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Well it really depends on what you use the phone for. There is nothing wrong with the prices. The consumers are just too meek, too lazy, to actual do there homework. I recently popped my phone and found one that does what I need it to do and even better then the last one for less then $100. Just broke the screen/digitizer/glass at the same time. Had to spend $50 dollars to fix it. Point being is that your being manipulated in buying garbage. When you could be investing that money elsewhere.
For the longest many people signed 2 yr contracts and usually got a high end smart phone for $200. I know the carrier just charged a bit more for the plan and the end result was still typically about $4-600 for the phone or about $5-600 if you bought it out right.
Now with contracts going away and peoples bills being a bit lower, I see smartphones with prices of typically $600-$800+, which is insane. The phones are only about $2-300 to build tops, so I can even understand $400 to maybe $500 for one, but when a Galaxy 7 Note is $850, a Galaxy 7 is $789, and $600 for just about anything else LG, HTC , etc, these phones arent even worth $300 1 year later.
I know the American way is to pay little by little for everything and ignore the outright cost and is probably the reason why even small to medium sized cars are pushing $30k, but do you think the prices of smartphones would go back down if the general public stopped doing installment payments and were buying these phones outright?
I am debating between upgrading my phone and not. I still have the S4 from when it first came out.
My husband traded in his old iPhone for the newer one and he was able to put it toward the purchase of a new one. I think he traded it in for around $200-250, which I thought was pretty good since it wasn't even the predecessor and it was starting to act up, the whole reason for the upgrade in the first place. Luckily it behaved when they were testing it. Now if I wait until my phone dies some type of horrible death, I won't have anything to put toward a new phone.
when purchasing the latest and newest mobile device, you are paying for the engineering and development costs of the hardware and software.
don't want to pay? purchase a two year old phone that doesn't have the same level of technology for half the price.
back when Verizon and ATT would charge $200 for an upgrade, they were getting that money back in billing over the course of the next two years.
in europe and asia everyone always paid full price for a handset. we were coddled by the mobile carriers for years.
i have always bought my handsets at full price, and since i am an early adopter of the newest technology, i have to pay more.
as a consumer you should first identify what your needs are in a mobile phone, and then your price range. there are so many price segments of cell phones on the market for every level of consumer. do your research. don't rely on the sales people in the brick and mortar stores. they have sales quotas to fill and they will sell you **** on stick if you let them.
Just picked up two new iPhone 5S's for $149 each from Wal-Mart last month. Those replaced aging S4 mini's, bought a couple years ago for $125 a piece, sold for $60-ish last week. Use Total Wireless on Verizon towers for $31/month, unlimited talk, text, and 4gb data.
IMO the best thing about the newer smart phones is the security (like fingerprint sensors) and cameras. That being said buying new for $600-$800 in pretty crazy IMO. But some people like to spend their money on the latest and greatest. I have a habit of breaking phones so the older they are the cheaper they are to fix, but I certainly see the value in owning a new phone. I'm more concerned with the monthly line costs than I am the purchase price.
I prefer the new non-subsidy plans. I've always been the primary customer on a 4 phone family plan. Pre-mobile share plans I was paying $218 for a family plan with 3 smart phones, 2 unlimited data, and one dumb phone. Ever since the mobile share came out I get 30 GB a month which is more than enough, unlimited text and calls for $157 out the door. The savings of $60 a month equates to $720 a year. And I'll buy year old phones for $200-300.
In the old days I pAid $60 more a month and had to foot $200 for a new phone which id usually sell for $200 when the contract ended. It works for me and my folks because no one is needy for a brand new phone every year. I have the 5s and I don't see myself replacing it for another 2-4 years depending on how it holds up. As long as it functions I see no need to replace it. Groupon is selling refurbished 5s as of now for $160.
I paid $99 for my Android 2 years ago. Last month I went to an iPhone and they no longer discount the contract, Verizon makes me pay monthly, total will be $528. The old "deals" we're to get more people hooked. Now that everyone has a smart phone, they look at replacements as a cash cow.
There actually was no deal before, you just paid more for monthly service to cover the cost of the phone they where "discounting". It was all rolled in together so no one really knew about it.
Verizon lowered the cost of service and then charged full price for the phones.
In the end it really didn't make much difference. It is all just marketing and slight of hand pricing.
not only do people buy $600-$800 for the new phones, they use them for maybe 2-3 years, and then get another even more expensive one because it has some new features. up until about 3 days ago i never had anything but a land line, because i said i would only get a cell phone when it was cheaper than a land line. this drove my kids nuts (age 28, 28, and 30) who have been bugging me for years to get a cell phone. finally one of them said they would add me to his family plan and it would only cost me $15 a month, plus the cost of the phone, so i got a Samsung Galaxy for about $150, and for one year of use it is less than $30 a month total (phone plus monthly charges). Then the following years i will pay him $30 a month to keep me on his family plan. i can never see needing anything fancier than this most basic model.
My land line physical phone was a $15 plastic phone that has lasted me over 19 years and still works great. I have never had anything more than the most basic model. I like low tech and simple at home. I use plenty of technology at work, i don't need a bunch of gadgets at home.
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