With the massive 2014 Swiss watch fair “Baselworld” just completed and all those hot new models being released, it’s easy to get caught up in the excitement and yield to temptation by forking over your hard-earned dough as soon as those beauties become available later this year. And if there’s another watch out there that you’ve been jonesing to own for a while now, you might also be considering going to the brand’s boutique store or authorized dealer and ponying up for it there. But the truth is that for most models (unless money is no object), there’s no real reason to pay full retail for the watch of your dreams. For example, you might consider buying from so-called “gray market” sellers who will offer small discounts over MSRP. But very often they will deliberately leave out such desirable pieces of the new watch package as certain authenticating paperwork and, worse yet, some will even file off serial numbers because these watches have literally gone out the back door of an authorized dealer. Far better in my opinion to do your hunting among like-minded enthusiasts through one of the very high quality and high volume Sales Corners hosted by the major watch forums on the Net. With a little due diligence and patience, you can usually save a significant percentage by buying a pre-owned example from another collector rather than paying dealer prices. Just as with a newish but pre-owned automobile, the prior owner will have taken some of the depreciation out of the price equation, leaving you with a lot more bang for your buck.

One of the largest watch discussion sites in the world, Timezone.com also has an excellent Sales Corner

The two best places to do your shopping are on Timezone.com and Watchuseek.com. Both have massive sales corners with a large volume of For Sale posts daily. Between these two sites, you might see one of every watch ever made eventually. Timezone has cleverly divided their sales areas into two distinct fora: Sales Corner for watches listed under $5k and TZ Showcase for watches over that (i.e. usually big time luxury models). On Watchuseek, the main sales forums are divided a bit differently with no price cutoff but rather a Dealers and non-Dealer distinction. In any event, these two sites have by far the largest audience and memberships in the watch world so whatever you’re looking for, it will most likely pop up on one of these boards sooner or later.

Probably the world’s largest watch-related site, WUS also has a massive sales section for preowned watches

For specific brands you can search out smaller, dedicated forums that cater to a particular marque for even better odds of snagging the object of your desire. For example, if you are hunting a modern Rolex you may want to check out The Rolex Forums’ classified ads. If it’s an Omega you’ve got in your sights, then the dedicated Omega Forums’ Watch Sales area could be the ticket. Likewise for Breitling there’s the Breitling Source Forums and for Panerai there’s the Paneristi Collector’s Market. And on and on. If you can find a forum dedicated to a specific brand, chances are they will have a busy sales corner to peruse.

Now the question you may be asking yourself is: how do I know I can trust the other guy to make good when I send him my money for the watch? And certainly that’s the most important concern. But unlike buying through a Craigslist-type deal or even eBay, the sellers through watch discussion forums tend to be at least somewhat established within the community with a verifiable profile and prior transactions to check up on. In other words, a guy with 2000+ posts in a watch forum has been around and is probably not going to risk his good rep by acting like a jerk when selling. Chances are he has bought or sold a bunch in the past, as well, and so has a track record of deals.

To make sure of this, you can check his posting history via the sites’ member pages and get an idea of the person you’re dealing with just from that. You can also run his name/nickname/email through Google, as well as the very handy “Deal Watch” forum over at TZ’s sister site, Watchnet, which keeps a record of troubled transactions and shady sellers. And whether a seller has a lot of prior deals or not, you should always ask them for references because chances are this will be a relatively high value transaction. All sellers of good repute should be able to provide references of some sort even if they’re simply of the professional/Linked In variety. Knowing who you’re doing business with definitely breeds confidence. And in the end, most people are honest and perfectly good to deal with.

Because it can feel a little like tightrope walking when you first start, it’s probably better to do the deal through Paypal or some other credit card processor rather than a bank wire so that you have a margin of safety should the deal go south. As has been said many times before, never use Western Union to send money or engage with people with very elaborate back stories about their sad personal situation or how they came to own the watch in response to simple questions. Similarly, if a guy’s profile or email indicates he’s from California but you’re given a bank address in Addis Ababa, that’s obviously a red flag. Also, try to deal with sellers who have a concrete written return policy in their ads. The industry standard is 3 days unconditional return so that is a reasonable expectation to have but it will obviously depend on the individual seller since they are usually not professional dealers. I’d say starting out, you should try to deal with a guy who will take returns under at least some reasonable conditions because that means they’ll stand by the authenticity of the watch in question or if there is a mechanical problem when you’ve taken delivery. So of course, definitely proceed with caution but don’t let fear stand in the way of a great deal on a great watch. If you approach it like any other high value transaction that you’d undertake in life — hiring a contractor or a nanny, buying a used car or house — you’ll do just fine. As with any of those things, due diligence is the key.

Finally, I’d also add that it’s best to wait awhile before making your move on a brand new model. For most watches not named Patek Philippe, the more time that passes from their initial release, the lower the price becomes on the secondary market. If you can just keep from pulling the trigger for 6 months to a year, you can save literally hundreds and sometimes thousands of dollars in that relatively short time. As I know all too well, waiting is easier said than done when you are dying to get that certain special wristwatch onto your wrist. But then again, saving a ton of money through applying just a little patience and by doing a deal with a fellow collector is also pretty sweet.