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Message: <blockquote data-quote="med stud" data-source="post: 4219988" data-attributes="member: 1211">Not only money, risk is also a factor. You sit on something that is extremely valuable and there is a concrete risk that noone will buy it in your life time. An adventurer comes to you with a sword. You buy the sword for, say, 2000 gp, more money than ten peasants will earn in a lifetime. If you find the right buyer, you can get 12000 gp for it. The problem is that that particular buyer may not show up for twenty years. You stockpile these items and by selling them off at one piece per, maybe six months, you manage to get a good living out of it.If the adventurer himself wants to sell it, there is no ebay.com for it. Very few people want to buy a 12000 gp sword when that is enough to buy armour and horses for 12 knights. The adventurer can sit on the sword, relying on luck to sell it. Most likely it will become the famous family heirloom in that case. He can spend time to find a buyer, but then that will essentially become his job. That way, he will lose time.Really, the merchants in this case are like risk capitalists, they make an unsure investment for a potentially great profit. The risks are that the item may not be sold and the item has to be stored safely. I can't see that this is illogical.</blockquote>