Every time new skins appear in Counter-Strike, it’s better not to rush buying them because their price is too high. Sometimes in just six months, skins can drop in cost by an order of magnitude! CS.MONEY Blog tells how quickly prices for skins in CS:GO reduce and also explains when the cost of skins decreases and how much hype affects skin prices.
If you wanted to upgrade your inventory for a long time and have been waiting for the right moment before the release of CS2, the time has come! Visit us at CS.MONEY Trade, the easiest way to trade: low prices, handy filters and a bunch of other excellent features.
Post-Release Hype: How Fast Skin Prices Drop?
Skins, for most weapons, cost more right after they are initially released. Sometimes this is expressed in a sharp drop in prices in 2-3 weeks, and sometimes the process stretches for two months or even more. Let’s talk about this phenomenon using the well-known and popular Printstream series. The series includes three skins: M4A1-S, USP-S and Desert Eagle. By the way, these skins are available in cheap options at CS.MONEY.
So, three skins. All are Rare, made in the same style and designed for meta weapons. If you look at the price charts, you will see the exact cost flow pattern in all three skins: price peaks in the first hours, followed by a decline over several months. After that, the skins continue to decrease in price for a long time. It took a whole year after the initial release for the dynamic to change.
M4A1-S Printstream pulled ahead the most. However, this is due to Operation Riptide’s launch, as the development team decided to increase M4A1-S damage, making it really popular and a must, subsequently affecting skins prices.
How Long Should You Wait For Skin Prices To Drop?
CS:GO Trading 101: if you don’t want to risk, wait a hundred days before buying a skin. During this time, prices for new skins will more or less stabilize. This way, you will purchase skins without significant overpayments.
Let’s examine this theory using USP-S The Traitor and its path. It’s a rare skin for a meta (moreover, basic CT pistol) weapon with a super-catchy design, and it appeared in the game pretty recently (Valve released it on May 3, 2021). So, ten days after the release, USP-S The Traitor Minimal Wear cost at least 160 dollars.
A hundred days later, you could’ve bought the same skin three times cheaper. Now, two years after the initial release, it’s even more affordable. But is it worth waiting years for more significant savings? Hardly. First, skin prices tend to rise. USP-S The Traitor is instead an exception. USP-S Whiteout Minimal Wear, an equally cool skin with a single stand-out feature being a splendid craft base, has been dropping in price for several months since its release. But now it is twice as expensive as on release. Maybe, though, it’s because of CS2 and new lightning, which will make it look better.
When is the best time to buy skins?
Moreover, you want to play with cool skins now—not in a couple of years. Therefore, delaying the purchase is not worth it. Buying a skin in the first or second month after it got into the game is basically an inevitable hype-related overpayment. But the price drops noticeably after that, so the best time to buy skins is, as we said above, in 100 days.
When To Buy Skins For Investment?
As we mentioned earlier, skins, especially limited ones, increase in value over time. USP-S The Traitor drops from the Snakebite Case. And the case itself still drops after simple CS:GO matches. Therefore, the flow of this skin on the market is relatively stable. Nevertheless, more than half of USP skins drop from Rare Drops or Archived cases. So, their prices are constantly rising.
So how long should you wait before buying a skin for investment? Shortly, as much as needed. The problem is that the best time to buy depends on each skin. Desert Eagle Ocean Drive took almost a year to reach the lowest price point. But then, with the announcement of CS2, its price naturally skyrocketed.
It took almost ten months for M4A1-S Printstream to drop to its lowest: released in December 2020, it reverse-peaked in September 2021. M4A4 Cyber Security‘s path to the lowest cost point took a month longer. Glock-18 Neo-Noir, along with other skins from the Operation Broken Fang Case, managed to reach the price bottom in the summer of 2022!
Fortunately, there is good news: you can track skins’ prices easily at our CS.MONEY Wiki. It has a special card for each skin! Cards include skin descriptions, recommended stickers, previews, and pattern/float selections. You can also pick which specific price chart you need. Just like on all screenshots above! You should check out this fantastic tool.
