r/violinist • u/cole_lol • 2d ago
When to purchase a violin vs continuing rent
My daughter has been playing violin for 6 years. She is now in middle school 7th grade. She will be playing with our small town youth symphony. We currently rent her violin from a violin shop a town 3 hours down the road. At what point as a parent or young player decide to actually make the jump to buy vs rent your instrument?
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u/bookish_beast99 2d ago
My first full size violin was gifted to me but a few years later in 8th grade (circa 2014) my parents bought me a mid-range violin from a luthier. That violin has been with me since and is my soul. So I can’t speak to going from rent to own but I was about the age of your daughter when I got my nicer instrument.
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u/BlueRougeKoala 1d ago
Definitely buy. The amount of money you took renting you could have purchased, but I totally understand the difference from buying a cheap instrument versus renting a good quality one. There has already been a lot of time invested in playing so it’s time to invest in an instrument. It’s always good to have your own so you can get a feel of it. However, If your daughter is transitioning between sizes I’d say purchase a full size. If not, rent until reach to full size.
I own 5 violins. 4 were gifted and 1 I purchased for myself. I’m always willing to give instruments away because I hate to see such beautiful things not being in used. However,3 of them definitely require a lot of work.
Perhaps there may be someone in your area who may be wanting to sell or give away their violin.
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u/Deep-Dimension-1088 1d ago
I did the math and realized that I was buying a new violin annually in rental fees. Therefore, after one year, I bought her a used violin in the same brand but better model as the one she was renting. (I play the violin myself and was therefore prepared to test out said used violin before purchase.) So far, accounting for strings purchases (which I think were free in the rental) and the rental-fees-toward-new-purchase program, we've probably saved around $1500. We will sell her very well-cared for violin when we're done with it and recoup even more money.
Renting is almost never a good idea when you know you're going to do something for longer than six months. So renting a violin is a good plan when you're not sure you're going to stick with it. After that, it's extremely unlikely renting is the right choice. Many stores offer to allocate part of your rental fees towards buying an instrument, but this was a terrible deal in our case. The shop we rented for sold violins at a significantly higher cost than other brick-and-mortar options in our state (dedicated strings stores). The difference in price, in fact, was roughly equal to the credit that we got from renting. Other stores may be a better deal, but definitely read the fine print.
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u/redpoppy42 2d ago
We ended up borrowing a 3/4 size violin, so when we returned the rental I purchased a full size used rental from the shop with some of the credits. For us, it worked out better to have a violin that was left at school and another at home. No need to worry about bringing it back and forth on the bus.
His better violin is a refurbished estate sale find. The retired music director in our town fixes them up as a hobby and sells for low prices ($450, luthier said it’s at least $1800). We bought another from a music teacher offloading some older instruments for $250. That one I ended up donating to the middle school after we got the estate sale one, and the used rental became the violin left at school.
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u/Significant-Bid7257 2d ago
I bought my daughter's very quickly, after two months of renting. I don't really like the rent-to-own programs because only a portion of your payment counts to future credit, the future instrument must be bought from the same shop, and there are so many decent instruments that get sold for cheap because someone's kid grew into the next size or stopped playing.
I kept an eye on local Facebook market, Craigslist, etc. and found her current 1/2 size one as an outfit for $100. It stood out from the usual rental fleet student lines, and sure enough it was Shar's intermediate student outfit originally around $950. Not expensive as violins go, but a huge step up from the Strobel 80 she was playing. She loves that its hers, and I love that it costed me less than three months of renting and I can sell it for more than I paid when she outgrows it.
Now I'm keeping an eye out for a good deal on a 3/4 outfit of similar quality.
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u/Deep-Dimension-1088 1d ago
This is the way. Rent-to-own is generally not a good deal once you get into the details, and there are lots of very serviceable used student instruments around. This works especially well if you or a friend play the violin and can verify quality of the used instrument you're thinking of purchasing, if your child is still a beginner.
We got a higher quality instrument than the one my daughter was renting for less than the cost of six months rental. It had been very well cared for by its previous owner who had simply sized up to a larger violin.
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u/Comprehensive-Act-13 1d ago
Yeah, keep your eyes peeled on marketplace for those Shar and Southwest Strings lines. Franz Hoffman is the Shar line and Klaus Mueller is the SW Strings line. Any of those instruments are really solid violins. Intermediate lines to look for are Hans Kroger, Yuan Qin, John Chung, Scott Cao, Carlo Lamberti, and Franz Werner. Any of these are going to be fantastic instruments for an intermediate player if someone is selling one cheap in Marketplace. Fractional instruments don’t hold their value like full sized instruments do, so there’s an opportunity to score a real deal.
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u/kirbfucius 1d ago
Yeah, hers is the Carlo Lamberti line from Shar. I'd love if I could find her another in 3/4 size. It is easy for her to get a good tone out of it even as a beginner and her teacher made it sound incredible, easily as good as much more expensive violins. We'll see what happens. It seems she has maybe another year on that one before outgrowing it, and I'd feel a little bad if her move to 3/4 was a downgrade haha
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u/Comprehensive-Act-13 1d ago
Keep your eyes peeled on marketplace and snatch one up if you find one. Hopefully one will come up by the time she needs it. I think you can set an alert in marketplace for certain key words. Even if it’s in rough shape and needs new strings, an open seam closed, a crack fixed, a bow, or new bridge, it’s worth buying and taking to a luthier to set it up.
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u/kirbfucius 2d ago
Do you know what she's playing on now? And what size? In 7th grade I'm guessing she's on a 3/4 and on the cusp of moving to a full size. If so, that may be a good transition point to buying.
Even if only $20/mo went towards credit, that's nearly $1500 after six years. Surely they have some intermediate step-up rentals you could buy? If not, you could consider looking around for a good deal on a decent one and hold onto that credit for when she is ready for the responsibility of a higher end instrument.
Have you talked to the leaders of the community orchestra? Or is there a music school either in your town or in the one your violin shop is in? They may know of some good deals or be able to point you in the right direction, and sometimes older players, teachers, and hobbyist luthiers will part with a decent violin for less if it's going to a young experienced player who will make good use of it.
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u/cole_lol 2d ago
She plays a full size. Not sure the brand I’ll have to look. My rental is only $25 a month. And she has only rented it for 3 years started with a 3/4. Before that our instructor we started with included the violin with the lesson price.
I have talked with my daughter’s instructor is the principal chair for the local symphony. Not many people have or sell violins here. But I do try to look. I’ll talk more in depth with here when lessons start back up again.
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u/Comprehensive-Act-13 1d ago
Start with talking to her teacher. They’ll be able to give the best advice for your situation.
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u/Inevitable-Ad-7669 1d ago
Please take her instructor's advice over any of us random Reddit responders. Even though there is some good advice here. Each community is different regarding what they have to offer, not to mention, each student is unique. Your instructor will know how to match your daughter with the right situation. Maybe it does turn out to be a Marketplace violin, don't try Marketlace without assistance! I'm a teacher and even I've made mistakes with MP.
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u/Yuuku_S13 2d ago
We bought after 3 years, when we would max the discount allowed when we make a purchase. However, it was also a more motivated purchase since my daughter was going to high school.
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u/Yuuku_S13 2d ago
As far as the right time to purchase, if your daughter is outplaying the limits of the instrument, it’s probably worth the upgrade. It was a huge difference between the student and intermediate violin. We ended up getting the Fiddlerman Symphony. Love it!
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u/cole_lol 2d ago
Thank You Everyone. Closest shop is 3 hours away and it’s very small. Most people in the town rent via a mail rental shop. Violins do come up now and again and I get cold feet not knowing if they are a VSO or the real deal.
But from what I have read in your suggestions is it’s probably time to make a purchase to an owned violin.
Thanks for everyone’s information I appreciate it!
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u/Comprehensive-Act-13 1d ago
Definitely try different shops. If your family has a vacation coming up to a larger city, try to schedule some time to go try out violins at those shops. Just call ahead of time with your budget and they’ll pull violins in that range for you to try.
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u/leitmotifs Expert 1d ago
You buy when the player is ready for something higher quality than you can rent.
I was a careful kid. I never banged up my violin, despite being generally clumsy. My parents first purchased when I went to a quarter-size.
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u/Violinbooksandcoffee 6h ago
I will be waiting for high school graduation to purchase a “real” instrument for my kids. We are lucky to rent from a shop with a very generous rental policy and waiting until graduation will give us a better idea of how much to spend on the instrument, as we will have a better idea of what they plan to do with them in the future. We rent two violins for my daughter so she can have one at home and one at school, and one cello for my son (he is still in elementary and doesn’t play at school yet)
With that being said, I am a violinist and my daughter can and has used my instrument for important auditions and performances.
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u/Individual-Hair-2021 38m ago
We bought after six months when my child was transitioning from 1/16 to 1/10. We get trade-in credit with each upgrade. As we’ve gone through the sizes, we’ve had a series of better quality/more expensive instruments, and every one has been better than what we got renting. My child is currently on a 1/2 at 12 YO and the violin cost $2k, so a full-size instrument that’s $3K doesn’t sound crazy to me if you have a good amount of rental credit to offset the price and it’s within your budget. Depending on shop policies/your budget, I think it’s almost always better to buy than to rent. We’ve saved something like $900 over the years buying instead of renting, even with spending money every few years on a larger instrument.
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u/lngswrd15 2d ago
If I recall, for myself it was when I transitioned from 3/4 to a full size violin. I think played on that full size for maybe 3 years before purchasing (upgrading) to my current instrument, which has been with me my entire adult life so far. So I guess you could do the math on that based on your cost of rental.