Question about polishing on used timepieces

[acaixguard]

This is just a genuine curiosity of mine regarding used watches that are sold as like new/mint/excellent.

It seems to be common practice that anytime a preowned watch ends up in a secondary/grey dealer's inventory, it will receive some polishing. I do understand that it allows a piece to be sold as like new or mint, and many people do not want to buy a watch that comes with scratches.

Personally though, I feel differently. If a piece has been owned already, I expect it to not be scratch-free. If I'm buying a used watch, I would rather seek out a specimen that is in a condition that is acceptable to me, priced accordingly. My reason is this...I feel like polishing takes off years of a watch's life. There are only so many times you can polish a watch before too much material is removed. For a piece that isn't too old, I would rather wait till I personally put more scratches on before I feel the need to have it polished.

Does anyone else feel that when you buy a used watch that is polished already, you have lost some ability to have it further polished in the future?

[Joey_V]

I agree with you.

[WatchEater666]

I prefer something unpolished. Especially if it’s a watch where who does the polishing matters a lot. IE you don’t want anyone other than AP touching an RO. Too easy to mess up the crisp ones.