The serial # on your lil tiger will be of no help in determining the year of your bike. However, the Schwinn head badge is date coded to the 313th day of 1979, making it sometime in Nov. of 79. If you feel the need to put fresh grease in the bottom bracket the year date will be on the crank, and on earlier lil tigers and pixies it's the only way of dating these little classics. Values are very subjective, but in my opinion you paid a decent price for this bike, it could possibly be worth slightly more. The chrome is nice and should clean up good. You can try to find a good set of training wheels and the convertible bar that makes it a boy's bike. It's also missing the long "tombstone" reflector from the rear fender.