mec3437

Yes

Just in from the Great White North.

This whole thread is priceless!  Keep it coming!

Wow.  I can tell you that TF meets MLP will not be added to my pull list.  '84 Secrets & Lies comes out next week and that will be on my list.  Sometimes I hate Hasbro.

I bought Nam #1 CGC 9.8 in a newsstand.  Honestly, I liked the price box more than the direct.  Prices seem to fluctuate on 9.8 but sold listings show four 9.8 direct copies sold plus the one newsie I bought.  It's pretty much over a $100 difference if that aids in any research.

I totally get trying to pare down the collection.  That's another part of what I'm working on.  You still have a good pace of one book every 3-4 days.  I hit maybe 5-10 sales in a good month.  When the COVID-19-related lockdowns started, I sold quite a bit.  Since states have been reopening, it has slowed down for me considerably.  Best of luck to you with everything!

13 hours ago, Joe Ankenbauer said:

I had several people who were watching a listing of mine on Ebay. After about 10 days, I sent an offer to all these buyers. No one responded, so the offer expired. Can you send another offer to these buyers? If so, can you explain to me how to do it? I've tried and tried, but I can't get it to work. Plus, I have read MANY of Ebay's FAQs and other webpages, but I can't seem to find this information. I'm afraid that the only way to send a different offer is to cancel the original listing and relist the item again. I hope that this isn't the case, but ....

I usually list my items using Buy It Now. How long do you leave an item on Ebay before you attempt to make a sale by lowering the price?

Also, I have only done one auction, but the results were stellar.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/X-Men-Omnibus-Volume-1-Hardcover-Stan-Lee-and-Jack-Kirby-OOP-/124230090539?hash=item1cecb0bf2b%3Ag%3A5ioAAOSw0t5e7pDL&nma=true&si=YLCQ1D%2F8jLXEeo6JomKlKm%2FBeo4%3D&orig_cvip=true&nordt=true&rt=nc&_trksid=p2047675.l2557

I set a starting bid at $200, and I had a Buy It Now option for $350. I had NO idea that it would sell for an amount like this. I see many people start their auctions at $0.99; I'm just afraid that, if I offered a book that has a value of $15+, it could be possibly sold for $0.99.

There are things that I have listed that are really not generating any interest. What do you do to entice buyers to look at your listing, and then possibly buy it?

Thanks again for all the responses and advice. I planned on just asking about the offer question, but as I typed, several additional questions came to mind.

Good morning, Joe.  My understanding is that you can only send the BIN offer to new watchers.  Ebay is pretty loose in what they term new watchers, so if I were watching your item, unwatched it after the offer expired, then added it back to my watch list, you would be able to send me an offer again.  The only other way to send an offer would be if a potential buyer contacts you regarding the item, then you can make an offer through ebay's messaging system.  

As Capra said, patience is a virtue if you don't need the money.  Selling on ebay is a hobby for me, and the couple of the low amount I make on there definitely isn't keeping me afloat in my daily life.  However, I will occasionally scroll through listings and adjust prices or even end listings if I know there is no real interest.  I can't force anyone to buy anything.  My main focus is Transformers comics (Marvel, Dreamwave, IDW) so I'l sell some of those and usually doubles of other books I have.  I know the TF fan base when it comes to some of the comics.  I can get them to my listings, but I can't make them buy.  I would recommend that if you have slabs for sale, to try consigning through MyComicShop.  I just started doing that and it is relatively painless.  You can do a fixed price or auction.  Auctions can be feast or famine and that is a decision you'll have to make on your own.    

Arrived today.  Another one off the list.

welcome @Iron Man 63!  Heck of a first find you got there.  Here's hoping you find some more!

10 hours ago, Frisco Larson said:

@mec3437 What an AWESOME stack of books!!!! Pence copy goodness right there!!! Way to go brother!!!         

Thank you!  I've been ignoring my pence run of X-Men for too long so I decided to remedy it with a little retail therapy!

I've found the easiest way to get them to contact you is by calling your CC company to file a fraudulent transaction report because they never shipped the items.  It's like magic.  The second you mess with the money then they want to be your buddy.  It's been years since I ordered from them, and will never do it again.  

10 minutes ago, 1950's war comics said:

what are the "so called" valuable ones ?

There are prototype molds that Funko would raffle off or give away and a friend of mine secured a few.  After he and his wife were expecting baby #2, he auctioned them off and some were going over four figures.  I couldn't tell you specifics, but I'll shoot him a message and see if he'll shed light on it.  He has a CGC account, just not sure if he posts here.  

1 minute ago, 1950's war comics said:

i guess its a harmless collectible as long as one doesn't get carried away,,..

it beats blowing your money on hookers and blow ...

I'll agree to disagree

It's not my cup of tea, but I considered buying a couple of the GI Joe and Transformers Pops.  Then I decided against it.  Mostly because I figured it would be a slippery slope and I would end up trying to buy them all like Chinpokomon figures.  My friend is super into it, however.  He tries to get the super limited ones and prototypes and has gone to some of the Pops conventions.  If that is what someone likes, then good on them for getting enjoyment out of it.  

6 hours ago, Michelangelo said:

In January 2020, a buyer bought my BB28 CGC 3.0. 

He DM'd me about getting him the book ASAP because it was a birthday gift for his girlfriend. I thought it was odd anyone would give such an expensive gift, let alone to a girlfriend.

But, what do I know? To each their own. I expedited this to him and it arrived when he needed it. He gave me a positive eBay feedback and that was it.

Fast forward to April and I get notified by PP that he opened a case, citing that he didn't authorize (or was unaware of the purchase). 

I provided all evidence I had, which included

- a detailed eBay private message conversation

- tracking information that included an image of his actual signature

- PP invoice (name/address matching the eBay purchase)

- screenshot of positive feedback left (PP invoice transaction # matching the # on the ebay feedback)

Now in June, the financial institution still sided with the buyer. There was absolutely no other type of evidence I could reasonably present.

Thankfully, PP didn't debit the money from my account (despite that they said they would initially), but still, this crook got away with it and caused me 3 months of stress in the process.

His eBay account, which had 100+ positive feedback, was deleted because (according to eBay customer service) the account name was inappropriate - "randomshieeeet"

but his name is Kush Patel and he's from Montreal. If this SOB buys anything from you, don't ship.

Thanks for reading.

Sorry to hear that.  I think Bob Storms had some problems with orders going to Montreal.  Not sure if that would be someone from the same group pulling a fast one.

Nice grade on the CPV of Secret Wars #1.  Their service department has been good in my experience, so I hope the fix is quick & painless.

I'm going for the run, and can sell other stuff or myself to put towards a low grade AF15.  

If it's an impulse buy (which I try to not make usually), then I think about $50-$100 is normal.  As far as what is affordable to me, it just depends.  I haven't been one of those guys to drop $10K on a comic, but I have spent over $1k on a book a few times.  Depending on what it is and the condition, I would say $200-$400.  But that takes into account my income as well as the money coming out for bills and other expenses every month.  If it is a big book, I will save for a couple months then make the purchase.  

42 minutes ago, Corona smith said:

The numbers out there aren’t exact and the percentages were just estimates by people in the industry. In my experience post 2000 newsstands are quite difficult to find in most cases let alone in high grades. I know in my area in the 80-90’s you could buy comics everywhere. Drug Stores, Gas Stations, Grocery Stores, Department Stores, Actual Newsstands, etc. were all places you could find them.  There must’ve been at least 12-20 stores during that time where I could purchase comics. The only place to buy them around or just after 2000 was Borders. That’s just my area but I’m sure it was similar across the country. 

I can second this.  In the Cincinnati area, specifically the neighborhood where I grew up, my friends and I would walk to Kroger, to Walgreens, to K-Mart, to the gas station to pick up the issues because we never had a reliable way to a comic shop.  There were a few comic shops, but getting someone's parents to drive you there required some groveling, because the stores weren't right just down the street.  When I was able to drive, I wasn't buying too many comics at that time, and I may have still had subscriptions from Marvel.  I do remember going to the LCS to buy Ennis' Punisher maxi series.  I would still buy books off the newsstand at Media Play, Waldenbooks, or whichever other types of bookstores were still around.  The Waldenbooks closed sometime after 2009 (it's an Urgent Care facility now), so that was the last I can think of off the type of my head.  There is a Barnes and Noble somewhere in the area.  The grocery stores and pharmacies in the area stopped stocking comics some time in the 2000s.  I know because I would walk through the books and magazine section and the comics were all gone.  There were plenty of places to buy them in the 90s when I was a kid, but it really dried up in the 2000s.  

If Marvel goes all-digital, I will most likely stop buying Marvel titles.  I don't buy many of them now.  Some of the Star Wars titles, and some Punisher stuff.  I got back into reading new comics somewhere around 2012.  I'm not of the persuasion that all new comics are trash.  People look back fondly on the stuff they grew up with, or what got them into the hobby.  I liked X-Men and Transformers comics back in the day.  Then I went back and re-read some of that stuff.  It can be pretty bad too.  I'm not going to be that guy that says that new comics are garbage.  If I do that, I may as well yell at someone for being on my lawn when they are on the sidewalk.  Going back to Marvel, my main gripes are the price point and the paper stock.  $4 for just a regular issue is outrageous, especially when you can walk into a shop or get your pull list mailed to you from whichever online source and the books all have color rub and waves.  I don't intend to buy digital comics so that would be my jump off point.  I'll still be able to read the dreck from my youth and remember how cool I thought it was before I hit puberty.

On a side note, everyone feel free to throw all your post 2012 stuff in the trash so it increases scarcity and the perceived value of the stuff in my short boxes.