I’m new here, but I’ve seen both POV’s regarding the purchasing of cards thrown around and I was really curious about something:
Which do you operate under and why?
For example, let’s say that there was a card you needed to complete your set. However, it’s the rarest card in the set and a PSA 10 would cost you thousands (potential eclipsing 10k) of dollars. What would you do?
Would you simply buy the card (ungraded, mid-tier PSA, etc) so that you had it in your collection and completed your set? Or would you settle for nothing less than a 9 and do whatever it took to obtain a 10?
How about simply buying slabs for the sake of collecting? What is your reasoning behind going after the number range you go after (outside of the obvious issue of price for some cards)?
I’m just really curious as to the different schools of thought on this topic. Also, it doesn’t hurt that I’m looking to do exactly what my example above suggested in regards to needing one single card to complete a set…so I’m all ears.
My thoughts are that I am the ultimate authority on what conditions are acceptable to me. So grading condition isn’t worth the plastic the cards are sealed in. Maybe if I get into more expensive stuff some day or sell more, my perspective will change, but for now I have no interest in third party grades.
For my personal collection, I always buy the card, not the grade. I’ve passed on many PSA 10s that didn’t meet my personal condition standards.
The overall market however seems to care more about the grade. Meaning a bad PSA 10 will (almost) always bring more than a pristine PSA 9. So I guess the decision is simply dependent on your personal goals and preferences.
Since I only collect PSA 9 cards, I buy the grade rather than the actual condition since I’ve noticed conditions vary a lot on PSA 9 cards. I will however pass on a card if there’s something blatantly wrong with the card such as indents or creases.
I also care more about the front of the card than the back, so if the front looks like a 10 while the back is more of an 8, that is my ideal 9 since Im always looking at the front of the card.
Buy the card, you will complete the set regardless of PSA’s opinion. Another thing is if you really like that card in particular or if it’s a copy you kept from your childhood, or even if that set card is one of the highest end versions of that Pokemon and you want a 10 to say ok I’m done here let’s move on to the next tarjet.
If you’re more concerned about higher valuations and investment, I think the highest grade possible is what you are after as high end collectors will ultimately seek them out and pay a top dollar and there will always be less of them available on the market at any given time and the pops won’t increase near as much as the lower grades do. PSA 10s tend to have the most long term returns but also some of the bigger price swings in either direction as well from everything that I’ve seen (more volatile). 7s, 8s, 9s tend to stagnate but also I find they tend to be more stable over the long term while still going up in price albeit at a slower overall pace (i.e. lower risk, lower reward).
If you’re mostly concerned with collecting and want to minimize the volatility in your collection, I would go for 8s and 9s. You will get a lot more cards for your money and will be just as satisfied with your collection in the end I think as conditionally the differences can be really small. If investment is key and you feel it’s worth it, go for the 10. I tend to buy 10s of my absolute favourite cards and I don’t regret it. Everything else I go for 8s and 9s and sometimes even a 7 as they can still be a well conditioned card.
Also, all of this really depends on each card and set out there. I personally value certain cards in certain sets higher even in a lower grade. For example, with 1st Edition Base Set being what it is, I am personally happy to acquire these cards in a lower grade over say a PSA 10 Unlimited Base Set card. I simply value the card/set more in 1st Edition than Unlimited regardless of the grade but thats just me, other people may feel differently. I feel the same way towards Jungle or Fossil, I would sooner have the holos in 1st Edition lower grades than PSA 10 Unlimited holo as I value the 1st Edition stamp/card more than the technical grade.
I have 90% less cards than I used to, but they are far far rarer and more valuable to me emotionally and value wise.
But everyone is different.
Finding those high condition PSA 9s has become a hobby of mine - but personally I wouldnt settle for anything less than a strong 9 now as I know that I will always be wanted the higher grade.
Normally going for a raw minty card ( 9 ) is costefficent and smart.
But i dont want to be smart or costefficent, complete 10 is the Goal.
If i would be 50 Years old i would buy 9s for sure, but i have Time.
Goal will not be changed.
if a card will need Years to achieve waiting Years is ok
Fanatic approach lol
Personally, I consider both the grade and the card when I’m buying. If I’m buying an expensive card in a high grade, you bet I’m looking over the scans very carefully. But I’m not being overly picky, if I find some tiny wear on a card and it’s graded a 10 that’s not going to stop me from buying it. You don’t want to be the person who’s doing the 100x microscope meme on all your PSA 10 purchases trying to find any flaws because it’s all about “buying the card and not the grade.”
You also don’t want to blindly buy PSA 10s without any clear pictures. If a card doesn’t have scans, I’ll ask for a clear front and back picture before buying it. This helps to avoid making mistakes and buying any truly egregious cards which are clear misgrades.
Overall, buy what makes you happy. The happy medium between scrutinizing a card before purchasing and trusting the professionally-assigned grade which many of us have built our collections around is good I feel.
PSA 8s are where it’s at. Buy only PSA 8 cards and play the “is it really a PSA 10, 9, 8, 7 or 6? game” and you’ll never be bored. So, buy the grade AND the card.
For Advanced Collectors–@pro-STONKSONLY–buy only CGC 8.5 cards and re-sub them into the correct PSA cases that will once again range anywhere from PSA 6 to PSA 10.
And for those with no remaining collecting goals to chase and who simply want to serve and “give back to the community,” crack and re-sub all those PSA 8.5s into whole number cases. Any remaining 8.5s upon three consecutive subs shall become burnt offerings
Neither and both. Not everything can be broken down into a simple universal rule.
I assign a value to the card and a second value to the grade. The value of each depends on the situation. For instance, if I wanted to buy a STAFF worlds promo, the value of the grade is almost negligible to me because the set I’m currently building is raw and roughly NM. Whereas if I was buying a PSA 9 WOTC card for my almost-complete PSA 9 WOTC holo set, I’d value the 9 specifically much higher than an average person would.
Another example is that if I was buying for myself, I’d rather have a gem mint card in a PSA 9 slab than a PSA 9-worthy card in a PSA 10 case. If I was buying as an “investment” to sell, I’d rather have it the other way around.
There’s no simple answer. A trend I see though is that people with more experience tend to worry less about condition and also less about how the grade correlates with condition compared to a new person. Probably a symptom of the fact that every new card is a smaller percentage of your total collection or “portfolio” so the details just become less important over time.
Thank you all for the replies, this has been really interesting to read and understand the reasonings behind all of this.
This is completely hypothetical, but I’m curious as to how some of you would handle this situation:
Let’s say there’s a card you’ve always been after. Let’s say you have always dreamed of having a PSA 10 of the card, and a card worthy of that grade. However, you can’t find it. You keep waiting and waiting, but the prices to purchase that card at that grade keep going up, and the option to buy simply doesn’t present itself. Would you ‘settle’ for a really high 9? Or would you hold off and keep looking, even if it means it’s going to potentially hurt your wallet much more by the time you find it?
If it’s a relatively liquid card (which it sounds like it is), I would personally buy a nice looking 9 and hold onto it until a 10 presents itself. This is completely personal for you though, just depends on the weight you put on the number
Some cards are (almost) impossible to find at times. I experienced this when collecting my Base Set 2 holo set. The Wigglytuff in PSA 10 only has 8 copies ever graded a 10 and it was basically impossible to track down and I still haven’t seen one for sale. It’s a card that has tons of factory print lines right out of the pack so the 8s and 9s pile up (much like Neo Genesis Lugia holo). In this case I ultimately settled for the 9 so I was basically forced to buy the card and not the grade.
If it came down to a cost thing - my only suggestion there would be to buy it sooner than later or just keep saving until you are in a comfortable position to buy it. I have a high end sports card I bought a while back and the price just seems to go up every 3 months on it so I made it a priority to buy it sooner than later because it might be something I would struggle to obtain later on. I think the only way to determine this is by studying each card that you’re after. This also goes back to some stuff in my other post that because you’ll see less 10s on the market you’ll often see the prices vary more as well because of less competition when selling, whereas you will see way more 8s and 9s and usually for much better overall prices.
If you never can get in a position to buy the 10, then definitely just buy a 9 instead. You’ll still find plenty of enjoyment in that grade, the 10 just adds a bit of extra gratification to it. I love my 10s that I have been fortunate to obtain, but I love my 9s and 8s almost just as much because regardless of the grades I just really like the cards.
I’m sure a 10 will pop up at some point, I just don’t know if I want to fork over what a 10 would cost when that time comes! I just can’t seem to find it anywhere. There are 72 of them out there and it doesn’t seem like anyone wants to part with theirs at the moment. However, there are over 130 9’s and a few are on eBay, it just depends not the condition of those 9’s.
I’m becoming more and more comfortable with the idea of a very strong 9 and saving a few grand, if that ends up being the case.
For my graded Pokemon sets, I don’t go for less than gem mint (PSA 10 or CGC 9.5). This is my approach for two reasons:
I want mint cards and I wasn’t satisfied with the condition of many of the 9s I had collected. Even collecting 9.5s and 10s, I’m still occasionally disappointed in the condition of the card (which is inevitable given that you don’t get to inspect every card in person before buying it). But I find that I’m disappointed less often with 9.5s and 10s than with 9s.
I collect English set cards, which are extremely common (by their nature). Collecting only gem mint cards adds a level of difficulty to collecting that I find enjoyable. It also adds a level of rarity (condition rarity) that I find appealing. There are way fewer gem-potential cards than 9-potential cards. Run an eBay search on some random WotC/EX holo and look at all of the raw listings. Most won’t be NM/M, but some are. But even of the ones that are NM/M, the vast majority aren’t going to have any realistic PSA 10-potential. There are lots of 8/9-potential cards, though. Condition rarity is a real thing.
If you’re collecting cards that are rare in and of themselves (i.e., trophy cards), then condition rarity becomes less of a factor. Acquiring the card is itself a challenge. But for the reasons I mentioned, condition rarity is a big thing for set cards. And, whether we like it or not, people trust the grades that third-party grading companies give.
TL;DR: I care about both the third-party grade and the condition of the card.
@pmj13, I would definitely suggest only going for the 10 if you really can convince yourself it’s worth it. In my personal collection my 10s hold a pretty special spot as I took a lot of time to save up for them and seek them out so I have even more of an attachment to them for these reasons. I think in general a 10 should really fill a special part of your collection and shouldn’t be bought or collected on a whim.
This is also why I started collecting ‘strong’ 8s because they too are generally much cheaper than 9s but can be very close in condition. By buying these strong 8s, it’s allowed me to also go for 10s more often than if I continually buy 9s by saving on costs. Everyone is going to have a different approach, it just depends on your preferences or collecting goals.
If you want more cards then you’d be better off avoiding 10s all together for most cards out there. You can easily get a bunch of 8s or 9s for the price of a single 10 in some sets. In the end of the day the grade is a technical assessment. A PSA 10 is deemed ‘virtually perfect’. It’s ultimately up to you if that distinction is worth it. For me it is, but only on a few select cards that I really wanted in this assigned grade.
That’s a great point as well. This one card is simply a card that I was never able to obtain back in the day via booster boxes and packs. So, I think there’s a bit of a nostalgia element to wanting to get it and get one that is ‘perfect.’On the other hand, simple getting the card to complete that set would be an achievement - however, being older and understanding the value of things much more than back then, that part of me is itching to chase the ‘perfection’ aspect given that I now have the chance to do so.