What is the cheapest guitar you bought?

Subject: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: Bert
Date: 29 Oct 12 - 06:52 PM

I'm starting this thread 'cos I bought a guitar for $4.99 at Goodwill the other day. A new set of strings more than doubled it's cost. It doesn't sound too bad, I'm going to have to lower the action a tad. It has a thumb nail sized hole in the side which doesn't affect anything other than the appearance.

Oh, and freebies don't count.

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: Dorothy Parshall
Date: 29 Oct 12 - 07:02 PM

Back in the 70's my son (14) started out with a $50 guitar from Rufus Guitar Shop in Montreal (Which is now in Vancouver). He left it behind when he went away to school, moved on up, practiced lots and now he has two of those custom made ones from that woman in B.C. I sold the guitar back to Rufus Guitar shop. It may not have cost us anything?!

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: Bobert
Date: 29 Oct 12 - 07:36 PM

For 40 years I played my '66 Martin D-18 that I bought as a teenager... Then I found a $40 S.Yari in a pawn shop, bought it, and have been playing and performing with it ever since...

Answer; $40...

B~

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: Bee-dubya-ell
Date: 29 Oct 12 - 07:37 PM

I bought one of those "First Act" guitars WalMart sells for my grandson at a thrift store for $5.00. I don't claim it, but it lives at my house. Hard to fret, has lousy intonation, but tune it to an open tuning and it's a purty funky thing to do some slide on.

And I bought my first nylon-string guitar for $15.00 from a guy who came into a bookstore I was working in. He wanted to sell some second-hand books, but they were all junk. He was pretty hard up for cash, so he sold me the guitar instead. It wasn't much good, but it sparked enough interest in playing on nylon that I soon bought a better one. I think I gave it to a friend.

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: GUEST
Date: 29 Oct 12 - 08:35 PM

A Guild D 25, $125.00

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: Mark Ross
Date: 29 Oct 12 - 09:04 PM

$14.95 at G. Schirmers in Manhattan in 1964. The bridge started puling up from the tension of steel strings, so I put a set of nylon strings on it and sold it the next year for $15.

Mark Ross

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: Betsy
Date: 29 Oct 12 - 09:09 PM

Tatra Classic - £ 7.00 ( about $10 ) 1964
Did loads of Gigs with it - Busked in many places especially in Amsterdam in 1968 ish when the Police WOULD confiscate your gear, played on Dutch Radio KRO with fiddler Clive Collins an eventually drifted to a new steel stringed Yamaha FG 180. Jeez he Tatra days were happy days !!!!
Still got it - but it is unplayable / falling to bits.

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 29 Oct 12 - 09:19 PM

$37.50 for a Global. It's a nice guitar.

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: GUEST,999
Date: 29 Oct 12 - 09:31 PM

I had a Stella once that was close to $20.00. Good guitar. I learned to play "Since I Met You, Baby" and "Lulu" (yes, THAT one) on it and wrote my first song with that guitar. The words were horrible, but I intend very soon to reuse the melody because it's very pretty. I sanded and painted Stella's body with a kitchen enamel. Did't hurt the sound one bit. Must have been under the influence of having learned to sing Lulu. I think I was a young 13-year-old.

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: Beer
Date: 29 Oct 12 - 09:53 PM

I was 16 when i purchased me Axe from Eaton's. Can't remember the name but it was damn expensive. $15.99 if i remember correctly. Started turning the knobs on it and broke the string right away. about a month later got to town (Halifax) and bought the best string available and the fellow tuned it for me. Black Diamond Strings.
Adrien

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: Henry Krinkle
Date: 29 Oct 12 - 10:24 PM

$15 Mexican Estella classical from another guy in the bughouse. Had electric guitar strings on it and a bowed neck. Sparked enough interest that I bought my Acoustic Black Widow by Mosrite for $150 three months later. Sold the Estella to another guy in the bughouse for $15.
=(:-( ))

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: Phil Cooper
Date: 29 Oct 12 - 10:56 PM

Sears Silvertone for about $25.00 on Dec. 1 1969. I saved my allowance for a long time and bought it myself. Taught myself on it. Every guitar since has cost progressively more. Kind of like drug addiction.

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: Stanron
Date: 30 Oct 12 - 12:43 AM

In 1962 I bought my first guitar for three shillings and six pence. It was all plywood and had a Stauffer type adjustable neck. It had no strings, bridge, tail piece or tuners. It cost 15 shillings to put all that together and I had my first guitar. My dad was right, it was all downhill from then on.

40 odd years on at a Sunday morning car boot sale I picked up an unbranded guitar for £5. Stauffer type again, 24" string length but all solid wood. I removed the single bolt holding the neck on. There was no fretboard. The whole neck was a single piece of maple with the fretted part painted a different colour. It was intended as a classical guitar, too wide for me but 30 minutes with a belt sander put that right. A generous coat of black gloss and it has been my cooking guitar for years. I have several much better guitars but they all live in their cases. The old beater is the one that gets played most.

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: Bert
Date: 30 Oct 12 - 01:26 AM

Belt sander! I love it. The sign of a true guitar owner.

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: greg stephens
Date: 30 Oct 12 - 03:34 AM

10/- in Barnstaple, c 1958. Mind you in thoase days ten bob was a lot of money, you could get a guitar for that.

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: Henry Krinkle
Date: 30 Oct 12 - 03:53 AM

Used to be really expensive to buy a decent guitar. Now I'm finding good guitars for $25-$50.
=(:-( D)

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: alex s
Date: 30 Oct 12 - 06:44 AM

Betsy - my Tatra classic cost £7 in 1965 and it still plays fine. It has lived in the corner of every place I've been and all my kids learned to play on it. I still play it every day. When Armageddon comes it will be there with the cockroaches...

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: Myrtle's cook
Date: 30 Oct 12 - 07:27 AM

A £10 un branded Southern jumbo in 1984 from an Oxfam shop. No rod in the neck which had developed a very high action and coupled with the heavy weight strings it came with did not make for a comfortable inital playing exerpience. I did replace the tuners (which had lost all traction), replaced the original bridge which was so soft the strings had cut into it, and must have replaced the strings in a moment of extravagance.

It was a good transition from nylon strings to steel - and when I got a second hand ovation copy 5 years later (not so cheap - £50 including soft case) I could not believe how easy/comfortable the latter was to play. The Southern jumbo went to another Oxfam shop a few years later where it sold for £25. I like to think it has been recycled several times since raising a little more for charity each time!

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: GUEST,buddhuu sans cookie
Date: 30 Oct 12 - 08:00 AM

Dunno. All my guitars are cheap.

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: Nick
Date: 30 Oct 12 - 09:04 AM

Tatra Classic - in 1960's. It was a present but I think £10.

Bought a spanish guitar from Majorca a few years later for about £7

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: blinddrunkal
Date: 30 Oct 12 - 10:03 AM

In 1966 I bought a Balliol Apollo from Mazell's in Manchester for £5.00 - my weekly wage was £4.19s. so that wasn't really cheap at all! A couple of years ago I bought a new Epiphone 12 string for £100 including soft case - my weekly wage was £400. - now that was cheap!
I still play the old Apollo - but only with a slide!

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: Leadfingers
Date: 30 Oct 12 - 03:25 PM

Realised that all the songs I really wanted to sing were NOT Trad Unacc songs , so bit the bullet and bought a battered Classical stle but with steel strings from the NAAFI manager at RAF Steamer Point in Aden for a WHOLE English pound ! Th Top was comming away from the tailpiece , but gaffa tape , then later Araldite sorted that out . Learnt the basics on it and sold it back in UK for a fiver !!

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: Don Firth
Date: 30 Oct 12 - 04:16 PM

When I first got interested in folk music around 1952, I went looking for a guitar to learn on. A friend had just bought himself a Gibson f-hole orchestra guitar (he was into jazz) and offered me his old guitar for $5.00. He said it might need a few repairs.

Well—it was a real cheapie to begin with. And he, in a wall-eyed fit of some kind, had taken a woodburning set and burned a cartoon onto the soundboard. A stereotypical Mexican peon, complete with a big sombrero and serape, taking a siesta while leaning against a cactus. Burro patiently waiting in the background. Garish! Gawdawful. But I got it for a mere $5.00.

If the cartoon wasn't bad enough (I figured maybe I could throw a tarp over it), it only had five strings. One of the tuning keys had broken off. It turned out it would cost me more than I had paid for the damned thing to have new tuners put on.

I took it down to Myers' Music on Seattle's First Avenue (where all the pawn shops are) to see if I could trade it in on something serviceable. The salesman took one look and said, "Get that thing OUT of here!!"

But he sold me a little Regal plywood guitar for $9.95, plus $5.00 for a fiberboard case, and threw in a free copy of Nick Manoloff's How to Play the Guitar complete with a handy-dandy patented Nick Manaloff "Chord Wheel," a sort of cardboard slide rule with which you could dial a key and it would tell you what chords to use. Handy! I learned all about the Circle of Fifths from that gizmo.

But he still wanted me to get the guitar with the busted tuning key and the cartoon out of the shop quickly and unobtrusively.

I later sold it for—$5.00—to a friend who said he thought he could fix the tuning key, and since he planned on keeping it in his bedroom while he taught himself to play, he didn't mind the silly cartoon.

The Regal turned out to be not bad to start on. It was actually tunable, the intonation was right on, as were the frets, amd because it had a medium-low action, it was easy enough to play. Sounded like it was made from old apple crates, but wotthehell, it was good enough to start to learn on.

I sold it about a year and a half later—for $5.00—and bought myself a Martin 00-18. $110.00 complete with a fifteen dollar fiberboard case.

Don Firth

P. S. Belt sander! That would have taken care of that silly cartoon. Why didn't I think of that?

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: GUEST
Date: 30 Oct 12 - 05:54 PM

Ooh, had loads of cheapies over the years but the cheapest was a blue 3 p/u Futurama. strat shape but with switches rather than a selector. It had a perspex/glass top to it which I suspect was to protect the dodgy vinyl over chipboard body. I paid £6 for it from an old school mate and traded it in for a Japanese LP copy in about 1974 for - guess what ? - £6! Wish I'd got it now...
    Ian Gill

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: vectis
Date: 30 Oct 12 - 07:31 PM

I bought a Spanish reject direct from the factory for £3.50 when I was 16 and learned to play on it. Terrible instrument but sturdy, except for the neck which moved when you tried to tune it. Sold it for £10 a few years later.

Bought a classical for £3.50 about 10 years ago which plays a lot better than my old Spanish junker and sounds a whole lot better too.

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: musicmick
Date: 30 Oct 12 - 11:25 PM

My first guitar was a United Elitone, with action like a pasta slicer.
My first good guitar was a new Harmony 910 (retailed for $35 in 1957)
It played beautifully and the wood was so tough, I could have used it for a canoe paddle. It was the smaller of Harmony's classical guitar. The larger, more luxurious, model, the 173, was great, too.

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: Don Firth
Date: 31 Oct 12 - 01:39 AM

I had a Harmony 173 for awhile during the mid-1950s. I got it after I bought the Martin 00-28-G classical, to use for knocking about. The 173 was a darn nice guitar for the money. $53.00 as I recall.

I had a number of guitar students who started on Harmony 910s. Good, serviceable instrument, especially for the money.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: Henry Krinkle
Date: 31 Oct 12 - 01:53 AM

$53 was alot of money back then. People would work all week for less than that.
If ukes count I bought a pineapple uke for $5 or $10 in the early 90's.
=(:-( ))

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: BlueJay
Date: 31 Oct 12 - 03:20 AM

Bought an old Harmony at a garage sale for five bucks. Action wasn't bad, and it sounded OK. My brilliant thinking led me to believe that I could turn it into a cutaway, so I took a saw to it, planning to turn the leftover upper side indide out, and thus completing the body. To my chagrin, I discovered that the body taper did not allow for a proper fit, so I just left the upper bout open. It still played and sounded pretty good, and sold it at a yard sale for about five bucks. It was fun while it lasted. Thanks, BlueJay

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: Henry Krinkle
Date: 31 Oct 12 - 03:56 AM

At least you didn't do it to something really nice.
=(:-( ))

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: Betsy
Date: 31 Oct 12 - 06:05 AM

I've enjoyed reading THIS thread. I say THIS thread as I ( as I'm sure you could also) could have easily have made bold disclosures of expensive guitars I have, in another thread in Mudcat.I find that the stories here are extremely human , modest, nostalgic and good natured, and and avoid the vulgarity of bragging about expensive guitar purchases which we have made.

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: Henry Krinkle
Date: 31 Oct 12 - 06:58 AM

We're happy bragging about our indulgences. We deserved them for all the sacrifice and hard work. And our expensive guitars inspire us.
=(:-( ))

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: GUEST,Desi C
Date: 31 Oct 12 - 07:24 AM

I bought one in my youth for £40 in a mail order catalogue, It wasn't worth half that. First proper guitar was an aria Electro acoustic for £110, decent enough guitar, still got it for sale

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 31 Oct 12 - 07:29 AM

Back in the late 60s a mate of mine was passing a car saleroom in the centre of Liverpool when he saw a guitar hanging in the window of the office.
Apart from the fact it was badly hand-painted it looked in reasonable condition, so he asked what they were wanting for it.
The salesman told him that it was given in part exchange and he had no idea what to ask for it - they settled on £10.00 for the black, hand-painted Martin.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: Midchuck
Date: 31 Oct 12 - 07:40 AM

Strictly speaking, I didn't buy it. The lady, my wife, was volunteering for the setup of the big annual rummage sale our local Humane Society puts on. Volunteer workers got first chance to buy stuff. She came home with a mostly-plywood dreadnought from one of the big Pacific-rim builders - Ibanez, IIRC. People donating merchandise were supposed to price it themselves, and this had been donated with a marked price of US$5.00 - maybe three Pounds, British? It was very dirty, strings were rusty, etc. One assumes bought by a parent for a child who said they wanted to learn and then never did.

I cleaned it up, changed the strings, adjusted the truss rod, sanded down the saddle a little, and sold it for $75.00 at our yard sale, and we went out to dinner.

P.

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: Betsy
Date: 31 Oct 12 - 01:46 PM

I like a success story Midchuck !!!

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 31 Oct 12 - 09:03 PM

Think it was about £12 at late 60s prices for a classical nylon strung guitar. Moved to a £25 Eko Texan in 1970 ( a lot of money then!)

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: GUEST,songbob
Date: 31 Oct 12 - 10:29 PM

Let's see. My fist guitar (1961) was $15 (brand new), and I've bought a few junkers in yard sales.

Then there was the "guitar, $30" in the local shopper paper that turned out to be a 1932 Martin 0-18 (sunburst!). It took some work by a friend to set the neck and make it more playable (it wasn't so bad, but it did need the work).

I even bought a Martin 000-28 for $150 or so one day. It sounded tinny and actually pretty bad. I took it home to change the strings, and as I loosened the 6th string, the tone improved. I checked the tuning -- it was five frets high! I didn't even change the strings; tuning it to standard made it bloom. I took it to the Alexandria Folklore Center and put it up for sale at $300 and sold it that day. (This was around 1967, so the prices look so much better than today's).

But the top is the 1943 Martin 0-18 I still have, which came as a gift. Of course, resetting the neck (and replacing the bridge, which I'd planed too thin) cost $835, so the earlier 0-18 was the best buy.

Bob

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: Uncle Phil
Date: 31 Oct 12 - 10:47 PM

I have an all-mahogany baritone uke that someone gave me to secure a $15 loan about 40 years ago. I still play it pretty often, mostly late at night when guitar playing might wake up the house.
- Phil

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: GUEST,DrWord
Date: 01 Nov 12 - 12:55 AM

ca.1950 Regal tenor guitar, rusty strings and beyond repair banjo-style tuners: thirty bucks. Tuners and strings were another twenty, and I play it almost daily. Best yard sale buy ever! And I even like the mustiness of the khaki cardboard case :)

I prefer THIS thread, too, Betsy.
keep on pickin'
dennis

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 01 Nov 12 - 01:25 AM

I ain't sayin'!!

GfS

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: Rusty Dobro
Date: 01 Nov 12 - 01:35 PM

My brother found me an old Mugen 12-string (Martin replica) at a car-boot sale. I spent £15 on strings and a couple of machine-head parts, and it plays like a dream - big sound, stays in tune, low action and no buzzes or rattles. Although I tune it down two steps, the bridge still lifted eventually, but the luthier tells me his repair will last for ever.

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: Henry Krinkle
Date: 01 Nov 12 - 03:19 PM

I recently bought two of those Squier Strat and amp packs. One for $50. One for $60. They cost about $250 new. I got $100 trade in credit on an American Deluxe Strat with one of the guitars last week. And sold one of the amps with a cable for $45 this morning. So now I have about $650 in a super nice teal green American Deluxe Stratocaster with a nice hardshell case. I had bought a nice Gibson Les Paul 1960 Classic from the same guy a week earlier. He needed money. I love nice guitars.
=(:-( D)

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: Fossil
Date: 01 Nov 12 - 09:00 PM

Back in 1958, when I was 15 (you do the math...), worked a summer job driving a dishwasher in the cafeteria at Trentham Gardens, Stoke-on-Trent, UK.

With the proceeds, I paid 15 UK pounds for a Hofner Verithin President guitar at the local Exchange and Mart shop. A beautiful blonde guitar with a cutaway, it got me into music lessons, later into a trad jazz band then (having fitted it with a pick-up) a rock group. Long gone now, of course, but I'd love to find another one. But I wouldn't get it for 15 nicker, I know that!

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: GUEST,999
Date: 01 Nov 12 - 09:11 PM

Nice to meet another dish washer, 'cept in my case it was pots. It was doing that that allowed me to buy Stella II, and talk about a nice guitar. D-28 with beautiful sound, equally good on bass and treble and all places in between.

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: Wesley S
Date: 01 Nov 12 - 09:31 PM

Back in 1969 I paid right around $225.00 for a 1967 Martin D-18. I still have it.

Subject: RE: What is the cheapest guitar you bought?
From: Don Firth
Date: 01 Nov 12 - 09:33 PM

Air guitar?

Don Firth