or RX3?
Yes, I saw the price backlash. Show me a 35mm sensor camera with a 35mm f/2 at this quality that is significantly cheaper. Now show me one this size. The next closest in size is a Leica M with a 35mm f/2 Summicron. That would be more than $10,000. A DSLR is going to be somewhere between $2,000 and $3,000 dollars and a lens like this is $900 to $1,300. So why is the price so outrageous?
But the backlash is coming from a different group than the folks buying this camera. That is not the target group. Most of the cameras I have bought over my career would leave folks nonplussed over the price. I have found that the photographers that have inspired me tend not to use equipment you can find at Best Buy. Is there a correlation?