i think decent pricing dictates 99% of our collecting interest.
Value for money is a must these days my friend.
It would be nice to win the lottery but until then......
I think the prices went up as a combination of things. The forum has made HJ more popular for certain. The book caused a slight increase in the price of more common straps and drastic increase in the price of more scarce straps, but they were already climbing in value when it was released. With SS, Heer, Luftwaffe, SA, etc all becoming very expensive to collect HJ surged in popularity for a period. Straps are now overpriced IMO and not selling at nearly the rates or prices they were a year ago. HJ Knives are another example. People are still asking crazy prices for decent examples and they just don't sell until reduced. Also the economic recession in the US has brought a lot of stuff out from older collections for sale that has been sitting in collections for years and years. Just my observations and opinion.