I’ve been a serious collector for about 2 years now. Ebay has always been the primary means of obtaining cards for me, but I also trade locally when I can. When I first started collected it seems like I could find many under-priced cards on a daily basis. But this seems to be less and less the case. The last 2-3 months in particular seems extremely dry when it comes to finding deals on cards. I picked up less than 15 cards last month that I felt I could turn a profit on.
I spend at least an hour a day shopping for cards. Not surprisingly the price of cards continue their upward climb, but I find it unusual the variance in price on cards seems to be tightening to the extreme. I’ve also noticed the proportion of graded cards vs. raw steadily increasing. As someone who needs to buy and sell cards to be able to continue collect, I feel a bit pessimistic by the current market dynamics. Perhaps its the increase in the number of collectors who snatch up deals at a faster pace giving it the illusion of the market tightening. Should I be looking into other means of obtaining cards?
With all the publicity the hobby is getting, and the more public sales…more and more non collectors etc can find out what the cards have sold for and are worth.PLus forums like this and the ease of access to less niche cards, anyone can do a little research and find prices. also depends on the cards you are looking for? old wotc are on the increase, and finding non graded seems to be harder and harder to find in mint and gem mint. Are you only looking for profit? Maybe look at the long term rather than flipping, is seems so many do that these days…unless you know what you are doing it will be difficult to make profit. Based on your post…I would re assess theway you buy, flip and maybe re think your strategy to make profit (to use for your collection? that is what I personally would be doing)
Also what do you define as a serious collector? what was your strategy…why did you get back into the hobby? what are your goals for the next year or 2 and 5+? if you have them…also what ahve you been doign for the past 2 years and why did you decide to turn “serious” ? if you dont mind me asking all these questions aha. I am intrigued
I consider myself a serious collector because I have a pretty solid knowledge of the hobby and spend considerable amounts of money ($5k+) every year adding to my collection. My strategy is always buy raw and grade until I get what I want, which has served me extremely well. Grading has increased the value of my collection 20-fold over what I’ve paid. Right now I strictly collect vintage (with the exception of buying 1 box of every new set), because I feel its a race against time for affordability. I am focusing on completing a set of Gold Stars, Crystals, and Shinings then moving on to getting all the 1st edition WoTC holos.
I got back into the hobby due to finances allowing me to do so, as I was in college the last 13 years doing my Bachelors/Masters/Ph.D. I collect with a very strict set of guidelines, I can never be more than $500 in the red if I want to add more cards for my collection. So unless I buy and flip I can never add new items to my collection.
Good deals are still there, they just get snapped up a lot quicker now that eBay is a known source by perspective collectors. A seller I spoke with the other day passively mentioned that he received 40+ messages about his 1st edition Base Blastoise with a “best offer” option before it sold an hour later.
Ebay is the go-to place but there are plenty of other methods of finding deals
I think a lot of these YouTube videos of Pokemon “eBay finds and flips” aren’t helping the situation. Like jkanly said there are still good deals out there but you have to be very quick and very persistent.
As much as I love sitting on eBay for hours and hours at a time it gets very tiring very quickly. I can do a week or two at a time and then I need a while off before I’m back at it again.
Why is that? Only a small fraction of sellers are people liquidating their childhood collection. If it weren’t for people buying and selling cards to make money the secondary market would be nothing.
With Ebay email alerts collectors know instantly when an item is listen and millennials are starting to have large disposable incomes to invest in things they collected as kids.
‘Publicity and exposure is good for the hobby’ is code for ‘Publicity and exposure is good for the value of my collection because I already have the cards that publicity and exposure causes to increase in price’.
There is nothing wrong with that, but people try and spin it into some universally positive thing for everybody.
Without more exposure, this forum wouldn’t exist to have this conversation. The statement that “Publicity is ultimately good for the hobby”, is self evident. I remember being on the gym in 2008, and it was the same few people, with barely anything new really occurring. Today there are so many people enjoying the hobby, with so much more product, releases and activity.
I don’t see a real negative outside of personal individual frustration with the market changing.
The end result is more cards becoming completely unattainable for the average collector. I am not saying any sort of exposure is bad and that the hobby doesn’t need growth to sustain and be healthy, but it gets to a point where things are moving far too quickly and that unchecked growth and exposure shuts off more than a few ‘big ticket’ cards(which should exist).
Having said all that, it doesn’t stop me from capitalising on that growth when it suits me so you could call me a hypocrite and be correct. But my point was that people try and spin it into a benevolent situation where everybody can throw up their hands and celebrate because cards are becoming more expensive, when that isn’t the case at all.
There are negatives as well as positives to this growth, and people need to acknowledge them.
It seems as if Pokemon has really caught the attention of new collectors or just people like me who recently started collecting again from back when we started as kids. Cards are being snatched up quick and put away in collections so not many are hitting the market like before, especially wotc. I think the other issue is people just listing cards for crazy prices thinking the card is extremely valuable.
@milhouse But what are those actual negatives, and what are they worth? People who are entitled to cards they do not own and were not buying even when they were less? There is a growing divide in this hobby of people who simply cannot adapt. It has nothing to do with how much money someone has, or what expensive cards they have; it’s the flawed perspective that they somehow deserve something they don’t own. I am not going to blame the publicity of MTG for why I didn’t buy alpha cards 12 years ago for much less.
My reasoning is that more and more cards are qualifying for the category of ‘Well, I couldn’t even afford this card if I saved really hard for it’. It will get to a point where people will not be able to afford a Mint condition 1st ed base set holo unless they are on a 6 figure income. Yes, that is quite extreme and probably a little bit more the long term than we might think, and whilst that category of cards needs to exist(trophies, illustrator etc) I think that too many cards being in there is bad for people on an individual level.
I would like to re-iterate that I am not actually against the growth of the hobby has achieved over the last few years, and especially the last 2. You and I have had this conversation before and you know I accept, understand, and even cheer some of the positives that have come with this unprecedented growth.
People are entitled to NOTHING in this hobby, but it doesn’t stop me from wanting the average person to have a fair shake at being able to enjoy the thrill of attaining that chase card they have worked hard to obtain.
I would have to agree in the past 2 years since I have joined the hobby as well it has recently become much more difficult to find NM/Mint+ cards worth grading. The main attractions such as gold stars, shinings and crystals have all been considerably more difficult to find in these conditions (in my opinion) and when they do come up they are usually being sold for around PSA 9 asking price for the raw card. I’m also someone who is solely only able to fund his collection and card buying through reselling cards for profit as well, so I do see your pain here lol. And it really does anger me too when people say that resellers are just scum and don’t care for collecting and we’re just a big problem in the tcg blah blah. I’ve actually heard it countless times. But I would never be able to afford the cards I have if I didn’t do it. And countless others have received great deals from my ‘reselling for a profit’ as well so whatever. Anyway… although I have been able to manage other ways besides grading mint PSA cards, I’ve noticed a pretty big decrease in availability for those cards in mint condition. Maybe there’s just more competition looking, more people willing to pay a lot more now, or the sealed collectors just need to start opening their boxes for more cards ( ) … I also live in Canada so it’s a lot harder to find cards as a huge population of the game is located in the United States so i’m either always overpaying on shipping to try and find cards to the point where it’s not even a good deal anymore, or I get hit with huge customs charges, or sellers simply don’t offer shipping to Canada. So that’s a huge struggle as well. But I’d agree the publicity and I think much more people getting back into collecting again has taken a lot of the good cards off the market, and there just isn’t as much supply as there was 2 years ago. So time to start opening those remaining WOTC boxes if we still want those gem mint cards lol
I think you need to re-evaluate your personal strategy if you are making everyone else fund your collection.
It’s nice to be supplemented but ultimately the progression of your own collection needs to come from your pockets. Relying on the ignorance of others can only go on for so long.
That’s not to say I disagree with your strategy, just that you need to think about if that’s going to ultimately get you to your end point.
I have to majorly disagree here. He’s not making anyone do anything, people are willingly buying cards from him. And just because he is making a profit from the cards, certainly does not mean his buyers are just ignorant. They could be getting a good deal or getting a card that they love as well and are willing to spend the money. I’m not really sure where the idea that someones collection should be coming from the money of their “own pockets.” Not everyone would be able to afford their collection goals if they didn’t sell cards to make money. That’s kind of like telling a car salesman that the progression of his car collection shouldn’t come from selling cars to people, but from other means or out of “his own pocket”. And if he can only reach his collection goals to a certain extent because he’s only making so much money from selling cards, then so be it. He shouldn’t have to fork out extra money elsewhere just to reach his collecting goals.
