RPF0325-Jim_Rawles

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00:00:29.800 | Welcome to Radical Personal Finance, the show dedicated to providing you with the knowledge,

00:00:35.880 | skills, insight, and encouragement you need to live a rich and meaningful life now while

00:00:41.480 | also building a plan for financial freedom in 10 years or less.

00:00:46.200 | On today's show, I welcome back past guest of Radical Personal Finance, James Wesley

00:00:50.560 | Rawls.

00:00:52.280 | Jim is an author, most famously of the largest survival website on the internet called Survival

00:00:59.760 | Blog.com.

00:01:00.760 | He's also written a series of novels.

00:01:03.120 | He comes from a military background and also has a deep level of expertise in survivalism

00:01:09.360 | and preparedness.

00:01:11.360 | But he also, most interestingly for today's show, has a deep level of expertise on the

00:01:16.480 | subject of firearms.

00:01:18.240 | Specifically, I've invited him on today to discuss how to invest in guns, how you can

00:01:25.880 | diversify your investments by purchasing, owning, trading, investing in guns.

00:01:34.240 | I'm really excited to bring this show to you because I think it will be practically useful

00:01:40.680 | to those of you who wish to pursue this course of action.

00:01:44.960 | It will also be theoretically interesting to those of you who are just interested in

00:01:49.640 | considering investment markets.

00:01:53.040 | I think guns are a unique asset class.

00:01:57.720 | This episode advances one of my major agendas with Radical Personal Finance.

00:02:00.920 | Over time, my hope is that I can change the way that people in general think about investing.

00:02:06.840 | Over time, I'd like to undo a lot of the marketing work of the financial world.

00:02:11.400 | Today, if I say "investment" to the average person on the street, they automatically think

00:02:17.560 | of something like a mutual fund held within a retirement account.

00:02:22.520 | Now, although that is one perfectly valid way to think about investing, that's primarily

00:02:28.840 | a concept that has been sold to you systematically by the financial industry over the last few

00:02:33.240 | decades.

00:02:34.240 | That's not the only way to invest, and it's not even necessarily the best way to invest.

00:02:39.240 | It's simply one way to invest that has certain attributes, certain characteristics, but there

00:02:44.120 | are many other ways to invest.

00:02:46.560 | I like to profile some of those different approaches to investing, which is why I'm

00:02:50.520 | excited to bring you today's episode.

00:02:53.560 | Guns are unique, and I love thinking about the marketplace from an investment perspective

00:03:00.360 | because of some of the underlying characteristics.

00:03:02.520 | So before I play the interview, I want to talk with you about seven interesting characteristics

00:03:08.560 | of the firearms marketplace that you should consider and consider how they apply to your

00:03:15.280 | own situation with possibly your interest in investing in guns or how they apply to

00:03:21.760 | other types of marketplaces that you see around you that might be more familiar to you.

00:03:30.920 | First thing I'd like to discuss is the underlying value and floor of an investment.

00:03:36.040 | One fear that many people have about investing in certain types of assets is that somehow

00:03:41.500 | the marketplace could disintegrate and the value of that asset could be driven to zero.

00:03:47.520 | Now a lot of times this fear is unfounded.

00:03:49.860 | For example, if you invest in the assets of a company through purchasing shares of its

00:03:55.680 | stock, it's a rare company which would actually fall to a value of zero in the marketplace.

00:04:02.760 | Most companies have some level of equipment and physical plant and equipment, things that

00:04:06.920 | could be sold at a bankruptcy auction to have some underlying value.

00:04:10.560 | Not all companies.

00:04:11.560 | Some companies are simply primarily their value is composed of intellectual property

00:04:14.960 | rights and if for some reason those intellectual property rights become worthless, well then

00:04:18.720 | theoretically the value of the stock could plummet to zero or perhaps as the investor

00:04:23.280 | and owner of a company, the company could acquire so much debt that the creditors would

00:04:28.800 | take any value of the company before you were to receive any residual value.

00:04:32.740 | So it is possible that stocks can decline in value to zero but it's unlikely for most

00:04:38.320 | well-run companies.

00:04:39.320 | But it's often hard for people to visualize this when thinking about paper-based assets

00:04:44.720 | like stocks and bonds, things like that.

00:04:47.640 | But there are many other ways where you can see the underlying floor and this is one very

00:04:54.480 | attractive feature of firearms.

00:04:58.940 | Guns have today and as far as I can tell will always have some underlying intrinsic value

00:05:06.820 | as a tool.

00:05:08.200 | That tool might be for the purpose of hunting food, defending yourself from physical attack

00:05:13.080 | or simply a tool for fun by engaging in various aspects of the shooting sports.

00:05:19.640 | But that underlying value as a tool, the intrinsic value, leads to their having a fascinating

00:05:27.200 | price floor because of their utility.

00:05:31.480 | Now this is a unique characteristic and it's something I think we should pay attention

00:05:35.200 | to when considering investments.

00:05:38.320 | There are other items you could invest in that have that feature.

00:05:41.280 | For example, a functioning automobile is always going to have at least a certain value.

00:05:46.560 | I don't know what that market value is in your area but where I live, if a car works,

00:05:52.120 | you can always sell it for at least 500 bucks.

00:05:53.840 | If it gets you from point A to point B, who knows how long it's going to do that.

00:05:56.800 | But if it gets you there, it's going to be at least worth 500 bucks.

00:05:59.800 | In Florida, bonus points if the AC works, that adds another 500 bucks to your value.

00:06:04.960 | A car with a working AC has a price floor of 1,000 bucks.

00:06:07.640 | It doesn't matter how ugly, how reliable, you can sell it for 1,000 bucks if it has

00:06:11.640 | a working air conditioning.

00:06:13.920 | But automobiles generally tend to degrade over time.

00:06:16.020 | There are other things that you could do as well.

00:06:18.760 | I've always been fascinated by the market for physical coins.

00:06:23.320 | One of the benefits of some aspects of the coin marketplace is you have an underlying

00:06:28.280 | floor of value based upon the currency value of your investment.

00:06:33.760 | For example, if you're purchasing US currency pre-1965, US silver dimes, quarters and half

00:06:39.560 | dollars, well, the value of those coins is primarily going to be driven by the melt value

00:06:45.580 | of the silver marketplace.

00:06:48.000 | But if the value of silver were to plummet to effectively zero because all of the demand

00:06:53.580 | for silver disappeared, those coins have an underlying floor of value based upon their

00:06:59.780 | face value.

00:07:01.160 | A dime is always going to be worth at least 10 cents as long as the US economy and world

00:07:06.120 | economy is functioned and denominated in terms of dollars.

00:07:10.120 | Or today, some people invest in physical nickels for the same purpose.

00:07:13.780 | They have a melt value of a certain number based upon the value of the physical nickel

00:07:20.560 | as a commodity, but they always are worth at least five cents as a currency.

00:07:25.720 | This is an interesting floor.

00:07:28.020 | This is not only applicable to coins or guns.

00:07:30.520 | You could do this – you could find this in land and buildings.

00:07:33.600 | When you own a rental house, that rental house always has a certain value based upon its

00:07:41.680 | utility as shelter, either shelter that you can rent or sell.

00:07:47.360 | As long as people need or want shelter, it's going to have a certain value.

00:07:52.040 | If you own a warehouse, it's going to have a certain value as large shelter for a business

00:07:55.800 | that needs a warehouse.

00:07:57.280 | Raw land might have a basic value partly judged by the marketplace, its desirability in a

00:08:02.920 | certain climate, what's going on in the local economy.

00:08:06.240 | But if it has timber on it, there's a certain value simply based upon your being able to

00:08:10.120 | harvest and sell the timber.

00:08:12.820 | You can apply this to other types of tools.

00:08:15.020 | A snap-on wrench to a mechanic is always going to have some certain residual value as a high-quality

00:08:21.640 | tool.

00:08:22.640 | I was fascinated a few years ago when preparing for the birth of our first baby.

00:08:27.220 | My wife and I were buying cloth diapers and I couldn't believe that a used cloth diaper

00:08:35.040 | has an incredibly high residual value.

00:08:38.780 | Blew my mind.

00:08:40.540 | Used cloth diapers have an extremely high residual value when measured against their

00:08:48.400 | new purchase price.

00:08:50.020 | Amazing.

00:08:51.020 | If you want to cloth diaper your kid, you can sell all your diapers out at the end of

00:08:55.360 | your kids using them for a very high value proportionally speaking.

00:09:01.240 | So this fundamental underlying value is something we should look for and guns have that.

00:09:08.740 | They have that historically.

00:09:11.060 | Historically guns are the great leveling influence in human society.

00:09:15.300 | A gun is what makes a weak 80-year-old woman capable to defend herself against an aggressor

00:09:19.500 | or a young lady.

00:09:20.500 | A gun makes her powerful against a stronger male attacker.

00:09:24.700 | If you look at the history of liberty and freedom throughout the world, widespread gun

00:09:28.120 | ownership promotes a healthy respect for the general population by those who wish to be

00:09:32.820 | a part of the ruling class.

00:09:34.100 | It's a fascinating historical study when you go and study different cultures as they've

00:09:39.620 | developed.

00:09:40.620 | So there's a long market and even today, guns will always find a ready market value

00:09:46.020 | at some price at the gun shows or pawn shops or back alleys of every city of the world.

00:09:52.660 | This is unique as an investment attribute.

00:09:56.060 | It's kind of hard to walk into a pawn shop and sell a few shares of stock, but it's

00:10:00.380 | pretty easy to walk into a pawn shop and get a low but practical price on the sale of any

00:10:08.860 | firearm.

00:10:10.420 | Guns are also interesting.

00:10:11.420 | My second point in that they have a unique and incredible durability.

00:10:16.040 | As a physical item, they have an incredible durability.

00:10:19.740 | When cared for and prepared properly for protection against the physical elements, a gun is a

00:10:23.780 | physical item that can be sealed up in a vault for 100 years or more and that gun will emerge

00:10:29.860 | as fully capable of its intended purpose as it is today.

00:10:35.540 | I own a pistol that my grandfather wore on his belt every day as a rancher in the mountains

00:10:38.780 | of Colorado 75 years ago and it shoots just as well today as it did then.

00:10:43.860 | I own a rifle that he used to harvest deer for, feed his family, and it functions every

00:10:48.340 | bit as reliably today as it did then.

00:10:50.060 | If I want to take it out hunting, it will work just as well.

00:10:53.980 | Interesting thing, there is a subcategory in the gun marketplace of machine guns.

00:11:00.980 | Most of these fully automatic machine guns are decades old, but their values is huge.

00:11:07.940 | Their values are huge simply based upon the legislation that governs them.

00:11:12.340 | Third point about investing in guns is there are many ways to access the gun market for

00:11:18.140 | investment purposes at various dollar amounts.

00:11:22.420 | Just no matter how much money you would actually like to invest in guns, in today's interview,

00:11:27.580 | you're going to find out some ways to do it.

00:11:29.380 | Rawls discusses in today's interview how you can speculate on – if you'd like to

00:11:33.940 | speculate, you can speculate on the impact of future government legislation of paramilitary

00:11:40.180 | style semi-automatic sporting rifles with the ownership of a $19 part.

00:11:46.980 | So if you want to invest 100 bucks and speculate on what the US government will do with regard

00:11:52.220 | to gun control legislation, you can get into it for 19 bucks.

00:11:57.300 | Now if you think that – so if you predict future more restrictive gun laws, you might

00:12:03.540 | want to pay attention to that way of doing it.

00:12:06.220 | Or if you've got more money to work with, you could easily invest a few thousand bucks

00:12:09.700 | just into purchasing some rifles or you could put tens of thousands of dollars to work in

00:12:13.980 | the ownership and trading of fully automatic rifles and machine guns if you're willing

00:12:17.180 | to deal with the paperwork requirements of them.

00:12:21.220 | Another interesting feature to guns is they can be very compact and portable.

00:12:26.400 | You could relatively easily store $50,000 or $100,000 worth of firearms in a large home

00:12:31.520 | safe in your spare bedroom.

00:12:34.500 | If needed, you could transport that high dollar value of property in the trunk of a large

00:12:37.740 | car or the back of an SUV or a pickup truck.

00:12:40.780 | It's a little bit different as far as the compactness of wealth than say purchasing

00:12:47.100 | a house.

00:12:49.320 | So there's an interesting dynamic to the portability and the compact nature and ability

00:12:55.240 | to store wealth.

00:12:57.140 | Fifth, guns have an almost infinite level of specialization.

00:13:01.480 | So as a marketplace, it's fascinating to consider it in the aggregate as far as guns,

00:13:08.420 | which is a somewhat nondescriptive term, versus certain types of guns.

00:13:13.260 | It's a perfect market into which you can apply specialized knowledge to gain a competitive

00:13:19.180 | advantage.

00:13:20.740 | Sixth, guns have the unique feature of generally always being in high demand.

00:13:27.860 | Personally, it's a rare gun owner that I know who owns only one.

00:13:32.600 | So there's always a strong market among existing gun owners.

00:13:36.300 | I know some of you are international listeners and the markets in your country are different

00:13:40.100 | than they are in the United States of America.

00:13:41.660 | But there's generally a strong market.

00:13:45.540 | Although I'm sure they must exist somewhere, I've never personally met anyone who, after

00:13:50.760 | owning a gun or multiple guns, generally voluntarily becomes a non-gun owner.

00:13:55.860 | Sure, people get rid of guns.

00:13:57.900 | But if you look at the weapons collected in gun buyback programs, you usually find some

00:14:02.760 | intelligent business people trading in worthless, inoperable hunks of junk to their local police

00:14:09.260 | department in exchange for some very useful cash or gift cards if that's what they're

00:14:14.060 | using.

00:14:15.060 | So here's a little market tip for you.

00:14:17.340 | If you ever hear of your local police department holding a gun buyback program, get some cash

00:14:21.460 | together and set up – grab a table and go use it.

00:14:26.020 | See if you can make some money.

00:14:27.820 | What a lot of gun owners do is when the local police department is having a gun buyback

00:14:31.700 | program, they'll come down and set up a table and offer people cash, more cash than

00:14:36.580 | the local police department is offering for their – for the gun buyback.

00:14:40.820 | So you can often – if there is anyone selling in a weapon that actually works or is worth

00:14:44.980 | having, you can usually get it at a nice price and get yourself a good gun at a great discount.

00:14:50.860 | Plus, you can consider yourself to be doing your patriotic duty by getting that gun off

00:14:55.180 | the street and safely sequestering it into your safe, keeping it out of the hands of

00:14:59.300 | criminals.

00:15:01.140 | Or another little interesting marketplace thing, if the police department is offering

00:15:07.600 | a lot of money, sometimes it can be worth it to go buy cheap guns from a different market

00:15:12.860 | and sell them into the buyback program in order to make some money.

00:15:16.460 | There are some great stories of that happening at an Oakland, California gun buyback program

00:15:20.980 | back in 2008 where a bunch of gun owners went and purchased guns at another market for cheap

00:15:26.740 | and they were – I think they were paying 250 bucks for them and they sold them all

00:15:29.540 | to the police department, 250 bucks, and took some nice cash.

00:15:32.600 | So just pay attention for those little markets.

00:15:34.500 | As in anything, there's always interesting times to buy and to sell.

00:15:39.540 | Seventh attribute of the gun market, which I think is very fascinating, is it's a market

00:15:43.780 | that's subject to external influence, specifically legislative influence.

00:15:49.220 | Jim and I discussed this at the very beginning of today's interview, which is why I wanted

00:15:52.040 | to release this interview to you now in a timely manner because it will make a fascinating

00:15:56.780 | case study as we watch what happens in the next year or so.

00:16:00.580 | Now as with any marketplace, you should pay attention and think about the gun marketplace

00:16:05.580 | as a way to analyze the risks.

00:16:08.960 | For example, if you go out and buy guns, you have to know what you're buying.

00:16:12.820 | You have to build and rely on your own knowledge and skill or you have to establish a relationship

00:16:18.740 | with a trusted broker, somebody that you can count on to help you with their knowledge

00:16:22.820 | and skill.

00:16:24.220 | You have to physically protect your investment.

00:16:27.020 | This is something that we're not generally accustomed to thinking of.

00:16:29.420 | We only think of it when our bank gets hacked or our brokerage company gets subjected to

00:16:36.580 | a criminal operation that's trying to deal with them.

00:16:39.420 | But you have to physically protect your investment.

00:16:42.040 | You have to know the market and there are very large market risks.

00:16:46.420 | For example, you might misread the legislative direction in your country.

00:16:51.140 | What's the trend?

00:16:52.140 | Is it toward tighter restrictions on gun ownership or looser restrictions on gun ownership?

00:16:58.060 | You would have to calculate technological changes.

00:17:02.700 | Certain types of guns might be more valued in the future than others or you'd have to

00:17:07.180 | calculate the impact of 3D printing on your investment portfolio.

00:17:11.220 | A decade from now, maybe a little more, maybe a little less.

00:17:15.220 | I'm just speculating on the timing but probably a decade from now, any of us who desires to

00:17:19.420 | can mass produce our own guns on the 3D printers in our spare bedrooms.

00:17:23.900 | So how will that impact the market value of your investments?

00:17:26.940 | A more typical question, how will that impact the market value of your guns or any of your

00:17:33.860 | investment portfolio, any asset class simply as it adjusts the political tone of the world?

00:17:41.320 | How does 3D printing impact the control and imposition of tyranny by governments around

00:17:45.980 | the world?

00:17:46.980 | I have no idea.

00:17:47.980 | You have to figure that out.

00:17:49.740 | So some of these features are unique to the gun market and some are not.

00:17:53.260 | I'll try to cover other interesting markets in the future.

00:17:55.900 | I'm trying to get my mechanic to come on.

00:17:58.140 | He's got a $180,000 Porsche sitting in the back of his garage and I want to talk about

00:18:01.820 | investing in classic cars and things like that.

00:18:05.220 | There's all these interesting markets and whether or not you care to participate, I

00:18:09.700 | don't personally care to do anything with cars.

00:18:12.300 | That interests me not the least.

00:18:15.360 | Still study a market and then look around you and think about how you can apply that

00:18:21.220 | knowledge.

00:18:23.220 | But today in light of the forthcoming presidential elections, I'd like to discuss with you how

00:18:29.140 | to diversify your investment portfolio by investing in guns.

00:18:36.380 | Jim Rawls, welcome back to Radical Personal Finance.

00:18:38.260 | >>Jim Rawls: Thank you so much for having me on.

00:18:40.260 | >>Aaron Powell, House of Representatives Spokesman>>

00:18:41.260 | So we're going to tackle a topic that I think is very exciting and is sure to anger some

00:18:45.340 | people and sure to intrigue many.

00:18:47.980 | But I want to talk about guns, specifically the topic of investing in guns.

00:18:55.100 | Although I've owned guns and shot guns for a very long time, I'm an absolute neophyte

00:18:59.900 | when it comes to the ability to assess the value, the ability to understand the marketplace,

00:19:05.420 | etc.

00:19:06.420 | In light of the forthcoming presidential election, I feel like this is an interesting time to

00:19:11.860 | tackle the topic because depending on what happens, it could affect the values of guns.

00:19:18.180 | So I said, "Well, who better to discuss this topic than one of the most knowledgeable men

00:19:22.380 | I know, Jim Rawls?"

00:19:23.620 | So thank you for being willing to do this interview with me.

00:19:25.780 | >>Jim Rawls: Sure.

00:19:26.780 | I'm happy to be here to do this.

00:19:29.500 | I want to start out with the caveat that nobody knows what's going to happen at the upcoming

00:19:36.140 | presidential conventions, the campaign conventions for the two major parties.

00:19:44.500 | I think that it's very likely that Hillary Clinton is going to get nominated despite

00:19:51.060 | the fact that she should really be in prison.

00:19:54.260 | If she does, I can predict that immediately after she's nominated, there will be a realization

00:20:01.100 | nationwide that she will probably win the election and that when she gets in office,

00:20:06.860 | she's going to try to enact a lot of so-called gun control measures.

00:20:11.020 | I like to refer to them as civilian disarmament measures.

00:20:16.340 | So I have a feeling, it's just a gut level feeling and it's based on many years of experience

00:20:23.140 | as a firearms trader, that the price of most black rifles and their magazines and the ammunition

00:20:34.740 | in those primary battle rifle calibers like 5.56 NATO, 7.62 NATO, 7.62 by 39, which is

00:20:44.620 | the AK-47 cartridge, and 5.45 by 39, which is the AK-74 cartridge.

00:20:52.540 | Basically everything is going to double in price and the availability will become very,

00:20:59.940 | very limited.

00:21:00.940 | There will be basically a run on everything.

00:21:03.420 | The stores will get cleaned out, at least of all the military calibers and the main

00:21:09.140 | defensive handgun calibers.

00:21:12.540 | High capacity or what I refer to as standard capacity magazines will be very hard to find.

00:21:19.820 | And again, basically across the board, I think prices are going to double on selected items.

00:21:24.860 | So it's wise, if I was in a situation where I was a stock picker and I knew for certain

00:21:32.820 | that a company was going to be releasing a new product and it was going to double the

00:21:37.860 | value of that stock, I would want to publicize it, right?

00:21:42.420 | Well, of course, I'd want to invest myself first.

00:21:45.540 | And then publicize it.

00:21:48.420 | And I'm kind of in that situation right now with firearms in that I can see the handwriting

00:21:54.500 | on the wall.

00:21:55.500 | I've seen what's happened in the past when there have been crises where it has the Democrat

00:22:01.540 | Party and the mass media, their buddies, all screaming for more gun control.

00:22:07.140 | The first thing that happens is that everybody rushes to the gun shows, they rush to the

00:22:10.860 | gun store, everything gets cleaned out, prices get jacked up, and people are frantic.

00:22:16.900 | So in my line of business, which is the preparedness business, I like to say panic now and avoid

00:22:22.980 | the rush.

00:22:25.980 | And instead of really panicking, people need to very dispassionately just think about what

00:22:32.180 | they need for their own families, think in terms of both your immediate family and also

00:22:38.740 | your future, your progeny, the future generations, what your descendants are going to need and

00:22:44.540 | stock up accordingly.

00:22:46.180 | And then with any extra money that you have for investing for guns that you plan to actually

00:22:51.060 | turn over, try to buy guns that are going to be in the highest demand and the shortest

00:22:58.100 | supply.

00:23:00.380 | It's just common sense.

00:23:01.380 | So before we go to the specific practical application, I want to talk a little bit about

00:23:06.420 | the market.

00:23:07.420 | And for the sake of the record, you and I are recording this on April 22, 2016.

00:23:11.660 | So as you said, we don't know anything about what's going to happen at upcoming political

00:23:16.540 | conventions.

00:23:17.540 | We don't know what's going to happen with the presidential candidates.

00:23:19.660 | We don't know what scandals are going to emerge.

00:23:21.340 | We don't know if the FBI is going to announce their findings on Hillary Clinton, all these

00:23:26.700 | things.

00:23:27.700 | I'll tell you, I think that if anyone could ever be elected president while under indictment

00:23:34.620 | or after conviction and a presidential pardon, it's probably Hillary Clinton.

00:23:40.460 | I believe it.

00:23:41.820 | So I have been – I mean for quite a while, I've simply assumed personally for the sake

00:23:47.720 | of my own purposes, I've assumed that Hillary Clinton will win the presidency.

00:23:52.740 | And who knows what will happen with the political makeup of Congress and of the Senate.

00:23:57.860 | But I've just assumed –

00:23:58.860 | Yeah, the Supreme Court.

00:24:00.780 | But I've assumed for my own planning purposes that Hillary Clinton will win and at the moment

00:24:04.480 | I have no reason to assume anything else.

00:24:07.800 | But I also recognize that I could be wrong and that's where I want to talk about because

00:24:12.640 | in my mind, the firearms marketplace demonstrates exactly the challenge.

00:24:19.460 | Here's what I see as a layperson and I want to ask you this question.

00:24:24.260 | On the one hand, it would seem easy for me to predict that, OK, if Hillary Clinton wins

00:24:29.200 | the presidency, then there will be a barrage of new restrictions and gun laws, et cetera,

00:24:35.160 | which would lead to additional restrictions on the acquisition of certain types of firearms

00:24:41.960 | and therefore because of the decreased supply, the demand will rise and thus the price will

00:24:47.420 | rise.

00:24:48.420 | But the major concerns that I have are threefold.

00:24:52.620 | One, historically, we've gone through these ebbs and flows.

00:24:57.380 | So I'm only 30 years old.

00:24:58.840 | So I went back during Bill Clinton and the Brady campaign and things like that.

00:25:02.500 | I was not practically aware.

00:25:04.420 | I studied those things as a matter of history rather than as a matter of actual experience.

00:25:10.140 | But it's been difficult for me to discern the actual historical record.

00:25:13.840 | On the one hand, it seems like many people are constantly clamoring for additional restrictions

00:25:19.060 | on firearms ownership.

00:25:21.380 | But when you actually look at the facts, specifically the best example on Wikipedia, there's a great

00:25:27.900 | animated map of – for example, the spread of the concealed carry laws.

00:25:32.140 | It's just a march of freedom.

00:25:34.100 | Exactly.

00:25:35.100 | So you've got this steady overturnment of laws.

00:25:38.580 | When I look at the last eight years under President Obama and I just observe what has

00:25:43.460 | happened, it's hard for me to imagine a political candidate who is – would like

00:25:47.860 | to do more.

00:25:49.200 | But yet in practical reality, I'm not aware of any major substantive restrictions that

00:25:54.620 | have actually been put in place.

00:25:56.980 | So I feel like most of what we see is political posturing.

00:26:00.140 | So what if even though Hillary Clinton – let's assume she were elected, how do we know anything

00:26:07.060 | – how do we know she could actually do anything?

00:26:09.540 | Right.

00:26:10.540 | Well, she could do a lot of things by executive order and that's completely absent any input

00:26:16.340 | from Congress or the courts.

00:26:17.920 | So why hasn't President Obama done that then?

00:26:22.260 | I think Obama has been reluctant to do too many executive orders.

00:26:27.060 | But I'm not sure if Clinton will have that same reluctance because she has an outlook

00:26:35.820 | on life that's very proactive.

00:26:40.500 | If you look at the way she was involved behind the scenes with the predecessor of Obamacare,

00:26:47.460 | in the very first year of the Bill Clinton – the first Bill Clinton presidency, she

00:26:53.220 | was chairing the committee for a socialized medicine plan for the United States.

00:27:01.820 | And in fact, the minutes of all those meetings have never been released.

00:27:08.820 | But she was apparently very proactive.

00:27:10.900 | She wanted it immediately and she was horribly disappointed when it didn't happen.

00:27:16.220 | So I think that's her basic outlook.

00:27:18.620 | She's proactive and I think she will push as hard and as fast as she can with executive

00:27:23.380 | orders.

00:27:24.380 | Now, the executive orders will primarily involve imports because obviously she can't get involved

00:27:33.180 | because of the commerce clause and what goes on inside of each state.

00:27:36.980 | But for importation, the presidential power is tremendous.

00:27:42.840 | So for anyone who owns any European-made semi-automatic firearms, I strongly recommend that if you

00:27:50.560 | want a spare parts set, you order it now.

00:27:53.100 | If you want any extra magazines, if you own a gun like a Steyr AUG or an Israeli Tavor

00:28:00.620 | or whatever, you need to get your spare parts and your extra magazines laid in soon because

00:28:07.300 | by executive order, Hillary Clinton could ban the importation of any magazine over ten

00:28:13.260 | rounds except for law enforcement purposes.

00:28:16.320 | That could very well happen.

00:28:17.320 | So you're saying that I should encourage a relative of mine who's been lusting after

00:28:22.040 | the new Tavor bullpup to go ahead and pull the trigger and get one?

00:28:25.060 | Yes, you should.

00:28:26.060 | You can get one of the new X95s which is the Tavor with the improved trigger.

00:28:30.900 | That's the gun to buy.

00:28:33.020 | And right now, they're about $1,900.

00:28:37.340 | Stock up.

00:28:38.340 | If he can afford to buy two or three, he really should because by buying just two of them,

00:28:44.220 | if the parts for those become import banned and they can no longer assemble them in the

00:28:49.140 | States, instead of a $2,000 rifle, it's going to become a $4,000 rifle.

00:28:53.740 | He can then sell one of those two rifles and then be able to keep the other one effectively

00:28:58.400 | for free.

00:28:59.400 | So how confident do you feel?

00:29:00.900 | So let's say – and we're going to talk about this.

00:29:03.740 | Don't worry.

00:29:04.740 | I'm not just going to willy-nilly follow your advice.

00:29:07.540 | But let's use me as an example.

00:29:09.580 | Let's pretend that I'm not worrying necessarily at this point.

00:29:12.900 | We'll come back to this.

00:29:13.900 | But I'm not planning to – I'm not planning and trying to prepare for the end of the world

00:29:17.200 | as we know it.

00:29:18.200 | I'm not trying to create an armory of many rifles of common things.

00:29:22.020 | I just want to speculate on the gun market.

00:29:24.220 | How confident would you feel in saying, "Hey, Josh.

00:29:26.580 | We'll consider going out and buying a couple of the Tavor bullpups," and for those who

00:29:31.780 | aren't familiar with firearm nomenclature, this is a scary black rifle that shoots lots

00:29:37.860 | of bullets, which is extremely compact and extremely valuable for those who like to shoot.

00:29:43.340 | Is that an accurate assessment?

00:29:45.260 | How confident would you feel in that investment advice?

00:29:47.300 | Josh Woodruff: I'd say that's a pretty good investment strategy, although in terms

00:29:51.380 | of absolute bang for the buck, in terms of things that will more than double in value

00:29:56.260 | if there is a perceived crisis, and I think there will be coming out of the Democratic

00:30:00.740 | Convention in the third week of July, starting the third week of July.

00:30:06.780 | The thing to buy actually is, if you can find them, is stripped AR-15 lower receivers.

00:30:13.420 | Right now they can be had for as low as $29 a piece.

00:30:18.780 | During the last crisis, which was after the Sandy Hook shootings, they were going for

00:30:24.100 | $250 a piece.

00:30:25.100 | That's a lot of money.

00:30:26.100 | That's a lot of money.

00:30:27.100 | It's not a large piece.

00:30:28.100 | It's not a large piece.

00:30:29.100 | It's not a large piece.

00:30:30.100 | It's not a large piece.

00:30:31.100 | That's the most valuable.

00:30:32.100 | The lower receiver on an AR-15 actually is just a trigger group.

00:30:36.020 | It really isn't a receiver, but that's the part that many, many years ago, Eugene

00:30:39.420 | Stoner decided to stamp the serial number on and he referred to that group, which most

00:30:45.300 | people would refer to as a trigger group, as the lower receiver.

00:30:49.780 | Technically, under the federal law, that receiver constitutes the firearm because that's

00:30:55.820 | the piece that carries the serial number.

00:30:58.620 | You can build an AR-15 yourself without any special tools just from that lower receiver.

00:31:06.380 | You can buy a complete barreled upper receiver and just slap together the gun.

00:31:12.020 | The critical component, the one that's going to be in greatest demand, will be that lower

00:31:15.560 | receiver.

00:31:16.560 | Traditionally, they've sold for anywhere between $25 and $75 a piece, depending on

00:31:22.860 | the maker.

00:31:25.980 | The supply has been very, very spotty.

00:31:29.620 | During the 1994 to 2004 federal firearms ban, lower receivers were very hard to find.

00:31:38.300 | Technically, with that ban, you would have to have assembled a gun before that law went

00:31:46.880 | into effect in 1994 to be able to legally possess it.

00:31:51.520 | What a lot of people would do is just take ... They'd buy a bunch of lower receivers

00:31:56.960 | and then slap the same upper on that lower, lay it down on a newspaper and take a picture

00:32:03.220 | of it.

00:32:04.220 | This is even before the days of digital photography.

00:32:07.380 | With both the serial number showing and the date of the newspaper showing.

00:32:13.320 | That was their proof that they had assembled that lower receiver before the law went into

00:32:17.560 | effect.

00:32:18.680 | In this case, if we could end up with another ban on battle rifles, you could do something

00:32:28.800 | very similar.

00:32:29.800 | But the crucial item to have is that lower receiver itself.

00:32:34.240 | Now, if you don't mind signing for them doing the federal paperwork, you can get them for

00:32:39.800 | as low as $19.95 a piece if you order them 10 at a time.

00:32:44.920 | If you look around, you can find a local transfer dealer with a federal firearms license who

00:32:50.160 | will do transfers for 10% over cost.

00:32:53.040 | That's very little money to do a lot of paperwork.

00:32:57.200 | Say you wanted to invest $2,000 in 100 AR-15 stripped lower receivers.

00:33:05.960 | Even if you don't have a federal firearms license of your own, you could probably get

00:33:09.120 | them for around $20 a piece.

00:33:12.880 | If you're a real speculator, you'd go out and buy 100 of them.

00:33:16.600 | Go ahead and sign for them.

00:33:17.960 | I know you're developing a huge paper trail by doing this.

00:33:22.680 | But the upside is if there is another buying frenzy following the Democrat convention in

00:33:29.480 | July of 2016, the price of stripped lower receivers will probably jump to somewhere

00:33:35.280 | between $200 and $300 a piece.

00:33:38.880 | You would then, during the height of that frenzy, sell them back into the market and

00:33:44.920 | recoup a huge profit.

00:33:48.240 | Paul Matzko: For some reason, one of the nice backups of that idea is if my recent

00:33:56.480 | experience over the last five to ten years with the firearms market is any indication,

00:34:01.200 | all you need to do is – even if let's say you weren't gambling on election campaigns

00:34:08.840 | and let's say that – I don't know what.

00:34:10.440 | I guess Ted Cruz were to win the presidency.

00:34:12.240 | Michael Munger: It's still like fixed inflation.

00:34:13.240 | Paul Matzko: Yeah, you still have something that's valuable and then all you have to

00:34:16.560 | do is just simply wait for the next terrorist attack, the next mass shooting, whatever it

00:34:21.080 | is that the next thing which will come around every few years which will drive the market

00:34:27.040 | demand up and then you have a good floor.

00:34:30.200 | Michael Munger: Yeah.

00:34:32.440 | That's one of the beauties of free market economics is the ability to buy low and sell

00:34:38.160 | high and in my estimation, there is no such thing as hoarding.

00:34:43.120 | If you're buying now when supplies are plentiful of anything, whether it's food, wheat grinders,

00:34:49.200 | guns, ammunition or whatever, if you're buying now and the pipeline is still full,

00:34:55.600 | then you can never be accused of hoarding.

00:34:59.760 | There really is no such thing as hoarding in a true free market.

00:35:02.240 | There are only buyers and sellers at a price point.

00:35:05.120 | Trevor Burrus: I like the strategy you've outlined simply because even on the flip side,

00:35:11.200 | let's say I bought 10 or 20 lower receivers.

00:35:14.160 | I could systematically over time simply take those receivers and even if there were no

00:35:19.240 | resale value, even if I never wanted to sell them out, I could just over the course of

00:35:24.200 | coming years, use those receivers to assemble my own armory.

00:35:28.560 | Michael Munger: Sure.

00:35:29.560 | Or you could set them aside for your future grandkids or whatever when they wouldn't be

00:35:35.520 | available without any paperwork.

00:35:39.160 | Of course the ideal situation is to try to go to gun shows and find them laying on gun

00:35:43.440 | show tables.

00:35:44.440 | Occasionally, you will find complete lowers, even more rarely stripped lowers available

00:35:49.160 | on secondary sales with no paperwork but that is a rarity.

00:35:53.840 | You're probably going to end up having to fill out a federal form 4473 which is the

00:35:59.200 | dealer acquisition and sale form to take possession of those.

00:36:06.200 | Now I want to kind of back up a little bit and encourage your listeners to get smart

00:36:12.640 | about the firearms market.

00:36:15.360 | In a lot of ways, the firearms market is similar to the rare coin market and that is it's the

00:36:21.640 | savvy, the really astute buyers that make the most money trading in these commodities

00:36:28.600 | and the ignorant sheeple who are late to the market and not well informed, the sheep get

00:36:36.840 | shorn basically.

00:36:38.360 | Those sheeple are not going to be well positioned to have the knowledge it takes to make a lot

00:36:47.400 | of money with firearms.

00:36:49.320 | So I recommend that people get smart about firearms.

00:36:51.800 | If you go to my website, it's survivalblog.com.

00:36:56.400 | In the left hand bar, you'll see a list of links of static pages.

00:37:01.720 | I have one that's titled "Book and Video Shelf".

00:37:06.840 | If you click on that, I have several recommendations for books that are available through amazon.com.

00:37:13.560 | One of them is called "Flederman's Guide to Antique Firearms and Their Values".

00:37:18.720 | Great big fat book that gets updated once every two or three years with a tremendous

00:37:23.680 | wealth of information about antique guns.

00:37:27.240 | Anybody who's considering buying a pre-1899 antique gun for investment purposes needs a

00:37:33.640 | copy of that book.

00:37:35.640 | For modern guns, I would recommend that you get the latest edition.

00:37:40.760 | It's also at my bookshelf page.

00:37:42.440 | It's called "The Blue Book of Gun Values".

00:37:47.720 | That is kind of considered the bible of firearms collecting for modern guns.

00:37:53.880 | If you go to gun shows, you often see a copy of that laying right on the tables being used

00:38:00.080 | as a reference by the firearms dealers as they're assessing guns that are handed to

00:38:05.280 | them for potential purchase.

00:38:07.440 | Again, "Flederman's Guide to Antique Firearms and Their Values" and "The Blue Book of Gun

00:38:13.520 | Values".

00:38:14.520 | Those are the two key references that everyone should have.

00:38:18.120 | Jim, why would somebody want to buy a 117+ year old gun?

00:38:24.280 | Okay, well, also at my website, I have a static page called "The Pre-1899 Antique Firearms

00:38:36.000 | FAQ".

00:38:38.080 | It was a piece that I co-authored about the amazing little loophole, in fact, I really

00:38:44.840 | shouldn't even call it a loophole, the feature in American firearms laws that exempts firearms

00:38:50.480 | that were made in or before 1898.

00:38:54.160 | So you can have two identical guns.

00:38:56.200 | Say you have a Winchester 3030 lever action, a Model 1894, the classic that everybody knows.

00:39:02.440 | The ones that were made in the first four years of production from 1894 to 1898 are

00:39:09.720 | already worth about 30% more than ones that were made just a year later, 1899 and later,

00:39:18.000 | because under federal law, any gun or just its frame or receiver that was made in or

00:39:26.240 | before December 31st of 1898 is not considered a firearm, it's considered an antique.

00:39:34.120 | And as an antique, it is outside of federal jurisdiction, which means that, you know,

00:39:41.240 | earlier I was talking about the paperwork you have to fill out when you buy a modern

00:39:44.400 | gun.

00:39:45.400 | Well, if you buy an antique gun, there's absolutely no paperwork, it's outside of federal jurisdiction,

00:39:50.840 | there's no federal nexus.

00:39:52.780 | That gun can go across state lines legally without going through a federally licensed

00:39:58.320 | dealer with no paper trail.

00:40:01.160 | And a lot of astute firearms collectors know that and they are actively looking for cartridge

00:40:06.840 | guns that were made in or before 1898.

00:40:11.080 | In the FAQ piece that I wrote, again, it's available free at my website, survivalblog.com.

00:40:17.320 | In the left hand bar, click on the link that's marked FAQ, or FAQS.

00:40:26.220 | And if you open up the FAQ file that I have on pre-1899 guns, it describes in detail the

00:40:33.060 | legalities, and I also have some very extensive lists of the serial number breaks.

00:40:39.680 | Say you're at a gun show, you see a really old Winchester and you're wondering, "Could

00:40:45.040 | this be one of those ones that was made in 1898 or earlier?"

00:40:49.440 | If you have a printout of that FAQ article that I wrote, I have the serial number breaks

00:40:54.360 | that will show you that if, with a particular serial number, for a particular make and model

00:41:02.400 | of gun, what the break is for pre-1899 versus post-1899.

00:41:08.320 | It's a pretty valuable reference, and again, I make it available free at my website.

00:41:12.520 | The guns, the antique guns that I recommend buying are the ones from the 1890s that shoot

00:41:17.960 | modern cartridges.

00:41:21.200 | They're not muzzle loaders, these are repeating cartridge guns, usually lever action, pump

00:41:25.960 | action, or bolt action.

00:41:28.040 | Again, they're completely outside of federal jurisdiction, but they will shoot a deer just

00:41:33.840 | as dead as a modern gun at the same range.

00:41:38.200 | In fact, you can legally sporterize one of these guns and put a modern scope on it, and

00:41:42.280 | even put it in a modern Kevlar graphite stock if you want to.

00:41:45.920 | They're perfectly capable guns, but if you buy ones in the right serial number ranges,

00:41:50.520 | they'll be made before 1899, and they'll be chambered in a cartridge that's still factory

00:41:57.120 | made.

00:41:58.120 | The ones that I recommend are things like the Swedish Mausers that are chambered in

00:42:01.360 | 6.5x55 Swedish Mauser.

00:42:04.680 | They're dated right on the receiver ring, 1898, 1896, whatever, right on the receiver

00:42:11.320 | ring, so there's absolutely no doubt when those guns were made.

00:42:16.120 | I recommend Mauser bolt actions that were made in or before 1898, Smith & Wesson top

00:42:21.240 | break revolvers, particularly 38s and 4440s that were made in or before 1898, and also

00:42:29.360 | Winchester Model 1897 pump action shotguns that were made in the first two years of production.

00:42:36.000 | There's only about, I think there were about what, 35,000 made, but you can still find

00:42:40.080 | them at gun shows if you look around, or you can find them of course just by the mail order.

00:42:45.920 | If you search at gunbroker.com or gunsamerica.com, they usually, in fact they even have a separate

00:42:54.360 | section just for pre-1899 guns.

00:42:57.480 | If you want to invest in a couple of antiques, especially if you're politically paranoid

00:43:03.560 | and you think that we may ever have a nationwide gun registration, that would be a really good

00:43:10.320 | category of guns to invest in, because right now, pre-1899 guns sell for about a 30% premium

00:43:17.800 | over an absolutely identical model, identical condition gun that was made in 1899 or later.

00:43:25.400 | I think in the long run, they'll be at as much as a 100% or 200% premium on those guns

00:43:31.520 | if we ever have nationwide gun registration, because it'll only be those guns that are

00:43:36.200 | outside of federal jurisdiction and exempt from registration.

00:43:39.600 | But couldn't the new, if we did, let's say, okay, we're going to have a national gun registration

00:43:48.400 | system, couldn't that law and that legislation simply include pre-1899 firearms as well?

00:43:57.160 | But that 1898 threshold hasn't changed since 1968, so the pool of guns out there, the available

00:44:06.320 | supply of pre-1899 guns is actually gradually shrinking.

00:44:11.880 | In the eyes of the typical DC beltway politician, they really consider them a non-issue.

00:44:19.120 | Unless one was ever used in a really high profile event, and here we're talking Lee

00:44:23.440 | Harvey Oswald or something like that, unless one was horribly misused, I don't think they're

00:44:28.400 | ever going to get around to including those in any federal laws.

00:44:35.400 | And in the eyes of the courts, it's a really, really long stretch to come before the Supreme

00:44:44.680 | Court and say, "Oh, Mr. Supreme Court Justices, these guns that were made in 1898 or earlier

00:44:51.920 | are still engaged, are still part of interstate commerce.

00:44:58.200 | These guns have been out of interstate commerce for 117 years, so you really can't claim federal

00:45:04.040 | jurisdiction."

00:45:05.040 | I don't think the courts would hold that up if they ever tried to bring them into federal

00:45:09.160 | jurisdiction at this point.

00:45:10.560 | Again, that very arbitrary 1898 cutoff date has been set in stone since the passage of

00:45:18.400 | the Gun Control Act of 1968.

00:45:20.440 | Technically, they really should have just defined "antique" as a gun that is 100

00:45:25.600 | years old or older, and then that threshold would have rolled forward one year each December

00:45:31.680 | 31st.

00:45:32.920 | But instead, they arbitrarily locked it in as December 31st, 1898, and it's been frozen

00:45:39.080 | there ever since 1968.

00:45:41.680 | So I think, again, in the eyes of the politician, they consider them a non-issue, and I think

00:45:48.200 | that exemption will continue at least for our generation or maybe even future generations.

00:45:55.000 | What are some of the other interesting little value wrinkles in the gun marketplace, little

00:45:59.720 | corners of the market where you get an unexpected premium based upon certain characteristics?

00:46:05.200 | Well, the rarity of a particular gun is, of course, the main driving factor.

00:46:12.080 | One of the guns that I've liked to collect over the years were the semi-auto battle rifles

00:46:17.960 | made by a Finnish company called Valmet, V-A-L-M-E-T.

00:46:22.760 | They have been out of the firearms business since about the year 2000, and there have

00:46:28.760 | been none imported into the United States in military configuration since about 1992.

00:46:36.760 | So the supply of those guns is fixed.

00:46:41.360 | There are new collectors coming out of the market constantly.

00:46:45.120 | Ten years ago, I was buying Valmets for around $2,000 a piece.

00:46:49.920 | Right now, they're between $4,000 and $6,000 a piece, and the sky's the limit because,

00:46:54.720 | again, they've frozen the supply.

00:46:57.400 | And in fact, the tooling for the Valmet rifles actually was destroyed after a corporate merger.

00:47:04.400 | The same corporation that Valmet became also acquired HK, Heckler & Koch, from Germany,

00:47:14.360 | which is also a very well-known battle rifle maker.

00:47:18.000 | And apparently, the executives at HK did not like the idea of having competition within

00:47:22.480 | their own company, and they asked the corporate management to destroy the tooling for the

00:47:28.640 | Valmet firearms.

00:47:29.800 | So there will be no more Valmets ever made, unless they somehow magically recreate the

00:47:35.560 | tooling.

00:47:37.180 | So I think that Valmets are one particularly good for the really high-end collector who

00:47:41.980 | already has a pretty complete battery of firearms, and they're looking to diversify.

00:47:49.440 | I would say either Valmets or another good category would be the accidental import FN

00:47:56.000 | FALs.

00:47:57.000 | An FN is a .308 battle rifle.

00:48:00.160 | It's a big, long, black rifle with a 20-round magazine.

00:48:04.800 | The early ones were brought in by Browning Arms, and there were several other importers

00:48:10.340 | since then.

00:48:11.940 | They're no longer imported.

00:48:13.580 | There are some domestically made FALs, but the supply of original Belgian-European-made

00:48:20.040 | FALs is essentially frozen as well.

00:48:22.760 | And the early, early ones are what's called a G-series FAL.

00:48:27.280 | Those were considered an accidental import, because if they were imported now, they would

00:48:30.920 | be legally considered a machine gun, because they have a cut in the lower receiver for

00:48:37.400 | an auto sear, and they wouldn't be importable in that configuration now.

00:48:41.520 | You don't have to register them as a machine gun, but everybody knows that they're a gun

00:48:46.520 | that would be easy to convert to full auto, and people are willing to pay a premium for

00:48:52.480 | them for that reason.

00:48:53.480 | Again, that's called a G-series FAL.

00:48:57.280 | Tim, the reason I broached this topic on radical personal finance is I teach people to invest

00:49:07.280 | in what they know.

00:49:08.440 | I think as a background of a financial advisor, professional financial advisor, I think that

00:49:13.720 | we as financial advisors do the public a disservice, wherein we primarily shuttle people directly

00:49:19.640 | into mutual funds, and that's the extent of our investment knowledge.

00:49:24.920 | But as I've interacted with lots of rich people, what I've found is that many people have insider

00:49:31.120 | knowledge on a specific marketplace, and they've been able to exploit that marketplace for

00:49:35.680 | their own financial gain.

00:49:37.000 | Now, for some people, this is local single-family houses.

00:49:40.200 | For other people, it's large ranches.

00:49:41.760 | For some people, it's guns.

00:49:43.320 | For other people, it's Porsches.

00:49:44.560 | For some people, it's collectible coins.

00:49:46.440 | For other people, it's Barbie dolls.

00:49:50.480 | Describe for me your development as a firearms investor, and tell us how this has impacted

00:49:59.160 | your financial life.

00:50:00.600 | Sure.

00:50:01.600 | Well, I was born in 1960.

00:50:03.360 | I started collecting guns as a teenager.

00:50:08.440 | Immediately after turning 21, I got a federal firearms license while I was still in college,

00:50:14.640 | and I guess in retrospect, I can safely say that I sold quite a few guns out of my dorm

00:50:20.520 | room with my federal firearms license, even though it was against the campus policy.

00:50:26.240 | I started attending gun shows about 1980, and have been attending gun shows pretty regularly

00:50:33.120 | ever since.

00:50:34.120 | So I'm a pretty savvy collector.

00:50:36.640 | I've developed a lot of knowledge, but what I would recommend for your listeners is that

00:50:43.160 | they pick a particular area in the firearms market to study up on.

00:50:50.760 | If you get smart and you master the knowledge of a particular maker or even just a particular

00:50:59.040 | maker and a particular model of firearm, and then you attend gun shows, you can walk through

00:51:07.080 | a gun show.

00:51:08.080 | In fact, you could scan a gun show very quickly just looking for that particular model gun

00:51:12.920 | based on its outline.

00:51:14.920 | You can walk through a gun show, hit all the aisles of a gun show in the first 20 minutes

00:51:21.160 | after a gun show opens, and then jot down the table locations or memorize the table

00:51:26.600 | locations to go back and talk to those dealers.

00:51:30.600 | Based on your knowledge of that particular model and paying very close attention to things

00:51:37.120 | like bore condition, you want to carry a bore inspection light with you.

00:51:40.560 | It's a fiber optic light that you shine up a firearms bore so you can closely inspect

00:51:45.880 | the condition of the bore, which is one of the crucial factors of firearms condition.

00:51:50.880 | But based on your knowledge of that particular model, you can literally buy a gun at one

00:51:58.840 | side of a gun show from an elderly collector who's getting rid of a collection and doesn't

00:52:05.000 | realize what something is now worth.

00:52:07.340 | You buy that gun, you walk it over to the other side of the show where you see a dealer

00:52:12.080 | who has a similar assortment of guns, and based on your market knowledge, turn around

00:52:23.600 | and resale that gun at wholesale and still make a 20% profit.

00:52:31.600 | The same kind of thing goes on in the coin market all the time with ungraded coins.

00:52:35.960 | But there it's an even more arcane knowledge based on the Sheldon scale of coin grading.

00:52:41.320 | I don't want to go into that, but I'm sure you've had other guests who have described

00:52:45.800 | that.

00:52:46.800 | It's a pretty arcane body of knowledge, but if you can master that knowledge, have that

00:52:52.520 | between your ears, that is very valuable knowledge.

00:52:57.480 | I would recommend that, say if someone has an interest in Colt single action revolvers,

00:53:02.360 | or Winchester lever action rifles, or Colt AR-15s, or M1 carbines, or whatever.

00:53:12.320 | Whatever guns interest you, do the research.

00:53:16.080 | Nowadays you don't even have to go through back issues of magazines to develop that body

00:53:20.880 | of knowledge.

00:53:21.880 | All the knowledge you need is available on the internet, just with a lot of web searches

00:53:27.280 | and detailed reading.

00:53:29.320 | If you can get smart about that particular type of gun, you can turn that to your advantage

00:53:37.640 | and you can make a handsome profit even in a market that's stagnant.

00:53:44.320 | In a rising market, you can make a tremendous amount of money.

00:53:47.360 | I have a lot of buddies who have very nicely filled safes and they affectionately refer

00:53:54.520 | to them as their retirement plan.

00:53:56.800 | I always doubted the authority of that statement simply because it's a rare gun collector that

00:54:04.560 | I've met who keeps detailed records.

00:54:06.400 | I've never had a great deal of insight as to the actual appreciation and the value of

00:54:11.120 | the gun market.

00:54:12.120 | Two part question.

00:54:13.120 | One, what's been the long term rate of return of firearms if we were just to pretend it's

00:54:19.400 | an asset class?

00:54:20.400 | Two, do you have any sense whether you have detailed records or just a general sense,

00:54:24.880 | do you have any sense of your own personal investment rate of return of your investing

00:54:30.560 | activities with regard to firearms?

00:54:32.680 | Sure.

00:54:33.680 | I think we can safely say that guns as a whole have matched inflation.

00:54:41.160 | High grade guns and guns with particular collector appeal have far surpassed the rate of inflation.

00:54:51.800 | They haven't kept up with the Dow Jones Industrial Average or the S&P in terms of decade in,

00:55:00.680 | decade out.

00:55:02.760 | But it's still as an asset class a very good investment.

00:55:09.280 | You're hardly ever going to lose money unless you do stupid things like store your firearms

00:55:17.120 | improperly, say you live in a humid climate and you don't oil your firearms and you don't

00:55:22.600 | leave them in a climate controlled gun vault.

00:55:26.440 | You want to invest in what's called a golden rod.

00:55:30.040 | It's an electric dehumidifier that sits in the bottom of your gun vault.

00:55:35.240 | As long as you don't store your guns improperly, you're basically never going to lose money

00:55:40.160 | on guns.

00:55:41.160 | And if you buy the right guns, you have the potential to make a very handsome profit.

00:55:48.000 | I think my own rate of return has been above average because I've gone pretty heavily into

00:55:55.000 | what are commonly called black rifles which are essentially paramilitary semi-automatic

00:56:01.280 | firearms.

00:56:02.280 | They're guns that basically look like modern battle rifles but they're not capable of fully

00:56:08.100 | automatic fire.

00:56:09.100 | They're only semi-automatic.

00:56:11.640 | And by buying guns from makers like FN, from Valmet, from IWI, they're the makers of the

00:56:19.200 | Tavor in Israel.

00:56:20.760 | Well, actually, they're assembled here in the States.

00:56:23.320 | The parts come from Israel.

00:56:25.860 | By buying particular models, my rate of return has probably averaged around 12 to 15% per

00:56:34.000 | year.

00:56:36.560 | And I've always been the type that's constantly improving my collection.

00:56:42.560 | And although my collection has gotten considerably larger in recent years, I've mainly just been

00:56:49.080 | upgrading my collection with each trade that I make.

00:56:52.720 | And by doing so, the net worth that I have in those gun vaults, and I use that term in

00:57:00.360 | the plural, I have several, has gone up substantially.

00:57:05.780 | What I love about your guess or estimate of 12 to 15% rate of return is it demonstrates

00:57:13.440 | a practical way to approach preparedness.

00:57:16.640 | One of the dangers that I observe of people who become concerned about catastrophic events,

00:57:23.720 | whether it be economic collapse or various other events which could lead to global unrest

00:57:31.940 | and the end of the world as we know it, as it's affectionately called in prepper circles,

00:57:37.240 | it's easy to perhaps go overboard and only assume catastrophe.

00:57:43.120 | And if your plans only assume a catastrophe or collapse of some sort, then perhaps you

00:57:50.760 | might not be able to enjoy the benefit of just the good life if things continue just

00:57:55.600 | about as they have for the last few decades.

00:57:58.040 | And so if you've been able to achieve a nice financial return, not only do you have a well-armored

00:58:04.600 | household which has tremendous benefit if there is some sort of scenarios which involve

00:58:10.760 | the end of the world as we know it, but if that doesn't occur, then you've achieved a

00:58:15.900 | nice investment rate of return and you've had an enjoyable hobby.

00:58:18.720 | It gives you something to do with your children, you get to go to gun shows, and that's something

00:58:22.080 | that I would assume you enjoy.

00:58:24.000 | So it's a good illustration of managing both sides of the risk.

00:58:26.720 | Yes, and I think that is a very well-reasoned approach.

00:58:31.160 | And I do recommend that people don't go overboard.

00:58:34.000 | I often see with preppers, in particular, people who come from the medical profession

00:58:40.980 | tend to weigh overdue on medical preps.

00:58:43.900 | And people who come from a firefighting background tend to weigh overdue on firefighting.

00:58:50.620 | And people who are gun hobbyists tend to actually overdo on firearms themselves even to the

00:58:59.740 | detriment of not being able to provide enough food storage for their family.

00:59:03.740 | So I believe in well-balanced preparations.

00:59:08.020 | And if you buy quality tools, and I consider guns to be nothing more than a tool.

00:59:15.380 | There's nothing magical about guns, although they do have a certain cachet.

00:59:22.140 | It's a tool.

00:59:23.140 | And if you buy a quality tool, it's something that will last not just your own lifetime

00:59:28.220 | but into the lifetime of your grandchildren.

00:59:31.540 | Right now, I'm in the process of diversifying my own collection and pushing into stainless

00:59:37.020 | steel bolt-action rifles.

00:59:39.660 | In part as a hedge in the event that we end up with a future ban on semi-automatic rifles.

00:59:48.220 | I'm hedging pretty heavily right now into modern black-stocked stainless steel rifles

00:59:55.620 | made by Ruger, Winchester, and Remington.

00:59:59.540 | And I don't think I can go too far wrong with that because that's going to at least match

01:00:05.340 | the rate of inflation and because they're stainless steel, they're guns that are literally

01:00:10.260 | last four or five generations, maybe 10 generations.

01:00:14.540 | You know, right now, it's a rarity to find a firearm with a nice bore that's 300 years

01:00:20.260 | old, especially because black powder was used in those days.

01:00:25.060 | But just the age of the steel and given the vagaries of maintenance by various family

01:00:35.540 | members, someone occasionally is going to leave a gun wet after firing it and it's going

01:00:40.460 | to end up with a rusty bore and then that means it's going to have a pitted bore.

01:00:43.980 | But if you're starting out with stainless steel firearms, it's kind of hard to mess

01:00:47.260 | up.

01:00:48.620 | So I'm actually pushing in that direction quite a bit.

01:00:52.740 | And one of the other reasons I'm pushing towards stainless steel firearms right now is because

01:00:57.820 | there are now a number of exotic coatings available.

01:01:00.980 | One is called Cerakote, it's C-E-R-A-K-O-T-E, that are available to go over the top of stainless

01:01:08.580 | steel.

01:01:09.580 | If you don't like the reflective surface of stainless steel, you can just simply have

01:01:12.780 | it Cerakoted.

01:01:14.420 | There's also a dazzling number of camouflage patterns that are available to be applied

01:01:21.740 | to any gun, including stainless steel guns, through what's called a hydro dipping process.

01:01:28.500 | It's essentially like a decal that goes over the top of the finish of the gun.

01:01:34.380 | They dip the rifle in a bath and it looks almost like magic when they come up there

01:01:38.780 | and camouflage coated from end to end.

01:01:43.700 | And that finish can be peeled off and removed at a later date if need be.

01:01:51.020 | But that provides a wonderfully protective finish for the gun and it will, of course,

01:01:56.740 | if you can get a nice subdued color or a camouflage pattern, it will cover up the shiny reflective

01:02:03.420 | surface of stainless steel.

01:02:05.820 | So I think with those finishes now available, stainless steel rifles are definitely the

01:02:10.380 | way to go.

01:02:11.380 | Jim, you're a big advocate of not only purchasing the firearms themselves, but also purchasing

01:02:16.460 | the appropriate accessories, replacement parts, magazines, etc.

01:02:20.620 | And I remember when I bought my first Glock, I went out and I didn't just stick with what

01:02:25.780 | did they come with, three magazines, I believe.

01:02:27.380 | I didn't just stick with the three that came with it.

01:02:29.180 | I went out and purchased more.

01:02:30.980 | And in retrospect, I wish I'd purchased more of the 33 round magazines when they were more

01:02:35.140 | widely available.

01:02:37.140 | How do you balance that access there, especially from a financial perspective?

01:02:42.700 | I understand from a prepper's perspective, you want to have lots of magazines in case

01:02:46.300 | you need to use the firearms for a defensive purpose.

01:02:50.060 | But from an investment perspective, how do you balance choosing to buy more firearms

01:02:57.020 | or choosing to buy more accessories?

01:02:58.580 | Because I think a strong case could be made, especially if one is predicting the end of

01:03:03.180 | the world as we know it, a strong case could be made that it's actually the magazines and

01:03:06.900 | the accessories which could be more valuable than the firearm itself.

01:03:11.660 | Right.

01:03:12.660 | For barter purposes, there would be nothing like having a shoebox full of Glock magazines

01:03:17.140 | of various calibers and capacities in a disaster situation.

01:03:22.020 | There may come a day where people will just scoff at the idea of trading you silver or

01:03:26.340 | gold coins for food.

01:03:28.100 | But boy, they will certainly be lining up to buy Glock magazines.

01:03:33.820 | And you're only 30, so you don't probably remember the gun ban of 1994 to 2004 very well.

01:03:45.460 | But during that 10-year period, a Glock magazine went from $19 a piece to $80 a piece by the

01:03:54.260 | time the ban ended.

01:03:56.180 | Thankfully, that ban had a 10-year sunset clause and it was canceled out at the end

01:04:01.060 | of 10 years.

01:04:02.060 | Otherwise, we'd still be stuck with it.

01:04:04.020 | And if we were, Glock magazines would probably be going for $200 or $300 a piece right now,

01:04:09.300 | just for a standard 13-round or 15-round Glock magazine.

01:04:12.580 | And we're talking about a piece of plastic here.

01:04:16.340 | When governments get involved and they artificially influence the free market, all manner of chaos

01:04:23.980 | results.

01:04:25.540 | And with things like firearms magazines, that's an area where politicians could get involved,

01:04:32.540 | where prices could go radically higher, and where even a small investment could reap a

01:04:39.340 | reward of anywhere from 100% to as much as 2,000% if a ban goes into effect, especially

01:04:47.940 | if it's a ban without a sunset clause.

01:04:50.180 | You are also an advocate of accumulating appropriate amounts of ammunition.

01:04:55.940 | I want to ask you about something.

01:04:57.140 | I've just always wanted to ask you this.

01:04:59.180 | You've been an advocate in the past of buying lots of .22 long rifle ammunition.

01:05:04.340 | You affectionately refer to it as ballistic wampum, and in your novels, you talk about

01:05:10.420 | it being used as a point of barter.

01:05:13.900 | I never bought that theory of yours.

01:05:16.660 | I thought, "Okay, that's very cute.

01:05:17.820 | Jim has this nice little turn of phrase.

01:05:19.660 | It's very nice," until, what was it, a few years ago.

01:05:23.820 | And you went to buy boxes of .22 long rifle, and even .22 long rifle was unavailable.

01:05:28.860 | So talk about—

01:05:29.860 | Jim Collison: Right.

01:05:30.860 | It's so hard to find.

01:05:31.860 | Steve: Yeah, so talk about the same market in ammunition and my kind of part-beeb, selfish

01:05:37.940 | question.

01:05:38.940 | Is there any historical evidence for your affection for .22 long rifle, or is that just

01:05:43.540 | something that you—

01:05:44.540 | Jim Collison: No, it's just simply because it's ubiquitous.

01:05:47.700 | It's used by so many different rifles and pistols, and it's a very common caliber.

01:05:54.020 | .22 long rifle and, to a lesser extent, .22 magnum are very widely used.

01:06:01.260 | And because there's such a huge installed base, as it were, there's always going to

01:06:06.860 | be a demand for that ammunition.

01:06:08.740 | And from a barter standpoint, I can't think of anything better in a disaster with which

01:06:12.780 | to be able to barter, because not only is it very durable—if you keep ammunition in

01:06:17.260 | a sealed can, it'll last for generations—but one of the other key attributes of any good

01:06:22.660 | barter item is that it's divisible, what they refer to as a fungible asset.

01:06:30.180 | And the divisibility of .22 long rifle in particular is tremendous, because it comes

01:06:36.660 | 50 or 100 or in a bulk pack as much as 800 rounds per box.

01:06:43.740 | That's potentially—a box of 50 .22 cartridges is potentially 50 separate barter transactions

01:06:53.140 | for small items of food, for example.

01:06:55.220 | You might be able to trade three or four .22 cartridges for a can of beans in a real disaster.

01:07:01.380 | So it really does make an ideal barter currency.

01:07:05.980 | I stocked up on it pretty heavily, and it was just kind of my dumb luck that I happened

01:07:10.820 | to notice a sale about, what was it, six or seven years ago.

01:07:15.680 | There was a big sale from Sportsman's Guide, which is one of the large mail order catalogs.

01:07:21.720 | And apparently they'd had trouble selling some bulk-packed ammunition made by the Federal

01:07:28.020 | Cartridge Company.

01:07:30.260 | For years, Federal Cartridge Company had a bulk pack of 550 rounds of .22 long rifle

01:07:36.460 | ammo.

01:07:38.180 | And about six or seven years ago, they switched to a 350-round bulk pack, and they didn't

01:07:44.700 | sell as well, because people felt somehow they were getting cheated, even though the

01:07:48.460 | per-cartridge cost was about the same, because they'd changed the quantity of the bulk

01:07:53.540 | pack.

01:07:55.500 | So those bulk packs of 350 rounds went on sale by mail order by Sportsman's Guide

01:08:04.080 | for $16 for a bulk pack of 350 cartridges.

01:08:08.340 | Whoa.

01:08:09.340 | I saw that as a bargain, because they had been selling the 550-round bulk packs for

01:08:16.260 | around $16.

01:08:19.020 | So I thought, "Well, I'm getting a lot here."

01:08:21.180 | So a buddy of mine and I split a large order, and between the two of us, I think we gave

01:08:27.300 | the UPS driver back strain.

01:08:31.740 | We bought, I believe it was somewhere around 30,000 rounds of .22 long rifle at that price.

01:08:39.700 | Only a year later, the crisis that you described came up, where a shortage of ammunition started

01:08:47.060 | with the battle rifle cartridges, but then just kind of as an after effect, people thought,

01:08:52.220 | "Oh, I should buy some .22 as well."

01:08:54.980 | Well, did they ever.

01:08:57.260 | And you still can't reliably find .22 long rifle cartridges.

01:09:01.940 | And those same bulk packs of .22 cartridges, again, they were 350 rounds per box, they

01:09:09.340 | were made by Federal Cartridge Company, now sell for between $50 and $70 per carton, per

01:09:16.980 | bulk pack.

01:09:19.100 | And I can't think of any other investment that I've made that's had near the same level

01:09:26.580 | of return on investment as that particular bulk purchase of .22 long rifle ammo.

01:09:35.460 | It turned out to be just kind of serendipity, but boy, I'm not regretting it at all.

01:09:40.100 | So as an investor, have you sold most of it to reap your profit?

01:09:44.420 | Actually, I've sold back into the market about half of it, and I've done quite well with

01:09:49.260 | it.

01:09:50.660 | But what I'm replacing it with is actually battle rifle ammunition.

01:09:54.620 | I'm now buying .223 and .308 ammo in quantity with the proceeds from that in anticipation

01:10:01.700 | of a new shortage in the future of those battle rifle cartridges.

01:10:07.300 | It's meant that I've had to buy a lot more ammo cans because that ammo is not quite as

01:10:12.580 | compact as .22 long rifle per cartridge.

01:10:16.060 | But I think that in the long run, that strategy should pay off well for me.

01:10:22.700 | What would be your advice?

01:10:24.260 | Pretend there's a listener who is just listening to this show out of interest, and most of

01:10:30.300 | the world does not have – here in the United States, a lot of us have lots of guns.

01:10:34.660 | But much of the world doesn't have – firearm ownership is not nearly as widespread as it

01:10:39.420 | is, and there are still many people in the United States who don't own any firearms.

01:10:45.940 | What would be your advice as far as a reasonable and thoughtful, rational way for a neophyte

01:10:54.940 | firearms buyer to approach building up their own collection?

01:11:01.300 | Well, it all depends on whether or not you're survival-minded.

01:11:05.020 | If you anticipate a socioeconomic collapse, then you would need a battery of firearms

01:11:10.340 | that would be appropriate to defend a family and to put food on the table of a family through

01:11:15.900 | hunting and through slaughtering your own livestock.

01:11:20.780 | And there I would recommend that you have one battle rifle for each adult member of

01:11:27.140 | the family, one modern combat high-capacity pistol in a man-stopping caliber, so that

01:11:36.300 | would be at least a 9mm, preferably a 40 Smith & Wesson or a 45 automatic for each adult

01:11:42.460 | member of the family, and then one .22 rifle for each member of the family, adults and

01:11:50.260 | children, and my favorite right now for that is the Ruger 10/22 stainless steel takedown.

01:11:56.460 | It's one that can be disassembled into two pieces so it'll fit in a backpack.

01:12:02.780 | And then one shotgun that could double as both a combat shotgun and as a bird hunting

01:12:10.540 | shotgun for each adult member of the family, and perhaps one long-range counter-sniper

01:12:19.700 | rifle.

01:12:20.700 | Here I'm talking about a scoped bolt-action rifle chambered in .308 or .30-06 preferably

01:12:28.820 | that would be capable of taking down a man-sized target out to 1,200 yards.

01:12:35.900 | You should have one of those at least for the family, preferably one for each adult

01:12:39.900 | member of the family.

01:12:41.580 | Now if your main concern is just investing and you're not anticipating any kind of societal

01:12:51.380 | disruption, then perhaps you're better off investing all in pre-1899 firearms because

01:12:57.780 | they're the, like for example Colts, a Colt single-action revolver that you would have

01:13:04.140 | paid $30 or $40 for in the 1960s is now selling for $6,000, $7,000, $8,000.

01:13:13.860 | It's just a matter of finding a make and model of gun that's of very high quality, that's

01:13:21.180 | sought after by collectors, and that's going to appreciate in value.

01:13:27.460 | What about, final couple of questions and we're done.

01:13:32.180 | Obviously with firearms, many of my listeners will be in living situations that make it

01:13:38.180 | perhaps more difficult to accumulate a collection, whether it's simply trundling ammo cans filled

01:13:46.140 | with ammunition up to the 30th floor of an apartment, that can be a little bit taxing,

01:13:51.700 | or simply coming and going with long rifle cases every day in many of our neighborhoods

01:13:59.340 | can raise some eyebrows.

01:14:00.860 | Do you have any advice for people who are concerned about theft?

01:14:03.580 | Certainly I would say, I would lean toward collecting handguns, but there's a lot to

01:14:09.380 | be said for using musical instrument cases.

01:14:12.260 | My favorites are guitar cases and trombone cases, or for example I just mentioned takedown

01:14:21.460 | rifles.

01:14:22.620 | You can fit a takedown .22 or a takedown combat shotgun or riot shotgun in a trumpet

01:14:30.300 | case and to the untrained eye, unless you're wearing an NRA hat and carrying it around,

01:14:40.060 | it's just going to look like you're a musician.

01:14:43.460 | You might want to lean more toward handguns if you're an urbanite and you're looking to

01:14:47.760 | invest in guns and you're worried about the high profile of carrying gun cases around.

01:14:54.620 | Musical instrument cases or Casio keyboard cases for example can cover all manner of

01:15:03.580 | investments.

01:15:04.580 | I won't say sins, I'll say investments.

01:15:07.280 | Why is gun collecting so addictive?

01:15:10.380 | I think part of it is the historical attachment that comes along with a lot of firearms.

01:15:17.740 | When you pick up a Winchester rifle that has brass tacks pounded into it by some Native

01:15:25.220 | American from the 1850s and 1860s, you're literally holding a piece of history in your

01:15:31.780 | hands.

01:15:33.400 | I often hear the phrase at gun shows, "If this gun could only speak about where it was."

01:15:38.160 | The same applies to military guns.

01:15:40.820 | You say you have a Model 98 Mauser that was made in 1917.

01:15:47.060 | Most of that gun probably was in the trenches of World War I or you say you have an M1 Garand

01:15:52.740 | that is in a serial number that dates it before 1945.

01:15:59.260 | Chances are probably 99% that gun was actually carried by a combat infantryman in World War

01:16:05.660 | II in either the European or the Pacific theater of operations.

01:16:11.340 | So you're literally investing in history and everyone really knows that when they see these

01:16:18.340 | particular makes and models of guns in particular serial number ranges.

01:16:22.300 | For example, there's a whole bunch of people who collect nothing but trapdoor Springfield

01:16:27.580 | carbines in what was called the Custer era.

01:16:33.380 | This is a single shot 45-70 carbine that was carried by cavalrymen and if you buy them

01:16:39.180 | in a particular serial number range, you're buying them before the Battle of Little Bighorn

01:16:49.940 | in 1876.

01:16:53.660 | You're literally buying a gun that could have been carried by a cavalry trooper in the Custer

01:17:02.900 | era.

01:17:04.900 | So for guns like that, there's a particular significance that's historical and I see the

01:17:12.500 | same thing go on with Japanese swords where just by seeing a particular maker's mark on

01:17:21.340 | the tang of a Japanese sword, you know that it's from the whatever era from like 1600

01:17:29.820 | or whatever and it could have been carried in whatever Japanese Civil War.

01:17:37.060 | Those kind of things are going to be known by astute collectors and they will always

01:17:45.340 | put not just a premium but a multiplier on the value of that particular item versus one

01:17:53.620 | that's just as well made but in a different serial number range.

01:17:57.460 | Aaron Ross Powell: Jim, this has been awesome.

01:18:00.380 | Survivalblog.com is your website, probably if not the largest, one of the largest survival

01:18:06.340 | oriented websites.

01:18:07.820 | Tell my audience about your newest novel.

01:18:10.300 | Jim Gildey, PhD Oh sure.

01:18:11.780 | My latest novel is called Land of Promise.

01:18:14.460 | It's about the establishment of a libertarian Christian homeland nation following the establishment

01:18:21.740 | of a global Islamic caliphate.

01:18:23.780 | It's set in the future.

01:18:24.780 | I hope your listeners enjoy reading it.

01:18:27.700 | But folks, please do take a look at survivalblog.com.

01:18:31.300 | If you go to my bookshelf and video page, you'll find a lot of references on investing

01:18:35.500 | in not just firearms but also things like coins for example.

01:18:40.620 | And everything that is at survivalblog.com is free of charge.

01:18:46.300 | There is no super secret members only area.

01:18:49.420 | It's all free.

01:18:50.500 | All the archives are fully searchable.

01:18:52.580 | So please folks, take full advantage of it.

01:18:54.580 | Aaron Ross Powell, thank you so much, Joshua.

01:18:57.580 | Thank you for listening to this episode of Radical Personal Finance.

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