I live in Nebraska, USA where thankfully there is a shortage of gun-grabbing liberal types. A lot of local gun shops will have older guns for sale. Their condition isn't great for that price mind you, but you can do a lot of the refurbishing work yourself quite easily. If you wanted one that was in way better condition, my guess is that it couldn't run any more than $250 or so.
The Germans produced tons of these things and they are very common; hence, their cheapness. Same goes with the Nagant and the later AK variants; the Russians (in the case of the Nagant) and the Soviets after them produced these things by the millions.
I remember that I bought my mauser for $98.50 not including tax about 3 years ago. Walked in, paid for it and did a minimal amount of paperwork and walked right out. I also bought a AK variant at a local gun show for $295 two days before jackass Clinton banned their import. Needless to say, that was a sound investment as the value doubled practically overnight. The price on those has seemed to be somewhat stabilized lately though.
