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A new piano that has had no or minimal prep simply means it will not be showing at its best and you will be on the hook for paying for that deferred maintenance over the course of the first couple of years, instead of the dealer. The piano will be less stable in the first year, for sure.

In my experience, the top roughly 20% of dealers might tune a new piano 4-5 times in its first year on the floor, touch up the regulation, and spot voice anything that's obviously troublesome; and they may be willing to do more than that if it means making a sale. These are also the dealers who tend to keep their pianos under covers when not in use, and prefer to operate by appointment.

The next tier of dealers do minimal prep, unless you've made an advance appointment and asked to see a specific piano. Then the piano might get an extra tuning before your visit and anything obvious attended to. It's in the case of these top two groups that my advice to call ahead before visiting makes the most sense.

The 3rd tier of dealers do minimal prep only, basically unpack the piano, throw a tuning on it, and only deal with the most obvious issues that would keep the piano from making sound. Pianos are kept open all the time, and are often dusty or exposed to direct sunlight and poor humidity conditions. Ironically, a worryingly significant portion of piano advertising videos on the internet by dealers (YouTube, etc.) seem to come from dealers who invest this little in the upkeep of their inventory.

I've heard new piano demonstration videos from what I'd describe as a 4th tier of dealers, but mostly these are in what might be considered developing parts of the world, and feature really cheap entry-level product that comes out of factories in rough shape. Have not run into this in the US anytime in the last decade.

Terminaldegree- nice summary! Apparently I’ve been rather fortunate enough to be spoiled dealing with “top dealers” in the past. I guess I will count my blessings and will be passing on recommendations to any and all people who I know are piano shopping.

There is also the dealer experience of whether they will advertise the true price or not, and whether they will use all sorts of pressure tactics to make it seem like you will spend the rest of your life in piano purgatory if you don't buy the piano in front of you immediately.

You cover a wide range of pianos in terms of quality, size, and price. Only you can answer what is best for you. Are you a beginner pianist, intermediate, or advanced amateur? What’s your budget? All the pianos you mention would be great pianos to own depending upon your situation and what you want. None of them are junk assuming they were cared for. Don’t over think the resale value thing unless you are not sure that playing or owning a piano is for you. If you are sure it is for you or it is already in your life then just choose the one that sounds and plays best to you. Personally I would be intrigued by the hand built models such as the Bosendorfer or Mason and Hamlin if your budget can easily accommodate those pianos. Those are some of the finest built so you can’t go wrong with those. They are special pianos individually built by artisans. The factory built models are also great buys for serious musicians and may be a good choice if budget is somewhat constrained or if you are just getting into the art of playing the piano but don’t want to invest too much money in the early stages. It’s up to you. I started with a beautiful factory model and then traded up to a hand built model many years later. I loved them both and they both gave me years of joy in equal measure. It’s nice to have options.

Also don’t worry about the maintenance thing. Have an independent tech check out your piano before purchase if you have concerns and understand their after purchase service policy and warranties.

Thanks, so much great information in this forum. It helps to alleviate some of the stress and anxiety around this whole process.

I'm fairly advanced (although, after a decades-long hiatus while I concentrated on career, I could use a lot more practice). I initially started with a budget of $15k while I looked at used pianos. I couldn't find one I liked, so I grudgingly increased the budget to $25k, then $35k, now I just say it's "flexible", depending on the piano.

The M&H ended up not being to my taste, but today I played a W. Hoffman that I instantly loved. The Bechstein next to it was pretty spectacular, too. I should be traveling again in a couple of weeks time, so I'll have a chance to play them again. I think I am finally okay with buying the piano I love best and not worry about resale.

Yes in your case you are looking at quality built pianos. You’re not trying to save a buck by buying junk. All of those pianos should have pretty good resale value. It’s the craigslist specials, the heavily discounted used ‘as is’ specials that typically have poor resale values and I’m sure there are some stencil brands some here may suggest you avoid. Some brands do have better resale values ie. you can recoup closer to what you paid for it in a resale than others, but I’m not suggesting you buy only a piano looking only for the pianos with the highest resale value. I don’t know if Yamaha/Kawai have the highest resale value but I’m inclined to think they are up there only because of their reputation for being solid pianos. Again, I only see good resale value as one measure of quality but their relative differences could be due to other reasons such as name recognition.

My advice is do not use resale value as a metric for piano purchase.

Unless you get extremely lucky be prepared to give up lots of monies if you want a different piano.

If I had $1 for every time I saw "hand built" in an ad or post, I could buy any piano I wanted!

To the best of my knowledge no pianos are hand built today and many parts of piano manufacture are better, sometimes far better, accomplished by computer controlled machines. What is true is that some parts of piano making can be better accomplished by hand and that some makers spend more time on procedures that must be or can better be done by hand. I bet the places where Boesendorfer and Mason & Hamlin pianos are made are called factories. "Hand built" is marketing tool that I think many piano buyers misunderstand.

Ok. How about we change the expression from “handmade” to something like “involves extensive craftsmanship in the voicing, regulation and finish work for each piano made”.

In the videos and brochures, advertising of course, they show human beings doing all the intricate work on stringing, carefully needling hammers and hand fitting and regulating keyboards. There’s a lot more human craft hours involved in making a Mason & Hamlin than done by Pearl River.

On grand pianos, the finish work of Steinway, Mason&Hamlin, Sauter, Bechstein and even Estonia stands out so that even a beginner can see and hopefully hear the difference.

I think a fair number of pianists can see differences in finishes to some extent but many cannot tell much about voicing and regulation. With some experience they can probably tell if they like a piano's touch/tone but that is not the same as knowing if the piano is well regulated and voiced. For example, M&H had much heavier actions until around 15 years ago, so someone might easily assume they were not well regulated when that was just the nature of their action at that time.

I do think a huge percentage of people have a big misunderstanding about the term "handmade" which is why so many manufacturers emphasize it in their ads. Many people assume "handmade" is better when machine made can be better for parts of piano manufacturing. I'm quite sure the places where M&H and Steinway are made are called their factories.

I assume your suggested replacement phrase was in jest.

I don’t believe that beginning pianists will be on the market for an expensive piano, nor do I think the majority of intermediate pianists will be familiar with any brands other than Steinway , Yamaha and Kawai

Those who haunt these forums aren’t typical of pianists in the wild.
This doesn’t mean we shouldn’t buy what we love and can afford. It just may not sell quickly or for the price we want. As a personal test, we should ask ourselves to list all the brands we knew before joining PW.

Wait, are you telling me these pianos aren’t fully hand made? No bloomeries smelting iron with craftsmen sweating over huge bellows and clanking anvils? What the heck are we paying for?

I think many people, possibly including you, don't have much idea what "handmade" means for pianos and the misconception that it is, superior to machine made.

Well...somewhat. I just think that a Bosendorfer grand requires significantly more human hand and tool work than a grand made by Pearl River.

Yes of course some have more work done by hand than others and we are not just talking about a Bosendorfer. People have been to factories and seen the work done by hand .I have heard at least two members mention work done by hand in manufactures in Europe, so I would think the same would be in the US.
Of course machinery is used as well .Estonias pianos I am sure really have quite a great deal of hand work done in production.

It's not complicated:

1. No pianos are handmade or handbuilt in the normal meaning of that word.
2. All pianos have some work done by hand. More exclusive pianos generally having more time spent time spent by human hands.
3 In some areas of piano making, machines are superior to humans.

Of course, no one has said anything to the contrary on this thread.

LadyBird - yes I mentioned Sauter and Estonia earlier so I just used Bosendorfer because I know they’re producing very few finished pianos each year and are one of the highest priced here in the US, and I know Pearl River produces more pianos every year than any other piano factory.

Also, when I view a video about Bosendorfer or even Estonia I see pictures of skilled craftspeople working on individual pianos as opposed to the typical production floor with massive machines moving piano parts through piano paint areas.

Higher tiered pianos take significantly more time to make and finish than does a “mass produced” piano. That’s what we’re paying for.

So yes, pianoloverus, we are in agreement.

Yes and no reason complicate it more than that unless we are here just to argue semantics for argument sake. I see process of building a piano as much an art as a science. Where you want consistency such as with metallurgy- the cast iron plate, the strings, the agraffes, the pins- of course you rely on machines. But when you are dealing with organic material such as wood there are inconsistencies that machines have a difficult time dealing with and where the human touch is beneficial and has its advantages. The idea is to have wood sound its "best" and "best" here is subjective and where the art of building a piano comes into play. So when the artisan is using his sense of touch and hearing to create a soundboard that the artisan thinks will amplify sound the "best" it's subjective and one gained from years of experience. A machine can cut wood with laser perfection but it can't anticipate what this particular piece will sound like. This is what we pay for. Even where consistency is possible sometimes it is not desirable. Take the copper windings around the bass strings. Machines can wind copper precisely every time but with the end result of the bass string sounding too perfect, too sterile. So manufacturers of high end pianos often have artisans hand wind copper around the strings to add that human inconsistency to the equation resulting in an instrument having it's own personality, it's own humanness. I see the use of machines as nothing more than an extension of the idea of using a "tool" to help us do our work. We use tools in making instruments where it just makes sense and offers an advantage but if the desire to build a work of art we need the human element to achieve this.

You spend most of the post giving examples where you think human hands are better but include very little about where machines are better. I don't think everyone would agree with you about a bass string sounding "too perfect". You said "no reason complicate it more than that unless we are here just to argue semantics for argument sake" and then wrote a very lengthy paragraph doing just that.