Deciding To Sell My Collection

[RainingTacos]

Hey everyone. New to this forum but not forums in general. My father and I collected for many years. I have been out of the loop for the last 10 year but finally revisited my many boxes of cards. All raw and immediately placed in plastic when I pulled them from packs. We were huge Michael Jordan, Kobe Bryant, Griffey Jr., Frank Thomas, Jeter, Shaq, Nolan Ryan, Ripken, etc. types of collectors. I also have Mantles, Aaron’s, etc. My collection is mostly 80’s and 90’s but I do have several from the 50’s-70’s. There are currently several grading companies, but some of their services are not offered. Several of my cards are selling in the multiple $1,000s range. Do I get these all graded or am I better off selling raw?

Just a couple examples would be:

Kobe 1996-97 EX-2000 Stardate 2000
Jordan 1997-98 Thunder and Lightning

I have multiples of most 90’s inserts of top players and rookies so It’s more important for me to have a safe and secure transaction than maximizing my profits but I need some forum help to guide. I appreciate your guidance.

Moderators, feel free to move my thread to a different topic if appropriate. Thanks all.

 

[pinetarboys]

Hey everyone. New to this forum but not forums in general. My father and I collected for many years. I have been out of the loop for the last 10 year but finally revisited my many boxes of cards. All raw and immediately placed in plastic when I pulled them from packs. We were huge Michael Jordan, Kobe Bryant, Griffey Jr., Frank Thomas, Jeter, Shaq, Nolan Ryan, Ripken, etc. types of collectors. I also have Mantles, Aaron’s, etc. My collection is mostly 80’s and 90’s but I do have several from the 50’s-70’s. There are currently several grading companies, but some of their services are not offered. Several of my cards are selling in the multiple $1,000s range. Do I get these all graded or am I better off selling raw?

Just a couple examples would be:

Kobe 1996-97 EX-2000 Stardate 2000
Jordan 1997-98 Thunder and Lightning

I have multiples of most 90’s inserts of top players and rookies so It’s more important for me to have a safe and secure transaction than maximizing my profits but I need some forum help to guide. I appreciate your guidance.

Moderators, feel free to move my thread to a different topic if appropriate. Thanks all.

Well…if you want to maximize your value on these cards you’ll have to get them graded which will cost you and you’ll have to wait a long time to get them back…or you sell them raw for 50-75% of Book Value because most buyers will not pay 100%…
Thanks Josh

 

[KCLJ520]

Hey everyone. New to this forum but not forums in general. My father and I collected for many years. I have been out of the loop for the last 10 year but finally revisited my many boxes of cards. All raw and immediately placed in plastic when I pulled them from packs. We were huge Michael Jordan, Kobe Bryant, Griffey Jr., Frank Thomas, Jeter, Shaq, Nolan Ryan, Ripken, etc. types of collectors. I also have Mantles, Aaron’s, etc. My collection is mostly 80’s and 90’s but I do have several from the 50’s-70’s. There are currently several grading companies, but some of their services are not offered. Several of my cards are selling in the multiple $1,000s range. Do I get these all graded or am I better off selling raw?

Just a couple examples would be:

Kobe 1996-97 EX-2000 Stardate 2000
Jordan 1997-98 Thunder and Lightning

I have multiples of most 90’s inserts of top players and rookies so It’s more important for me to have a safe and secure transaction than maximizing my profits but I need some forum help to guide. I appreciate your guidance.

Moderators, feel free to move my thread to a different topic if appropriate. Thanks all.

Those Jordans are HOT right now and have been for some time! Good luck, whatever you decide!

Blessings,

Kevin

 

[GotMelky]

Unfortunately, there is no easy answer. It really depends on your goal, need for the funds, and how much effort/work you want to put into it.

The easiest is to just sell the whole collection at once - you get the cash in hand quickly and very little effort is required. There are dealers online and in person who buy collections regularly. You won't get top dollar - I would expect 40-60% of the collection value doing it this way as they are doing the work to sell and assuming all of the risk - you get to walk away.

A middle level might be consigning with a reputable online seller - you get a higher percentage of the money as card sell, but you have to be patient and understand the funds will come in as the cards sell. This will only work on cards of a certain value and higher - you might have to sell the lower end stuff in batches/lots via forums/eBay/etc. You could use a site like COMC as well (especially on stuff in the $5-$20 range) - they seem to finally be catching up on listings but they've had severe growing pains in the last two years (almost every hobby related business has).

The most effort is to sell singles yourself - set up an eBay store and start listing. All the listing, maintenance, and shipping is on you for this but you also get the most money out of it. You can always sell on forums or try Facebook/Twitter/etc. but eBay usually is the best option because it has the most eyeballs and offers a pretty secure transaction for all involved.

It may be that you are best using a combination of ways to sell - it all really comes down to what you're most comfortable with.

In regards to grading - it might be worth it on the really high end cards. It is pretty expensive to grade even a single card, the services are proving less than reliable at times, you may end up waiting for the card, and there is an amount of risk involved that you need to understand.

If you have any specific questions, let me know as I'm happy to help.

 

[RainingTacos]

With PSA being under FBI investigation I’d be using other companies for grading. I’m not in a rush. I also don’t want a huge hassle. I appreciate the responses. Thanks for that. I have most 90’s Jordan’s. I want to sell. Prefer a safe and secure sale. Becket seems most reliable these days? PSA is under investigation.

 

[baystate123]

As stated earlier, there's no easy answer. It's hard enough just maximizing the sale of a collection as is. Throw in the option of grading cards to increase profit and your workload has really jumped. What I can say for sure is that in no way should you get them "all" graded. It's impossible that they are "all" worth grading. The trick is determining which are worth grading and how much time, energy, and out-of-pocket expense you want to spend figuring that out. And after all that, you need to factor in how long you will be waiting for returns on your investments. Without knowing the exact size of your collection, I might suggest working on let's say the top 10 candidates to be graded. After that, you'll start to get a feel for the process. Eventually, you'll hit a cut-off point and just sell the remainder as raw. You can always start by scanning (front & back) a few here and see what people say.