alexgross.com

awesome report! great to see all the photos-- really makes me want to go next year. looks like a whole different group of dealers than we get on the west coast. also, peter klaus is knute rockne. 

4 hours ago, Pontoon said:

I always get a kick out of the anti-dealer sentiment that crops up on the boards here and there. Just like people in every other aspect of life, there’s good ones and bad ones. Once you’ve figured out who the guys who know how to grade and price are, stick with them and just ignore the others. If buying at cons is so terrible, why are there so many Forumites who travel to different shows? Here’s a sampling of some of my buys over the last few years. Those who know me know I’m a cheapskate. I didn’t overpay on these and bought them at prices that both parties felt good about without any protracted negotiations. While we are on the subject, Bob showed me a very nice lower grade FF #4 one year at a nice price, but I’d just picked up the Hulk #2 and was low on funds.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

yes, everyone here says how great bob is, and i certainly believe them. i wish i saw him at wondercon (CA) every year, but i haven't. i've seen a lot of the dealers that are known from overstreet ads and online at that show, and my statement is based on that. i won't start naming names, but pretty much every dealer i've seen there asks prices a good deal over GPA for key books. saw a poor looking hulk 1 cgc 3.5 about a year and a half ago there and the dealer was asking 13k for it, when it was worth at most 9k. and this is a well known and well liked dealer. I'm not anti-dealer. but that's been my experience, and there are more stories like that one.  i'm glad to know that bob is apparently more fairly priced than most of these others. 

if you want to buy a silver age key at a convention, you will surely pay more than if you buy it on a CL or CC auction. as the dealers here have already mentioned, they have lots of costs in attending conventions, and that will surely be reflected in their prices, especially for the most sought after books, the keys. conventions are awesome for finding run books that are raw, you can really inspect them closely. but don't waste your time trying to find a great deal on hulk 1, af15, or anything like that at a convention, unless you want to pay extra. 

16 hours ago, Artboy99 said:

I am also wondering why buyers expect discounts off of key books that are fairly priced?

you've seen a key at a convention that was fairly priced?!? 

"Batman and Robin," before and after. i've been doing these paintings on antique photos for several years now. they are cabinet card photos from the late 1800s. i seal them with clear acrylic, and then paint directly on top of them. if you like this, you can see more of them on my website: http://www.alexgross.com/mixed-media/index.html

9 hours ago, Aman619 said:

What I'm saying, and has been discussed here often, is that Comiclink refused to deal with GPA with their data. The data is considered proprietary property of Comiclink.

yeah, i figured as much. this seems like a ridiculous legal position to take. if your auction is public on the internet, then the results are also public. of course, i'm not a lawyer. many of us have already, in our own amateur ways, kept certain records of their results on books we are interested in. but of course you are right, and if this is the position that comiclink is taking, then it is really comiclink that is screwing up results at GPA, and by extension, all of us who collect/invest in comics. 

if someone on this forum chose to keep a record of every comiclink result, and rather than sell it, make it available to everyone, with the possible suggestion of a small donation, like a museum does, that seems like it would be most useful, and legal.

23 hours ago, Aman619 said:

As to the value one gets from GPA being less than one expects, as we have discussed many times here, which newer posters may not have read, GPA is a concept that works better or worse depending on what types of comics prices one is hoping to research.  GPA effectiveness is limited by many real world roadblocks... but does the best it can.  

They can only include prices they are allowed to.  Comiclink has made it very clear that they choose to not work with GPA, preferring to keep their sales close to the vest.  Frankly I think they should share all auction and exchange sales that they currently choose to remain public by leaving them listed as Sale Pending.  Anything they want to hide that they currently take down asap can remain private.  

Many dealers will send them data, but have proven to be less than totally inclusive, cherry picking what sales they include. GPA can only try to convince the owners of the sales data to share 100% of their sales so that there is transparency, or they must choose to disallow all of that dealers data.

and as Bob pointed out, while GPA has digital data grabbing systems in place for auction house and dealers, this applies only to those dealers who maintain solid sales tracking and complete data records digitally.  Many many dealers still use pieces of paper and their memories.. for these dealers the chore of reporting data can take days and is put off for months.

basically mots of us have learned what books GPA is perfectly useful to research.  Books that trade often on the sites that report to them enough for a trend line to develop. After that, you just have to do your own research.  I think it's well worth the ten bucks a month for what they can and do report accurately.

 

i wish it were better. i wish the market was totally transparent. I wish. A lot of things that are just not possible given reality. 

so, public auction results, like those of comiclink auctions, are proprietary? gpa is not permitted by law to include those in it's results if comiclink does not agree? 

that 2 inch crease is ridiculous -- what a headache!

7 hours ago, SECollector said:

This is probably the coolest thread on the boards! Why has it been buried?! I just went through like 50 pages or something.

Anyway, I posted this elsewhere but I wanna be in the cool kids club as well. Here comes more or less my whole collection by now .

awesome group of keys! are you going to get DC books as well?

55 minutes ago, SECollector said:

OK, I can rephrase: I am not getting the service I thought I would get when I signed up. I thought I would get a really updated tracking of public sales at least for the big books. Its the best in its category (and the only one probably?), but the quality of the service provided can be much higher (i.e. including books from the other company as well). And allow me to disagree slightly and just hint that it actually might be their job to follow around the big selling venues like CL and CC and track down and register the sales. Its kind of why they are paid for. In my book if one single public sale is not published and taken into account then there is space for market manipulation. 

I mean, if we had the option tomorrow of a new service that actively tracks and register all public sales for CGC and the other company, who would you give your money to each month?

Anyway we are out of topic, and I don't have anything really against GPA, but I absolutely believe that there is space for improvement. Cheers.

amen! it really is time that someone opened a competing service. as you say, most if not all of us would gladly subscribe. it's hardly an impossible task. it simply means adding a few more sources than they currently use, and being more timely in updating information. i bet some of the longtime members here even have the capital to pursue such a start-up if they were so inclined. either way, GPA are so far off right now that i cannot be the only one contemplating dumping my subscription. 

is GPA completely worthless now? in reference to AF15 prices, they are so far out of touch with reality that one wonders why waste the eleven dollars per month. comiclink just sold a 7.0 for 125k. GPA has 2 sales of a 7.0 this year for 42 and 65k. about half the real price! similar results appear there in almost all grades. whats a 4.5 worth? less than a 4 apparently. a 5.0 goes for a couple grand more than a 4.0. ugh!!! it's way beyond time they start including comiclink results. do they use comicconnect results at least?

i'm so frustrated by this in particular because i have a 4.0 and would love to upgrade to a 4.5 or a 5.0. but there is no good way to know what each half point is worth at this stage. thoughts?

6 hours ago, SECollector said:

That damage on the front is way too distracting in my opinion, for a copy that is graded as FN. I would expect a much higher price for a better presenting 6.0 (or one that had the same damage on the BC) and / or one with a better PQ.

that 6.0 is kind of a tragic book-- the rest of it is so clean, it looks like an 8 at least. i thought about bidding but that crunch just held me back. i'm trying to upgrade my 4.0...

i just listed my asm14 on eBay. if anyone here is interested in it, obviously, i could do better than the listed price. thanks- 

http://www.ebay.com/itm/-/202053096280?

On 9/9/2017 at 4:16 PM, snitzer said:

Local ad yielded the following trio 

 

did they know what they had? pretty amazing haul you got there--

On 9/9/2017 at 1:17 PM, Dark Knight said:

Can we all bear another reboot though? At least to those who are not comic enthusiasts like us? Would be hard to sell after 2 unsuccessful outings. 

ruffalo's hulk is an ensemble player, not a lead. and when the most promising potential project in the near future is a movie about your main villain, (the dr doom movie idea that was only suggested at comiccon) then i think it suggests that the main property is not going to be put in theaters again for a long while. maybe they dont have fatal issues, but i always liked von doom more than the ff. am i alone?

batgirl

7 hours ago, Dark Knight said:

Seems like a 4.0 copy is the sweet spot to sell for the lower mid grades. There's a 4.0 with minimal chipping auction style on eBay starting at $25k by Gary Dolgoff. Not a bad looking copy. Also a trusted and long time dealer.  Would be interesting to see if the book sells this time around.  Was up a couple of times I believe with no takers. 

i'd call it a lot more than minimal chipping actually. it's pretty significant chipping. i agree he is a trusted longtime dealer, but i don't think that's a barometer book, since it's less than ideal for the grade with all those chips. 

 seems to be a huge gap between 3.5 and a 4.0. granted, chipping or lack of it can affect this, but on GPA the last 3 sales of a 4.0 are 30k, 30.5k and 35k. 

2 hours ago, Ken Aldred said:

 

Very polarising work.

Again, not for everyone.

well, nothing is for everyone!

frank miller's Ronin is still a great and groundbreaking 80s book without which we would never have gotten the dark knight returns. i think its a special mini series.

2 hours ago, blazingbob said:

 

And when posts are made to a forum board does anybody besides me think that after reading years and years of Overstreet dealer market reports that maybe those "forum experts" might be a little biased in what they recommend?  Sorry,  I always question the guys throwing out value when I know they own copies.     

totally agree with this! just wanted to say, in defense of some folks who write market reports in overstreet, that some of the better ones have shared valuable insights on what books would be good investments. i.e. a couple dealers mentioned getting into wonder woman about 5 years ago, and boy were they correct, from an investment standpoint. 

1 hour ago, NoMan said:

I'm not rich yet.  Actually kinda losen' money. 

ditto. i did the same thing, and sold it for a small loss last year so i could get a tos39 instead. strange tales 110 will probably do fine in the long run, but it's one of those rare key 1st appearance books where the character isnt on the cover. i think that has really affected peoples' interest in the book, and helps explain why doctor strange 169 and 1 have done better. 

16 minutes ago, Gene465 said:

I would so be boarding an airplane or making a drive to that comic store! That's a lot of money there!

he did go down there from NC and confront them, but didnt get the books back. i do completely understand that his story sounds fishy, i was astounded when he told me too. since i'm pretty new here, i know that my credibility is unproven (100% feedback on ebay though, over 400 deals- id is kanashibari), but all i can say is this is my close friend, and he is deeply honest, and also very ADD at times. hes generous and overly trusting of others, and hes also extremely busy- beleive it or not hes a physician!! and hes got kids. so i think being awake for days at a time on call has not helped him remember things like he left his comics with someone awhile ago, etc. i know it doesnt explain it all, but he certainly got screwed here, and i would be cautious about dealing with these people. no honest small town dealer would forget someone leaving an xmen 1 with them. even if it were years later, you'd remember that!

8 hours ago, Donatello said:

I was in that shop 2 weeks ago. They have a cgc 8.0 or 8.5 hulk 181 and an ungraded x-men 1 for sale in the counter at register for 4K and 10k. There was also a Stan Lee signed FF 1. The guy working said that he thought they were consignment  items, but he was unsure. I can't imagine anyone leaving the caliber of books I saw with a stranger for any period time, let alone 6 months unattended, seems fishy.

thanks for this info, i'll let him know about that. 

well, its bronze, not silver, but hulk181 continues to climb. a 9.0 was going for 2500-3000 a year ago, and is now often around 3500. and that same book cost 2k 3 years ago, when i got mine. similar results with asm129.