You Too Can Play the Handbag Stock Market

In my experience, the resale market for (some) handbags has been robust for quite some time. When I was younger and decidedly less well off I frequently bought/sold luxury handbags and accessories on ebay. Doing my homework allowed my to find diamonds in the rough, and each sale provided the cash for my next purchase. In the end I actually made a few dollars, had a fun hobby to enjoy, and got to carry a lot of wonderful bags. I now buy new without the intention of reselling, so my small collection is carefully curated. The skills I acquired help me keep my bags looking fabulous for a very, very long time.

$10,000 on a handbag!! I don't think all the handbags I've purchased through the years total $10,000!! There are children in this country that go hungry. Also, have pity on the poor alligators. Unbelievable.

I think if you have a luxury handbag you should use it and enjoy it. My mom used to use her Gucci and Bottega Veneta bags to death. But she loved them. I doubt she ever saw them as investments. They were accessories to be used.

what are you worried what to use? i'm disagreement to type of marketing, because the most people in the world or in a country are middle class so, it's impossible buy a bag what the price is same to a price car. For celebrities like Kylie Jenner is so easy acquire such an invesment, but for us is impossible. but also is acceptable ir you wants to buy a little colection to bags.

Heading for Canal Street with some Litecoin.

Of course, anything and almost everything can become an investment item. Handbags, described by Ms. Friedman; women's shoes (Imelda Marcos); underwear and garments, particularly of the famous; to say nothing of stamps, watches, etc. The trick is to identify a new item to that would not be as ephemeral as the stone-on-a-sring to walk.

I have a few Louis V’s for which I paid a reasonable price when I bought them new. To each their own. Kylie Jenner can easily afford all those bags. So honestly, who cares? Perhaps she’ll pass them on to her daughter like I plan to...

This is a stupid article. It is *terrible* financial advice. An "investment" should be appreciating in value. This article isn't even an argument for capital preservation, since none of these brands are holding value at par. In the best case scenario - Hermes - a resale at 80% of purchase price means that you are still losing 20%. Compared to this, a "safe bet" is saving you money and parking it in a savings account.

First, I personally love Chanel because of their quality and craftsmanship. I also occasionally purchase vintage Chanels because I feel the styles and quality were a little better 20-30 years ago. But when I purchase them, I don't necessarily consider them as an "investment" because your idea of an investment will change over time. i know i won't get a good resale value especially if you go thru third party consignments (e.g., Rebag, TheRealReal) where they take a chunk of the commission. And don't forget that these consignments can further discount your item if they don't sell within an x amount of days so in the end you can't control the actual resale value. So in the end, luxury handbags are a leisure pursuit. Second, this article interviewed the founder of Rebag and he's essentially using this opportunity to give people "investment advice" to shop second hand luxury handbags. It's entirely misleading. His pricing model chart has never been independently evaluated. Resale value is super subjective. Third, you're quoting from Kylie Jenner. It just makes this whole article illegitimate.

While I would not propose buying high end handbags as an investment strategy, it is comforting to know that the two paychecks I spent on my one time Louis Vuitton Neverfull purchase wasn’t a total waste of money. In addition to giving me pleasure while carrying it, being actually well designed and durable, it’s nice to know that it hasn’t depreciated too much in value. Given the volatile political climate and the possibility of resulting financial unrest, I am not so sure that my money is necessarily safer in the financial markets.

No, no they're not a great investment. Tell yourself what you will or must, Kylie, but just ... no. As one who has lived longer and 'collected' all sorts of things that were supposed to be 'valuable,' even had or are still having their 'moments' of interest, I will attest from experience to what a hollow pursuit this was, and is And the end of my life is far nearer than the beginning or even middle, I see all items, even lovely ones, as a waste of money, and more importantly, and far more valuable, a complete waste of time. Plus, no one wants 'stuff' anymore. At least not among my friends and family. So, Ms. Kardashian, enjoy them, let them soothe you or bring you pleasure, but don't fool yourself that that are also 'a great investment.' And don't try to fool a new generation that they are thus. (And really -- do you need the cash?)

Oh, for the love of god. Really?? Idea: Send this story to the White House. Their subscription to the NYT will be renewed instantly. Try to remember that most of your readers have brains.

And children are starving....... Sad, sad, sad!

yeah well 99.99% of people cannot buy a birkin so what is the point of this article again?

After finishing this comment, I'm going to make 412 copies of the article and deliver them door-to-door in the poorer part of town, on the other side of the tracks. Buying and holding super-expensive handbags is the perfect solution for ending poverty as we know it. Who knew?

Remember tulips? Bound to be a crash.

What you have to keep in mind is that in order to even be offered a Birkin bag (really the only bag that maintains or increases its value), you have to be obscenely wealthy in the first place with a robust spending history at Hermes. And I’m guessing that people with this type of money have legitimate investments and don’t need to justify their luxury purchase by labeling it as such. Anticipated use over resale value should be way higher on a high-end handbag purchaser’s list, or any shopping list for that matter. Otherwise it sounds like you’re trying to excuse away a nasty shopping addiction.

Given the world we live in, this is truly disturbing. Why worry about global warming when you can invest in handbags and watches?

Well, I read this article while eating lunch at my desk; then involuntarily 'purged' and went on with my day.

There is a flaw in trying to equate luxury handbags to futures contracts used to spot and predict price trends. Futures contracts have very exacting quality standardization for the underlying products, with scant room for variation within grades. Handbags do not, and their condition -- even when branded as "new" -- can vary tremendously, (e.g., is patina on a Vuitton bag's vachetta leather in an otherwise nearly new bag a huge deficit?). Grading them is VERY subjective. Few people keep handbags pristine and unused for the several years it might require to recoup their investment, and even if they don't carry them the leather ages, metal fittings tarnish or unintentionally scratch and valuations decline as the age of the bag increase. Finally, who is authenticating these bags, and how secure are their websites? Even the most experienced luxury bag resellers always are working to avoid reselling "super-fake" bags. They also are clearly having challenges keeping their clients' data secure. for example, Stock X's website was hacked in May 2019. After users' data showed up on the Dark Web and StockX offered users free credit monitoring, according to this article: https://techcrunch.com/2019/08/03/stockx-hacked-millions-records/ It makes one think twice before reallocating investment resources into handbags and elevating them to portfolio staple status.

This has got to be among the worst, wrongest investment advice since people were told that Beanie Babies were a good investment. Please just stop.

Why is the song "Tiptoe through the Tulips" running through my head right now?

Anyone who was "investing" during the Beanie Baby frenzy of the 90's might want to speak up here...

I'm feeling rather nauseated, after having read this. Maybe it's because of the meteoric descent down this particularly Materialistic Rabbit Hole . . .

However, rather than buy several "less expensive" bags that immediately lose all their resale-value or "captive" value once purchased and used. It seems better to have a few good bags that retain a fair percentage of their value over time.

Everyone involved in this story is confusing investments - which are supposed to go up in value - with something that doesn't depreciate as much as other things in its category. If a handbag only depreciates 10% in value on average - like a Birkin apparently does - it doesn't mean you made money on it. It just means you only lost 10% of what you paid for it. And that's before you calculate consignment fees or the re-purchase price which has to be less than the market price for the reseller to make a profit. Plus, you can't have used it much because condition is everything. Bottom line - You really only make money on a handbag if you're a celebrity and the designer gave it to you for free.