miraclemet

were they worth the stated amount ($60-70)? How many books were in each box?

He hast completed payment (shipping), so if its been 30 days you should be able to void the sale due to nonpayment, and sell the book elsewhere. Keep trying to refund him, but there's only so much you can do...

Justin bought some of my books, paid fast, communicated well and was super buyer. sell this guy your stuff!

How are you defining flippers? Anyone willing to sell the book? Anyone who bought the book in hopes of it increasing in value for future sales? Considering the number of dealers on here I'm sure there are 50 "investment " copies in people's boxes... At the right price virtually anyone will sell almost any book.

"Seriously people this book is only going up in GPA" seriously, do we need such a hard sell? And seriously its not only going up (there are a few grades that is is going down), and going up in the last 90 days doens't mean its going to keep going up... and the sales are all in the run up to the ASM2 movie release, isnt it possible that buyers here know not to buy books at their high point (at the point of a movie release), but rather when they are under-performing, or due for a bump?

Agreed. Although NM 98 is a true first appearance, but alas, BA 12 is not. I do believe that will hinder that book in the long run. -J. Whether it's "first appearance in a comic" or "first appearance in the DC universe proper" the market has already spoken and they (as a collective) don't seem to care about splitting the hairs. The fact that Harley was first introduced in cartoon form is what helps cement BA12 as the go to Harley book (because the cartoon is consistent with the animated stylings of the Batman Adventure line). 90 day GPA average for a 9.8 BA12 = $666 Batman:Harley Quinn OGN = $251 Batman 570: $46 So when faced with choosing between 1st comic book appearance (BA12), 1st in continuity appearance (B:HQ OGN) or 1st appearance in an in continuity comic book (Batman 570), the overwhelming choice by the market is BA12 Its like the IH180/181 argument. Sure Wolverine first appears in IH180, but the market has shown that it cares MOST about IH181, so that's what matters. You could have made the exact same statment about IH180/181 back in the 80s (as in "The fact that IH181 is not Wolverines true first appearance will hinder the books in the long run") and that would not have held up. I think there's enough evidence on BA12s performance so far that we can say it's growth will only be affected by the level of popularity that Harley maintains in comic books and general pop culture. Respectfully, the hulk 180/181 analogy is not entirely applicable in that regardless of whether or not the hobby values his first "full appearance" more than a "cameo", is not the same as the first appearance of a cartoon character in a comic book. A better analogy would be transformers #1. The first appearance of the transformers in a comic book. Basically a very inexpensive book in a 9.8, even with all the toys and movies. I think when Harley became popular people wanted to find a book to go after that featured her early comic book appearance. BA 12 is obviously the best anyone could come up with. But regardless of what it is currently selling for, I give NM 98 the definite edge in importance because it actually is the first appearance of deadpool, and not just some cartoon character retconned for the first time into a comic book. -J. respectfully I only think Transformers #1 would work as a better analogy would be if Optimus Prime was later brought into the Marvel Universe and became a member of the Avengers, gained widespread marvel comics fandom and was the obsession of lots of cosplay/con/comic book fans (and yes I know there was a Transformers vs Avengers mini a few years back, but that wasnt in continuity). Harley was a DC Animated character that was included in that Animated shows DC comic book line, who was then brought into "proper" continuity by showing up in the mainstream Batman titles. She never existed outside of DC (unlike Transformers, which existed on their own, in their own universe, in their own continuity for decades), so it's not like they are trying to shoehorn in My Little Pony. Harley is a DC character who got popular in her original animated format so she moved into the main universe to continue to grow. DC has many animated titles right now (Teen Titans, Justice League) so I imagine something like this could happen again... I agree with everything you just said for the most part. But I still stand by my assertion that BA 12 is a weak example of a character's "first appearance". As much as I like harley we just have to accept that there is no real first appearance of her that will ever exist in a comic, and that's why it is not on par with a NM 9.8. -J. wouldn't you consider either Batman:Harley Quinn OGN or Batman 570 her first appearance in comics since you seem to be anti her animated version, and the OGN and 570 are not the animated version, and Batman 570 is a comic book for sure. wouldnt that be her first appearance by your thinking? (since BA12 isnt?) She's in continuity now so at SOME point she had to first appear... the market thinks that its BA12, or to a lesser degree the OGN... but somewhere it had to start. Do we have other examples of this? where the first appearance seems out of continuity? Maybe something from an OGN?

Agreed. Although NM 98 is a true first appearance, but alas, BA 12 is not. I do believe that will hinder that book in the long run. -J. Whether it's "first appearance in a comic" or "first appearance in the DC universe proper" the market has already spoken and they (as a collective) don't seem to care about splitting the hairs. The fact that Harley was first introduced in cartoon form is what helps cement BA12 as the go to Harley book (because the cartoon is consistent with the animated stylings of the Batman Adventure line). 90 day GPA average for a 9.8 BA12 = $666 Batman:Harley Quinn OGN = $251 Batman 570: $46 So when faced with choosing between 1st comic book appearance (BA12), 1st in continuity appearance (B:HQ OGN) or 1st appearance in an in continuity comic book (Batman 570), the overwhelming choice by the market is BA12 Its like the IH180/181 argument. Sure Wolverine first appears in IH180, but the market has shown that it cares MOST about IH181, so that's what matters. You could have made the exact same statment about IH180/181 back in the 80s (as in "The fact that IH181 is not Wolverines true first appearance will hinder the books in the long run") and that would not have held up. I think there's enough evidence on BA12s performance so far that we can say it's growth will only be affected by the level of popularity that Harley maintains in comic books and general pop culture. Respectfully, the hulk 180/181 analogy is not entirely applicable in that regardless of whether or not the hobby values his first "full appearance" more than a "cameo", is not the same as the first appearance of a cartoon character in a comic book. A better analogy would be transformers #1. The first appearance of the transformers in a comic book. Basically a very inexpensive book in a 9.8, even with all the toys and movies. I think when Harley became popular people wanted to find a book to go after that featured her early comic book appearance. BA 12 is obviously the best anyone could come up with. But regardless of what it is currently selling for, I give NM 98 the definite edge in importance because it actually is the first appearance of deadpool, and not just some cartoon character retconned for the first time into a comic book. -J. respectfully I only think Transformers #1 would work as a better analogy would be if Optimus Prime was later brought into the Marvel Universe and became a member of the Avengers, gained widespread marvel comics fandom and was the obsession of lots of cosplay/con/comic book fans (and yes I know there was a Transformers vs Avengers mini a few years back, but that wasnt in continuity). Harley was a DC Animated character that was included in that Animated shows DC comic book line, who was then brought into "proper" continuity by showing up in the mainstream Batman titles. She never existed outside of DC (unlike Transformers, which existed on their own, in their own universe, in their own continuity for decades), so it's not like they are trying to shoehorn in My Little Pony. Harley is a DC character who got popular in her original animated format so she moved into the main universe to continue to grow. DC has many animated titles right now (Teen Titans, Justice League) so I imagine something like this could happen again...

Agreed. Although NM 98 is a true first appearance, but alas, BA 12 is not. I do believe that will hinder that book in the long run. -J. Whether it's "first appearance in a comic" or "first appearance in the DC universe proper" the market has already spoken and they (as a collective) don't seem to care about splitting the hairs. The fact that Harley was first introduced in cartoon form is what helps cement BA12 as the go to Harley book (because the cartoon is consistent with the animated stylings of the Batman Adventure line). 90 day GPA average for a 9.8 BA12 = $666 Batman:Harley Quinn OGN = $251 Batman 570: $46 So when faced with choosing between 1st comic book appearance (BA12), 1st in continuity appearance (B:HQ OGN) or 1st appearance in an in continuity comic book (Batman 570), the overwhelming choice by the market is BA12 Its like the IH180/181 argument. Sure Wolverine first appears in IH180, but the market has shown that it cares MOST about IH181, so that's what matters. You could have made the exact same statment about IH180/181 back in the 80s (as in "The fact that IH181 is not Wolverines true first appearance will hinder the books in the long run") and that would not have held up. I think there's enough evidence on BA12s performance so far that we can say it's growth will only be affected by the level of popularity that Harley maintains in comic books and general pop culture.

are they 9.6 not 9.8?

looks like about half of his thread has gotten un-kudoed... wonder if he'll be linking to his kudos thread anymore...

we're about 2 weeks away from someone having a sale titled "CGC It!" or "9.6 not a 9.8"

As opposed to when? The 80's X-men run by Claremont and Daredevil run by Miller is up there - I don't recall seeing 5 variant covers, embossed, poly bagged issues during that time. There has never been a time in the history of the company when a good product was more important than a punctual product. At least not in continuity. Quality of writing trumps style back in the day. Readers were more into substance. As I've said earlier, "they were in MORE for the money" during the 90's. Marvel tried making money by pandering to insufficiently_thoughtful_persons. Every company's goal is to keep shareholders happy. Everybody knows this. They were making money without the cheesy gimmicks - they just got greedier in the 90's because the market allowed it (speculators). I could be wrong, but wasn't it DC who started the 90's debacle. With 5 different covers for Robin 1, that was followed by Marvel and bagging X-Force 1 with 5 different cards, then X-Men 1 had 5 covers, then foil covers, then Bloodshot 1 had Chromium and Marvel went nuts with Chromium, and so on and so forth, and somehow we ended up with X-Statix, and Doop. Wow, I just had a horrible flashback. Doop is amusing agreed, and X-statix is an interesting read as a criticism of current pop culture both inside and outside of comics...

As opposed to when? The 80's X-men run by Claremont and Daredevil run by Miller is up there - I don't recall seeing 5 variant covers, embossed, poly bagged issues during that time. Not really a fair argument, since those things weren't around during the Claremont/Miller era you referenced. It is fair to say that there's not much "great" reading in and among those holo foil, poly bagged books... Some loved Valiant in that era and they had some of that stuff. Robinson's Starman was able to avoid the mess ... But the 90s were style over substance, and art over writing.

Thank goodness!

I dont think any of those mentioned titles will catch up to NM98 ...two of them are bronze age (so fewer 9.8 grade copies, and maybe fewer all together) ....walking dead had a smaller print run for sure, and most have been slabbed due to popularity and press. ...BA12 probably had less produced/kept, even though they were produced in the same era, the BA line was less "mainstream" than NM. Also NM copies are still sitting in plenty of 90s long boxes, sure some BA12s are too, but the NMs far outnumber the BAs.

with the popularity of the book, and the price potential, and the press that the 10.0 got last year I would assume that of those 1400 9.8s a decent percentage (more than the average book) are duplicates due to the sub, resub, press, resub, press with someone else, re-re-resub game. decent percentage in my guestimation.... 15%

No. GPA gets their eBay data through the eBay API which provides the actual purchase price (including the correct price for accepted best offers) - it's a different set of data compared to what you can see when you're just browsing completed auctions. You're wrong and I'll continue to take advantage of this loophole. For instance, I purchased a book for $600 from a guy's eBay store that he had listed as $900, but then he discounted the book to $600. GPA recorded the sale at $900 and it's still logged on GPA as $900.00. I will not talk specifics as it's not my job to create the software for GPA to record things accurately. I'll say it again, GPA is very flawed. Nope. Here's a good example: 1) Book was listed at a $500 BIN with the best offer option: http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&rd=1&item=141202284570 2) Best offer accepted by the seller for the book was $420. 3) GPA shows the correct $420 sale price: Not saying that there aren't bad sales data in GPA - with the amount of items they record, there's bound to be mistakes from time to time. But to claim that GPA doesn't record a sales price that includes seller discounts, accepted best offers, or any of the other stuff that influences the final selling price on eBay is flat out wrong. You and I are talking about 2 separate things so there's some misunderstanding between what we're trying to get across. Yes, when someone has a book as a BIN or best offer and the best offer is accepted then GPA does record the best offer price at the correct sale. BUT.... When an eBay store has a book listed at x amount and then puts a discount on the book at a lower amount and you buy it at the discounted price then GPA records the sale at the original price and not the discounted price. please provide an example, since MS has provide one that disproves it.

You mean the incorrect info above? Here's an example of a discounted listing on eBay: http://www.ebay.com/itm/CGC-SS-9-8-Walking-Dead-100-Chromium-Variant-signed-Lincoln-Gurira-Morrissey-/121322698110 If you look that sale up in GPA, it'll list the sale price as $525. Just like GPA, eBay's FVF assessment uses whatever the real sale value is as its basis. well thats a relief! thanks for citing an actual example. does the contrarian want to cite his example of the GPA vs eBay mis-match?

I wonder if eBay uses the listed price for assessing fees, or if they (correctly) use the discounted price? Seems like they'd have the API at the point of fee assesment, since that's going to be the correctly cited price (after discounts, or "Or Best Offers" or bids or second chance offers or whatever). but based on the above info (that GPA is tied to a dataset that reports the listed eBay store price not the discount price) it seems that's not the case....

Plus it would be pretty odd if all of the sales on non-gpa reporting venues were for higher $$$ than the gpa reporting venues. People complain that gpa is incomplete, but I think they'd be shocked to see prices drop on lots of books if gpa started including all of the convention sales in their data, where dealers are often happy to sell for under market so that they can pay for the cost of the con, or have more cash in hand for buying collections that show up. I also enjoy a seller mentioning that a book is on the rise when you look back at previous sales and see that their original purchase of the book was the high water mark.

it's accurate in that it is a collection of data and averages of a subset of market data. Saying it's inaccurate would imply that the data it presents is wrong, which it isnt unless theres a problem with the database or the queries or the source data. a more accurate way to describe GPA (if you feel so) is that it is an INCOMPLETE assessment of the market value of a book.

it's funny how when "GPA's not accurate" it's always because it's undervaluing the book... never the opposite...

I know it's semantics but when I get a response to an offer with "the least I can take is ____" when what you really mean the least you WILL take is _____.

I pointed him in the direction of the "please grade me" forum...

this may be the biggest fly in the ointment of your business plan.