Just as I was looking into buying a template for links I saw this comment today at Blog Storm http://www.blogstorm.co.uk/the-final-nail-in-the-coffin-of-sponsored-blog-themes/ taken from Google Web Master oh well life gets harder and harder to get links that count
I came to that conclusion some time back. Waste really of time and especially money to buy sponsored links on new templates. One, as the buyer of the link, you have little control on how that template is advertised to get potential users. You may buy a link on the template and maybe very few or no one will use that template! You have no control on who will use that template (and no one has any control on the many idiots who remove all such links). This is all templates, wordpress, directory, hosting, etc.