1995 koa ce value

Koa

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I was offered a mind koa ce , 1995, any idea as to the value? Is 1500 a bad price?
 
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It ended up costing me more than 1500...but looks like it was worth every penny...
 
I'm new to this forum, so not sure if it's ok to hijack this thread after it's been inactive, but here goes...
I've been trying to get info on a guitar and am having very little luck. It's a 1994 koa top CE3. I've known it since it was bought new - a friend bought it for her husband, who has now passed away. I contacted PRS about it, but they mis-identified it as a 2004. I tried again today - maybe I'll have better luck!

I know when it was bought, and I have the original guitar tag, so I know what it is. S/N 479841, Koa top, curly maple neck (bolt on), plain FB with dots (no fancy inlay), HFS treble pu, Vintage bass pu. The top is pretty spectacular, and the guitar is in excellent condition - never played out, just evenings and weekends at home.

I'm trying to get some idea of its value, as we're acoustic people and won't be playing it. I can post photos once the forum gives me the rights to post them. Any comments greatly appreciated!
 
Yes that serial number is a 94. We can excuse an error once in a while.;)

A straight up CE will go for $1200 tops, but since you have a rather unusual one the top end would only be a guess. Looks like the other one went for something north of $1500. Yours might get that too.:)
 
There are also presently some redwood and cedar topped CE's for sale from that time period. They're priced around $1400 at the moment.
 
Thanks! I've been looking on and off for some time and saw a few CE3's with asking prices in the $1500-2000 range, plus a few crazy high prices. But I don't know the guitars well enough to know whether the high prices were for limited edition or custom instruments or if they were just shots in the dark. I'm mainly wanting to make sure this is a standard production instrument that happens to have a flashy top, and not something rare enough to tempt a collector or some such if I go high when I finally put it up for sale.

Is there a way to post photos? I don't see how right off, but it may be because I'm new to the forum and don't have enough posts yet to have attachment privileges. I'm guessing the original post photos were links that are long gone - wish I could see them. Most of this guitar is going to look just like you'd expect, but the top is pretty spectacular - 2-piece curly koa with a very strong regular figure, top piece with a strong drift from heart- to sap-wood. Probably quartersawn or near to it, as the curl is very bold. Clear finish, so the curl leaps out at you. I wish I had some of that wood hanging out in the back of my shop <g>... It's very a really cool guitar - I'd love to hang on to it just to look at it and play it every so often, but we've gotta thin out the collection. I was a luthier for years, and we have violins, cellos and viola da gambas, plus several guitars.
 
Thanks! I've been looking on and off for some time and saw a few CE3's with asking prices in the $1500-2000 range, plus a few crazy high prices. But I don't know the guitars well enough to know whether the high prices were for limited edition or custom instruments or if they were just shots in the dark. I'm mainly wanting to make sure this is a standard production instrument that happens to have a flashy top, and not something rare enough to tempt a collector or some such if I go high when I finally put it up for sale.

Is there a way to post photos? I don't see how right off, but it may be because I'm new to the forum and don't have enough posts yet to have attachment privileges. I'm guessing the original post photos were links that are long gone - wish I could see them. Most of this guitar is going to look just like you'd expect, but the top is pretty spectacular - 2-piece curly koa with a very strong regular figure, top piece with a strong drift from heart- to sap-wood. Probably quartersawn or near to it, as the curl is very bold. Clear finish, so the curl leaps out at you. I wish I had some of that wood hanging out in the back of my shop <g>... It's very a really cool guitar - I'd love to hang on to it just to look at it and play it every so often, but we've gotta thin out the collection. I was a luthier for years, and we have violins, cellos and viola da gambas, plus several guitars.

Once you hit the minimum post threshold (3 or 10?) you can post photos. They have to be hosted from a third party site like Imgur, Flikr, Google Photos, etc. Once you upload them to your photo site, you can use the button on the toolbar, or copy/paste to post your photo in a thread.
 
No, haven't run into an '86. I'll get pics uploaded soon so I can post links to them - still have found almost nothing on early koa top CE3s - we sure seem to have an oddity.
 
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