Just yesterday I had a customer visit me looking for an old violin around £5000. My first thoughts are always "Why old?". In the last 20 years new violin making has had a resurgence and today's new violins (at this price  level) will exhibit , better wood, better workmanship and in my view sound better! For £5000 she was looking for an old French or German violin because her teacher told her that's what she should get .

However my feeling is you have to get the best sounding violin for this money and even if it ends up being a Chinese hand made instrument (shock horror!) Perhaps if you spend £10K or more, things such as "Antique" factor play a part in your purchase however for most people they want to make a better sound than the one they currently produce.  What do you think?