Buying a used cartridge...tell us your tale.

I bought a used Dynavector DV20L and the suspension was totally collapsed. Although the cartridge sounded wonderful, the bottom of the cartridge was scraping the record. I ended up selling the cartridge at a 400.00 loss to someone who was going to send it out to be fixed. Never Again!

Risk crossing the street...that said...with new catridges at many price points...going used unless no longer manufactured vintage (shure) ...seems less attractive. Still, Shure V series has tempted me on numerous times will excellent results. Maybe others can chime in...any super bargains in the sub $100 vintage cart arena?

I would not buy used, too delicate. Besides it is hard to track how many hours are really on it. I have used a Jubilee for about 7 years, I can't tell you within 500 hours how many it really has.

About 15 years ago, I was traveling for business to Denver and went into an audio store there. Can't remember the name of the place, but they had four or five lightly used very high-end cartridges from one of the audio designers in the area, who was checking them out with his gear. I bought the heavily discounted Lyra Evolve 99, and have been using Lyras ever since.
A totally positive experience for me. But I would be reluctant to buy a used cartridge from someone I did not know, and who was not a dealer.