Good Time To Buy Or Not?

[threegee]

I'd have put this in the computer section but on reflection it has much wider interest:

VAT goes up on 1st January and the Christmas rush is over, so now seems like the best ever time to buy that deferred purchase. Avoid inflated pre-Christmas pricing, and avoid increased tax. At first sight that seems 100% logical; but is it really?

Tracking prices of desirable computer gismos I see very few bargains at the moment. Yes, there has been the odd gismo at an unbelievably good price, but they were quickly cleaned out, and at the moment there's not much on sale that wasn't available at similar prices in the run up to the festive season. So could it be that retailers are extending their Christmas pricing to catch those who have been deliberately deferring purchases until the sales? A sort of double guessing the market? I think that generally there's a strong case for believing this. It may be time to double guess the double guessers for a real bargain!

In other words retail-wise things are set to go very very flat in the Spring (if not before), and retailers will have to respond to others slashing prices to move any stock at all. That VAT rise is only 2.5% and will be easily absorbed; in many cases a reduction wasn't really passed on in the first place, and was used to bolster margins. So unless a bargain is utterly irresistible there will be surely be a better one to be had by holding back a little. Sit on your money (or your credit card slack) for now must be the best advice.

[ex Bedlingtonian]

Yes but you can always "sit on your money". There will always be a "better product" come along, or the prices on the "obsolete" stuff will fall.

[Malcolm Robinson]

Com'on you know most of the stuff in 'sales' is a con, bought in especially to sell at huge reductions off MRRP. No one in their right mind would have carried too much stock last year so there can't be much in the way of clearance lines really. The shops and shopping centres look busy but I wonder what the numbers are going through the tills, where it counts? I think the next few years are going to be lean for retailers never mind months GGG.

You did say 'can' didn't you Ex-B?

[Monsta®]

depends on what your going to buy!