The premium applies to cards that look mint enough to score a 10, and that charizard looks like a 10. I have gotten some cards from eBay that scored 10, also paying a premium on most cards.
Perhaps you might not be willing to take the gamble to get a 10, but there are plenty of others out there that are, especially collectors that have experience grading that particular set
@hypernova hit it on the head! There is an excitement in earning a high grade. Certain people will pay for that risk. I remember ages ago I paid a premium at the time for a few raw sports cards. Ended up getting a psa 8 on a 1971 rookie. Which is equivalent to grading a raw 1st ed base holo 10.
Why wouldn’t people crack out their 9s then if they could potentially sell it for more raw.
Or on the other hand … wouldn’t it make more sense to someone trying to get a 10 to buy a strong 9, in hopes that the grader was either too harsh on the initial grade, or the grade might be so boarder line between 9 and 10 and just hoping for a beneficial coin flip.
People must be aware that 99.999% of the time when buying a raw gaming card from almost 20 years ago that it is not a 10, most likely not even a 9.
I understand its unethical and frowned upon in the hobby, but cracking and re-submitting 9s seems like the most cost effective / highest % chance of getting a 10.
While this may be true, its not like you have a 50/50 chance of it being a 10. I would say you don’t even have a 50/50 chance of it being a 9.
If you can buy the PSA 10 for lets say $400, how many “mint to the naked eye through a computer screen” cards do you think you’ll have to buy to find that 10? If a raw “mint” copy is selling for $125+, you literally only have 3 chances before you are spending more than the actual 10 would cost.
I would suggest the risk is quite high, seeing as on this particular auction, I don’t think there is enough information to positively determine the card is a 9 without a doubt.
I also wanted to add that if the card truly had a very strong chance at a 10, wouldn’t the owner send it in?
Of course, we don’t know his involvement / knowledge in the hobby, nor the reasons he is selling … but who knows, maybe this guy has tried to submit the card a few times … only getting a 9 each time. Maybes hes “done” with this card and wants to move on to another.
I think many of us here have bought raw ungradeds from people on ebay and gotten 10s. So when you say 99.999%, that may be true if you were just picking random cards off of ebay, but the beauty of ebay is that you get a picture of both the front and back, and can ask the seller for additional pictures (if it’s not already sold!). Experience submitting to PSA and doing your homework as to what usually gets what as far as grades go can give you a pretty close approximation as to what grade that card will get. There’s a lot of information for this auction that you might not be privy to - although you see two somewhat blurry pictures that could be roughly a 9 or 10, it’s possible someone sent a message asking for better pics and noticed that it really is flawless and believe it’ll be a 10.
They do for 8s if the price of the 8 is well below “raw mint”, and its becoming very common as well for 9s in big money cards because the difference between a 9 and 10 (e.g. Gold star Raquaza, Shining Charizard 1st Edition ect.) can be $1000+ in difference. It’s not ethical but money talks.
Whenever I buy 9s of a card I only buy very strong 9s, because 9s are typically plentiful for most cards and you can be choosy in what you buy. Just in case I ever can’t get a hold of a 10 someday, its nice to know I might have one sitting in my hands already. I’ve never regraded a card, but whose to say I never will.
I’d venture to guess that the majority of people that own pokemon cards, maybe 90%, fall in the realm of casual collector, either currently or in the past when they were a kid. These people most likely haven’t even heard of PSA. Then there’s maybe 5% of people that consider themselves hobbyist collectors, but are not interested in grades. These collectors know what PSA is, but it’s not about the grade to them, it’s more about the adventure of collecting as many sets, variants, boxes, booster packs, whatever the case may be, as possible. The last 5% are the people that are really gungho into the grading part of the hobby, and not only want to catch them all, but also want THE BEST GRADE POSSIBLE. These are generally people in their late 20s/early 30s and beyond, who have the ability to afford such an expensive hobby (or have bought/sold over many years to get where they are).
Who knows what group this seller belongs to, but probably not the most serious group. Heck, maybe they did submit this card already and only got a 9. My guess, after looking at his sold listings, is that there’s almost a 100% chance that he has not. Some sellers do that, where they believe a raw near mint ungraded has better sale value than a PSA 7 or 8. I’ll let you decide on the ethics of that behavior.
This is all a part of the wonderful web of ebay, though, so welcome and enjoy the fun!
lol you have summed up my life. I’m 27 and am now wanting all of these expensive PSA cards with some disposable income and since I’ve stopped traveling and living overseas. Although I feel I fit into both of those 5% in a way. Opening packs is certainly one of the funnest parts of the hobby!
I recently paid a significant premium for a mint condition Charizard gold star, graded it and it came back a 10. The age of finding old gem-mint cards at market value is over, if a card is well-known, has a large value discrepancy between 9 and 10, and looks like a possible 10, it’s going to command at least PSA 9 price at auction and often higher.
There are PSA 10 quality cards to be found raw (except maybe 1ED Base holos) you just have to do your research and bid on the right auctions.
I would have bought this. It’s a no brainer. I’ve seen people pay twice the Mint value on certain cards.
A friend sold a BGS 9 Unlimited Charizard for $350. I’m pretty sure it will not get a PSA 10, but the buyer thinks he has a chance at making $1000+. He can also resend to BGS for a possible 9.5 so it’s a calculated risk.
Ungraded cards are a different story but it is worth the gamble if you get a 10 now and then, especially when they go for 4-5x the value of a 9.
I was in a bid war with someone last night over some raw shadowless holos and he was dropping $200 per card. Lower end stuff like magneton, poliwrath. I couldn’t match it because I wouldn’t be able to handle the heart break of them inevitably being graded 9’s.
Very little risk, very big reward. It does cost you some effort.
I just looked over it quickly and didn’t find any flaw at all, then I’d look closer at it and if I still wouldn’t find a flaw, then I would buy it in a heartbeat. And even for more than the price it went for.
Looking at raw cards is one thing, you won’t see everything by just a few pictures, that is correct. But if the seller is honest about it never being played, and it looks like it’s never been played, then you might have hit the jackpot!
On the other hand, there does not exist such a thing as picking up a good-looking PSA 9, unless you really really want to gamble, because a case will hide lots of flaws. And it is very likely that one of those flaws is exactly the reason that it didn’t get a PSA 10. I’ve got cards of which I know that they don’t deserve a 10 graded, and the grade is not a 10, but despite that they still look flawless when you look at the cards through the case.
You can absolutely screen for centering and corner nicks in a case. There are lots of 9s that have centering problems and there are also those that dont. Same thing with corner nicks, and I see lots of PSA 10 with them. Centering is generally not passable for 10s, but nicks are.
