If you're buyin' it's used, if you're sellin' it's vintage.

As we all know vintage means 25 years old... ..... Being a ownner of 2 80's strats I'm sticking hard and fast to this static principle.......

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To me, the term vintage simply means 25+ years old, merely a date of manufacture, whether new old stock or previously played, and quality is not part of the definition. People collect vintage Teisco's, etc without an expectation that they are the finest instruments of their time. While it's alarming to think a 1988 guitar might now be considered vintage, that alarm says more about my age than the age of the instrument. I have to admit though when I think of "vintage guitar" I imagine something no later than 1968...

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I'm twanged if I do, twanged if I don't

I do think that the vintage tag ought be subject to a specific year where exceptional quality or a landmark change (for the better) was made. Instead of being brandished around willy nilly.
After all Kay guitars are junk, they've always been junk, they always will be junk. If you like yours, all well and good for you. The fact remains though that they were budget catalogue guitars made with less than adequate skill with cheap parts.
No matter how old they are.
Don't see how garbage can increase in value because someone calls it vintage garbage.

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No no and no

I think some of the other guys my age will also agree,not all Fenders made in the Pre CBS years were great sounding guitars,some were just okay,some were fantastic...I hate seeing the prices for Pre CBS Strats and knowing if you had the money to chunk,that you could be getting a so/so sounding guitar....just because it's a vintage Strat.
I own new made Strats that sound as good as most of the Vintage ones I've played since the '60s.

i've never considered my old charvel "vintage". i've owned it, "best i can remember", for over 20 years. now that i think about it, thats the best guitar i've ever owned.
i voted for 50 years.

Vintage=used
Aged=abused
Worn=used & abused

And all should have a used price!

I voted 25 years. $#@!, that means I'm vintage!

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2000 American Deluxe Stratocaster
2011 Gibson Les Paul Trad Pro 50's
2007 Epi Les Paul Custom
90's ESP Eclipse
JH-1B Jimi Hendrix Crybaby
Analogman KOT
Korg Pitchblack
Boss NS-2 PH-2
Blues Deluxe Reissue
1999 & 2007 Marshall TSL 100 w/1960BV cab

Thats a reasonable conclusion. Conversely wouldn't it be true that the bad ones have mostly fallen by the wayside though?

Or maybe all the good ones are safely stored away and all we see are the baddies?

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No no and no

As far as great sounding vintage Strats go,I would say it's most likely that the wonderful sounding ones are kept by the owners or sold amongst players and collectors who really know what they have....but if one that has been used by a star ever hits the market,it goes for a very high premium,I've seen a couple of Strats owned and played by Eric Johnson priced through the roof,because lots of people think that if he owned it,it must be superb sounding because of his pickiness about such things.
Gruhn's had a BF Twin Reverb formally owned by Eric going for about $4,000 last time I looked,that's higher than normal,because of the provenance.

well so far 25 to 30 seems to be the number, still a tad newer than i would like..... but thanks for all the help

although personally I think "quality" is to subjective to involve in this. it should be more about age and collectability. to me "vintage" should be used to say " hey this thing is at-least (winning #) old and is still here" no matter how good or bad it is, it is still a representation of that time. if its still around it couldn't have been that bad

now all we need is a well made scale of markup percentage for each time range

like
25 years new value - wear and tear
30 years new value + 10% - wear and tear
40 years new value + 20% - wear and tear
and so on

something else to ponder. maybe we can start to get these "vintage" prices back under control

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I Googled the answer out of curiosity and the answer that keeps coming up is seven years.
The whole thing is we all created this "vintage" mess and we can't seem to change the rules. Antique is another thing. I believe that is 100 years. But of you look on the Antique Roadshow, most of the stuff on there doesn't fit the criteria. I think the price should depict the rarity and quality of the instrument, which in the case of fender and Gibson guitars would leave out most mass produced guitars. Fender cranks them out by the bozillions. Gibson a bit less due to the fact that they're not manufactured world wide. 50's and 60's Strats , Teles and Les Pauls aren't rare, people just hang on to them.

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Life...... It's sexually transmitted and always fatal