As a long time collector and dealer of toy trains I can say for a fact all price guides are worthless.

The truth is the guides are written to sell books. There has been some speculation for decades about whether prices follow the guides or guides reflect real prices.

About ten years ago TM introduced a rarity scale. Now most price guides have these scales.

Are the scales worth anything?

No. As a result of eBay we are seeing frequently seeing trains that were thought to be extremely rare. Want a Lionel 289E? Greenberg's trading index gives this loco a value of 1. Meaning it's seldom traded. Makes sense.

But Greenberg gives the late 258 the same rating.

A 289E comes across eBay about once every six to eight months. There are a dozen late 258 locos on eBay at any time.

Now lets look at how TM rates these two items. . .

TM gives the 289E a rating of four. (TM's scale is one through five with five being the rarest.) While the late 258 gets a rating of  2.

That's a bit more accurate. But the TM guide has it's share of mistakes.

One of the items I collect heavily are 800 and 2800 series freight cars. The common versions of these cars are available on eBay constantly. The rarer versions come up frequently, and the extremely rare cars seldom come up.

Before eBay came along, the brown 813 stock car was considered the rarest 800 series car by most collectors and most authors, but we knowledgeable collectors have always thought the Rubber Stamped 816 was the rarest car. We also thought the rubber stamped cars with nickel plates were also rarer than the stock car, but they are so rare most people have never even seen them. Those odd cars aren't listed even listed in the Greenberg book.

Oddly Greenberg says the brown stock car is commoner than any version of the 814R refrigerator. Don't ask me I didn't write the book.

On eBay, the commoner refrigerator cars are available almost constantly. The brown 813 is seen every four to six months, and the cars in rubberstamped colors with nickel plates come up infrequently depending on the car. The black 816 is the most common of the cars with nickel plates.

It turns out the rarest 800 series car is not the black rubber stamped 816. I've seen three of those on eBay in 8 years of watching. The rarest car is the White/brown 814R with nickel plates. I've only seen two of those, and it could have been the same car twice. (That car is so rare it is not even listed in either price guide.)

So what about prices?

The prices of all 800/2800 series cars are declining EXCEPT extremely clean cars with high grade boxes. Oddly it seems like collectors will pay extra for a car with a nice box even if it's the WRONG box for the car.

Even the rarer cars won't bring the money they would have five years ago. Five years ago some of the rarer cars were going for up to $3500, and collectors had heated discussions about which car would become the first to break the $5000 barrier.

Today, none of the cars will bring more than $2500, and it's almost impossible to get that much for them.

Ten years from now collectors may be paying $3-500 for a boxed like new but common car, and less than a grand for the rare cars.