One's trash is someone else's treasure

I would sell the Picasso and send the money to Gemini.

In defense of Gemini:

The worth of an item can only be measured in the hands of the person holding it. To the elderly gentleman, the TT was only worth the $100.00 he asked for it. He could have offered it to his elderly next door neighbor to whom it may have only been worth $50.00. That's what it's worth would have been. To the person Gemini sold it to, it had a worth of $900.00. Maybe at the time Gemini resold it, he thought it had a worth of $1,500.00 but it was only worth $900.00 to the person who bought it. The worth of any item is only measured by the person who is willing to buy it or to the person holding it for the worth he is willing to part with it for. To say that Gemini should have offered the gentleman a measure of worth more than the gentleman was asking is to impart Gemini's sense of worth of the object to it, not the gentleman's measure. To the elderly gentleman, he was happy to get $100.00, he received the full measure of what he perceived to be its worth. Keep in mind also that this was 1993, well before there was any established mediums to sell used equipment and before there was a sense of established prices for used equipment. The elderly gentleman might have had absolutely no access to market to sell the TT thus it's value was hardly established in any measureable way and it was the beginning of CD's and everyone was dumping their TT's. For all the trouble the gentleman may have had trying to sell it using any other means or markets that were available then, the gentleman was very happy to sell it for the price he received. I think both Gemini and the elderly gentleman made great deals.

Mike

"The worth of an item can only be measured in the hands of the person holding it"

That's the value of the item based on one individuals perception of its worth, NOT fair market value, which is based on a cross-section of the buying public with a specific interest in the item.
The two are very different, let’s not get confused.

Having said all that how did the gentleman arrive at the $100 value for the TT? Is it the buyer who has responsibility for researching fair market value, or the seller? (obviously the seller). Is old age a good reason not to be able to research fair market value, in this instance, no, sorry it isn't. The gentleman was 'aware' enough to be able to make the necessary arrangements to place the advertisement, and would surely have taken one step further to research the items value, had he been so inclined. Maybe the old guy stole it and thought $100 for hot merchandise was a good deal. Who knows what circumstances were in play.

As for the little Picasso story, cute, but a poor analogy for what is going on here.

pW

Thanks for the comments about my cute Picasso story, Punkawalla, but it wasn't meant to be an analogy but another scenario.

Punkawalla,

Let's not confuse the matter with the concept of fair market value. Fair market value is the collective perception of all individuals having in interest in the item as to is value or worth. Between Gemini and the elderly gentleman, the concept of fair market value was not in play. One paid the other what the other expected or asked for the TT, and each person's perception of its value is what controlled the transaction. The problem that most folks are doing here is, like you, adding the concept of fair market value into the transaction as a measure of whether or not it was a good deal for each participant in the transaction.