In the last weeks I’ve been thinking a lot about getting cards graded and occasionally buying Mint copies from some people, now I’m wondering if there is a reason to try to get PSA 10’s on more recent cards.
My research so far have been mainly looking through Ebay both normal listings and the Sold Listings tab, I know that older series (almost all WOTC) sell quite well in PSA 10 and even so in PSA 9, and obviously 1st edition/shadowless sells a lot better, and from older sets the reallyr are cards sell better than the more normal holos.
What I’m wondering now though is how well more recent cards, say from the XY series, sell if graded? I did some random searches for various Alakazam’s from Fates Collide and those pull up quite some listings that have PSA graded cards in them and the Secret Rare Alakazam has been sold in PSA 10 state for a nice amount of money. However now I’m trying to find the value of Primal Clash cards and I’m practically not able to find any info on it, except that it appears that there are no super expensive cards.
So I have the following questions, ranging from very specific to very broad:
Looking at Primal Groudon EX 86/160 it doesn’t look like any PSA graded ones have sold in the last three months and there’s two PSA 9’s up at the moment. Is there no interest in the card at all? Or are people simply waiting for a PSA 10 to come by?
Should I buy a Primal Clash Display Booster Box if I can get it for a cheap price? As far as I’m aware it’s not sealed though and someone bought that person’s kid the box but he doesn’t play with Pokemon cards, do I take much risk of the packs being weighed? I’m aware though that a good pull from a fresh booster does not guarantee a PSA 10, though I’m hoping that a PSA 9 can be the standard for fresh pulls.
What PSA graded cards are collectors looking for? I’m aware of anything WOTC era, then there’s Gold Star cards from the era after that, but I’m a bit unknown of the recent sets.
I must say that I don’t intend to make big cash or anything like that from this, just doing it for hobby and fun and I might even keep some graded cards when they return if they really look awesome. (There’s no way I’m going to sell my childhood Pokemon cards, even if they don’t look Mint)
Everyone looks for different PSA graded cards depending on what they collect. If you PSA grade any older holo or EX card there’s a high probability there are some people out there who are interested in it, provided it scores a 9 or higher.
That being said, the market for things like PSA 10 Base-Neo holos is much larger than the market for PSA 9 Ultra Rare cards from newer sets. The biggest market for newer cards is in PSA 10 Full Arts which are ridiculously hard to get, and as such sell for $100-200 each. So for market reasons you’re most likely only going to make money if you get 10s, which is highly unlikely.
The main reason there are no good values on Primal Clash cards is that the card quality is literal shit, so nobody has them in 10s. I don’t believe any Primal FAs have been graded 10s, and that’s where the real money would be. There are a couple M Gardevoir/M Aggron FAs in 10s but those POPs are probably 3-4 or lower.
If you’re looking to grade newer cards, be prepared to spend a lot of money. Even 9s out of stuff like Primal Clash isn’t guaranteed. I remember opening an entire Ancient Origins box and I didn’t think any of the ultra rares I pulled would grade above a 9. That’s just the reality of newer cards. If you want newer cards in 10s then your best and cheapest bet is probably to wait till they come up on eBay and buy them outright.
Ouch, that’s sad to hear about the newer cards, a little bit sad for me but more sad for the overall community, I would’ve expected the cards to grade better if they’re pack-fresh.
I know this part will be a bit subjective, but when looking for cards I set very high standards for myself, more so because this will be the first time I submit to PSA. So for WOTC cards it is currently literally no damage visible on the card, which includes no whitening on the edges or corners at all. At most one or two very very minor imperfections is what I allow myself to buy.
Do you have any examples or can you tell anything about how bad these newer cards are? Is there literally whitening on the edges/corners after pulling from a pack? And I believe centering is also an issue, while it needs to be pretty bad for a card to get a PSA 10 according to the rules of PSA I strongly believe that an off-centered card lowers the visual appeal of a card and kind of destroys it chance to get a PSA 10 if graders are looking at it opinion-based.
Yeah, I know I still need to get around to buying a pack or a booster box myself, but I find it hard to justify if there’s only guaranteed losses.
At the end of the day these are trading cards, not Google stock. Even the stock market has inherent risk. You can’t completely eliminate risk, regardless of the market.
Basically a lot of the questions you simply have to experience yourself. Buy packs from different eras, get a feel for what to expect. Even experts in the hobby giving information on a platter won’t matter if you don’t have the experience to make it stick.
Best advice, do some research on your own. Look up sold auctions. Look at the price ranges for product, and what you feel comfortable spending.
I consider myself a seller more-so than collector when it comes to Pokemon Cards - don’t get me wrong, I still have and purchase items solely for my collection!
Back in 2009, I sold-off my childhood Pokemon Collection - at the time I knew VERY LITTLE in regards to eBay, PayPal, Packaging/Mailing, Pokemon (I knew NOTHING)… However, after that first sale, I was HOOKED! I remember my Dad taking me to his coin-wholesaler a few days after that sale to see if he had any back-stock of WotC-Era Pokemon - I purchased a Base Set 2-Player Starter Deck Display for $75.00 - just purchased another off eBay the other day for $450.00 - how the times have changed (Anyway, I Digress…). In any case, I started buying large collections of Pokemon Cards off eBay and re-selling those collections in smaller lots on eBay. With each purchase and sale that I made, I learned more-and-more: Sets, Cards, Condition, Card Grading, What Cards Sell Better and Why…
I have been buying/selling Pokemon Cards since 2009. Throughout the years, I have purchased A LOT of Pokemon Cards / Items. There are some collections where I make a really good return on my original investment; and others where I loose money (in some cases A LOT of money). It is just a learning experience - there is no “formula” to turn a profit selling Pokemon on eBay. While it SUCKS loosing money, those cases have actually been my best learning opportunities with Pokemon and eBay. Sure, it is a good idea to do your research - look through eBay (what people have listed and what is selling); look through the E4 Topics - see what cards people are looking to purchase and/or have purchased for there collections. However, in the end, it is going to come down to a gut feeling. I have come across a few eBay Auctions for re-sale that end in 5-10 minutes. You cannot do the research in that time - it just comes down to experience and a gut feeling: Is the seller reputable in describing these cards, will people actually want to purchase these cards, will I turn a profit on these cards, how long will it take to turn a profit on these cards… Those are all questions that can be easily answered through experience and making mistakes.
Best Advice; find something that interests you and start there - in this case Pokemon. Purchase a collection / booster box / booster pack and try submitting the cards into PSA. Sure, you might end up failing and get-back some awful grades; however, you will know what to look for in the future. Who knows, maybe your first re-sale purchase will be a home-run - mine was
I plan on doing a lot of videos and such on this topic on my YouTube channel. This is a topic that just takes a lot of research, a lot of patience, and a little bit of luck.
I think you need to work out what your goals are. You say you aren’t concerned with making money then say you’re hesitant on buying packs or a box as they’re a “guaranteed loss”, which wouldn’t really be a massive concern if you were purely collecting for fun.
If you want to collect without putting in a lot of money or wind up with tons of low value overstock, buy complete sets and pick up the ultra rares separately. As I said you need to work out what specifically you’re trying to achieve. Collecting, collecting for minimal investment by making some money back and simply making money are all different and require different strategies, amounts of time and risk.
Personally I think the golden times of making a killing consistently are over if you’re starting fresh. Grading is so common now it’s almost impossible to find lemony fresh raw cards for good prices which sell for huge amounts graded high (gold stars, 1st ed base, 1st ed shinings etc.)
A case is six booster boxes… right? That’s pretty damn awful then.
@others: I am reading your replies, thanks a lot for all your feedback and I’ll take it into consideration!
On the point about not wanting to open a box myself… So take Primal Clash as example, everything I hear is negative, I still don’t know how the cards actually look like when they come out of the boxes, most Youtube vids I’ve found have a pretty bad camera for close-ups of the cards. Yes, I want to see how they look like, but it’s hard to convince myself to buy something for say $120 and then have a guarantee that your cards are going to be worth less unless you are in the lucky 1% that manages to pull something awesome. I believe it makes more sense to buy a box from other sets.
To be honest mate if you are looking to purely make money there are much better ways than pokemon, I genuinely think you are looking for some sort of no risk strategy here but there just isn’t one as previously stated. New sets aren’t the boxes to open as the card quality is so poor and old sets aren’t the one to open because the boxes areally so expensive. You have to find something you are comfortable opening by going into it being okay with taking a big loss. If you can’t open one box without worrying about the money then you don’t have enough capital either.
Sealed boxes outperform my stock, CDs, etc. If you’re willing to put in the minimum of five years before selling that ALL investments require, you should do well on sealed boxes and cases of any new set with desirable UR characteristics. Just tuck them away and wait.
Have outperformed. Certainly not guaranteed to keep doing that. Stock and CD’s are also easier to drop real amount of money on. I mean investing $10k in an IRA is easy peasy whereas if you had wanted to invest $10k into flashfire boxes or roaring skies boxes it would require a lot of storage space and ensuring they don’t get damaged. Liquidity is an issue too.
It does take more than that though. It isn’t as simple as buy whatever you like and sit on it 5 years. 5 years ago Emerging Powers and Black and White base set were introduced. Those haven’t done too well. More recently and as little as only a year and a half ago we have Dark explorers, plasma storm, plasma freeze, flashfire and roarind skies which have all done extremely well.
Patience and knowledge are both huge. Knowledge best gained through experience. Know the TCG from the collectors side AND from the players side and you should do well. It is an interesting dynamic with card values affected by playability, collectibility as well as the fact that some portion of cards are held by people who “collect” them but also stuff them in their pockets, treat them like overall crap and often have them thrown out by their parents 5 years later.
basically any psa 9 or 10 of wotc holo will sell quite well psa 9 and 10 gold stars psa 10 full arts base set psa 10s any of them shadowless 1st edition pretty much 8 9 10 non holos and 7 8 9 10 holos apart from charizard and blastoise in which case pretty much any grade japanaese holos psa 10 will do quite well wotc reverse holos in 10s will do well and non holos in psa 10 on the 1st edition set
I think everything you said is correct, but it sort of misses a lot of what was built into my response.
I have an assumption that he isn’t dealing with massive quantities of money. I was suggesting sealed product as an alternative to investing large sums that will yield competitive gains.
Additionally, I specified that UR characteristics matter. Your counter examples are two of the least desirable UR sets. Your break out examples are evidence in favor of what I said. The URs were desirable in all of those sets from day one.
Additionally, I’m not seeking to eliminate risk. That wouldn’t make sense. But I don’t foresee this as a riskier investment than betting on current interest rates, especially with so many troubled economies and currencies at the moment. I know you can’t buy whatever you like and sit on it for five years. That’s why I said that. Lol
Sometimes with these sets everyone is which ends up making them not such a good investment. Looking at generations. Though it remains to be seen how generations will do after it is done being printed. Interesting on that one that it wasn’t available in a booster box and each item (except charizard red-blue box for whatever reason) was not able to be re-ordered after the initial orders from Pokemon.
Evolutions will be another standard set that is available for reprinting and repurchasing through distributors for ~2 years or so, so as last call comes in I will try to make my call then. I missed out on Flashfire in that respect, but roaring skies was very easy to tell IMO. Shaymin is a must have for any TCG player. I did very well on that last case that I ordered. I only wish I had a few thousand to put into multiple cases at the time.
ETA: Also @churlocker I was replying to your response having quoted it, but on the “don’t just buy anything and sit on it 5 years” thing at that point I was speaking more to the general audience and OP specifically as I am sure you would know that.
No modern set has sold as fast as CP6, not even flashfire. Not sure how CP6/evolutions will translate for players, but it has already exploded in the collecting market.
