Schimmel Grand Piano

[sarcher]

Hello! I am searching for a grand piano to replace my upright, and I found a 1987 Schimmel 5'10 grand at a piano store for $14,000. I was wondering if that is a reasonable price to pay or if I should make an offer. Does anyone have any experience with Schimmels? They also have a 1999 Kawai RX-1 for $11,900 and Mason and Hamlin Model B for $18,500. I am trying to research what the average price range is for these pianos so I can come up with a reasonable offer. and if anyone has any recommendations for pianos to look try out, I would greatly appreciate it! Thanks so much in advance!

[hfmadopter]

Depends on the dealer and what they have invested in the instrument, most have some niggle room. Those are all good quality instruments. It's always worth a shot to offer a couple of thousand less on a used piano in that class, but the prices ( depending on the exact instrument and condition, if rebuilds were involved etc.) to me sound fairly typical. And if I owned any one of them I probably wouldn't throw them out of my living room. In your shoes I'd buy the one that I feel most comfortable sitting at and playing my repertoire on. Have a tech check them out closely before purchase.

That said, I can't speak a whole bunch about the Schimmel because I haven't encountered one nor has our local dealer had one in that I can recall, but if I landed an RX1 or M&H B for around $11,000 or so I think I'd be pretty happy. He had a B in down the road from me that didn't have a whole lot of wear in it and as I recall it was around that price range. His prices are pretty fair through out the store but he says everyone buys the shiny new Chinese pianos for $6500- $7500. So some used or rebuilt pianos sit a long time. I'd take that as a hint to work on price a bit.

[gvans]

I have a 5'10" 1985 Schimmel. I love it, the tone is uniform up and down the register, the treble bright but not (IMO) overly so. I paid slightly less six years ago than the quoted price.

I think you're in the ball park. But of course, you must love the action, the sound, the whole thing. If you're not in love, don't elope.

[visitor]

it's a buyers market, those seem really high for both, even though they are qaulity instrments, 14K for a 30 year old schimmy feels like too much. Kawai's generally age quite well, they're the honda accord of the piano world, but 11k for the low baby rx that is 16 years old again, that's like double what i would pay through private sale, in a retail setting i think 25% markup over a decent private sale offer seems fair, so 6K + 25%, i  would start negotiating around the 7500, they likely paid 5 for it on a trade, you may have a conter in the 9K range which would seem much easier to stomach, again i like the kawai rx's they are the closest you'll get before breaking into a shigeru, so it's worth the hassle and haggle.