William-James88

Hey, it just dawned on me that you could use the CGC SS series to bypass the fees associated with higher tier books. Like lets say you have an ASM 1. That book is at a rather high tier to grade, but if you send it to be signed by someone, it could cost as low as $50 to grade. Obviously you are stuck with a book signed by a creator that didn't work on it, but does that reduce the value of your book? Like say you get McFarlane to sign that Spidey 1. Is it stupid, frugal or shrewed? Your thoughts please.

I wrote this in the newbie forum but maybe here is better. I am submitting for the Bagley signing (gotta do it before that Carnage movie comes out) and in my total I am charged a fed ex shipping charge for each submission. Nomatter if they are both going for pressing or none are. Is that normal? This is getting mucho mucho pricey.

FYI, those are not solid condition. You can already tell from the spines shown where we see blunt corners, tears, spine roll and rust on the staples. Unless that pic is not a good indication of course. But if it is, they are midgrade, meaning they would get on average 4 or 5 out of 10 condition wise.

I guess we have different definitions for high value then. Anything above $100 for something found in the attic sounds good to me.

Easy, the downside is you make less money or even no money. A slabbed comic will sell for more than a raw copy, not enough to make it worth it for you oftentimes, but a dealer wont care since they have that flat 10% regardless, on top of the extra cut they got from having you slab a comic (they get a dealer rate/cut for every slabbed book they send to CGC). Here is the scenario: You have a comic that could sell for $80 raw (any of the early black suit spidey issues are a good example) but that could sell for $100 slabbed (a 20% premium makes sense). Obviously for someone charging you 10% flat they would rather you get it graded since that will bring them $10 instead of $8. Now check this, getting it graded will cost you $30-$40 all together. Lets go for the cheaper option (best case scenario). You sell for $100, they substract their fee, and they substract how much it cost for grading, so you end up with $60. If you didn't grade it, they would only substract 8$ so you would get $72 for the same comic. And as I said, not only did they get more from it being graded with their 10% fee, but they also took a cut from your fee to submit to CGC. So they have every reason to recomend you slab a bunch of comics, they can't lose. But you can. And this was all best case scenario, if they charge more to slab your comic or if you get less back from the auction it could happen that you come out negative (at least for a few auctions). Thanks for sharing what those people told you because I am assuming they tell others and those people just follow since they will think like you, that there is no downside. Now I get why there are so many worthless comics being slabbed : You just have to choose if you want to maximise the seller's return, or your own?

it will be of substantive value regardless. I wish I found this in my attic but alas my father only ever collected Jimmy Olsen comics and even then they were thrown out of his house once he left.

Please remember, the value of your book is what is can sell as, not what it is being listed as. You have to check for what price your comics sold for. Also, what do you mean by worth being graded? The value does not necessarily go up on graded books. Raw books sell just as well, especially early issues of spider-man. If you want them graded because you think a slab looks nice, then go for it. But know that it wont increase the value of your books. And if you plan on selling them, then grading them will only eat into your profit.

I see one 20 cent book that seems to be of substantive value...

It will be my first time submitting books for CGC's in house signature series (well first time ding it myself). I am submitting 2 books and I see 2 fed ex charges, one per book. Is that normal? I tried both with pressing, none with pressing and one of each, same outcome. Do they not combine shipping of SS books? Let me know

For all you montrealers, the cheapest way to buy rare books is to do so at Comiccon. I know the price tag will look way more expensive, but when you factor shipping and taxes, it comes out cheaper for the books I looked at. That used to be my answer for CGC too, handing off books at the con and doing the SS series there. But now that they don't show up anymore, the most I deal with CGC is by buying pre slabbed books and writing on these boards

I love original art and have a sketch collection I am really proud of https://www.comicartfans.com/gallerydetail.asp?gcat=34336 Luckily, I got my grails rather easily, early on. And they are not a page per se, but sketches and I got them from the creators making them extra special. Since then, what I do though is wait until something falls into my lab. It has to be an artist I like, doing a character I like and cost under $200. I know I won't get that often so I just enjoy what I can get and I wait for a really good deal on something I like to come around, usually from the creators themselves. So clearly I don't buy original art often, but it makes the times I buy it all that more special to me. If you want an example, there will be a rare occasion that an artist I like chooses to liquidate his stuff on an unannounced facebook auction, or an inker i follow got some of his pages in and just wants to sell them quick, or Tony Daniel has had enough of sitting on his Batman art and is just doing a bunch of auctions on e-bay. I don't look for this, I just get a notice of it when going about my day. I still get grails, but I make them up as I go along (so I guess to answer your question, it's both at the same time). What I mean is I will meet a creator I love at a show and give them money to make me a grail. it will be of a character they are associated to and that I love. Here is my latest one was from Kevin Nowlan:

You don't win either way. When you shop at Heritage it's because you want to buy a book you can't find elsewhere. because or else, that will be the most costly way to buy books. You will be charged the priciest shipping, and customs are guaranteed to happen. A PO box doesn't help much since you are then charged US taxes+ the use of a PO Box and the hassel of getting your books. The best way to do it, so that it is somewhat worthwhile is to wait until you have A LOT of stuff to ship. I have waited years for that to happen. When you have upwards of 3000$ worth of books to ship, then that $300 shipping fee (and that upwards of $100 customs fee) doesn't seem so bad when breaking it down per book. I too wish they did but USPS is not as accountable for international orders as Fed Ex and UPS since they don't have their own branch here to continue the voyage. Heritage does not want to thus rely on Canada post, who is responsable for the rest of your package's journey once it hits canada. basically, if there is an issue, they want to be able to hold someone in the US accountable if any legal action is to be taken. It's all about them covering their buts at all costs and not losing money in any way. EDIT: also, pretty funny how we are all in Montreal

It's all supply and demand. Supply may be low but if demand is just as low, then the worth wont be much. So if no one is willing to pay multiple, then that book wont be sold and a book is only worth what someone is willing to pay.

Oh alright. Man I would still love that book, even in that grade, nice find! The colours look nice. I owned one once and sold it because someone had outlined Catwoman in pencil and it just never sat right with me.

Wut? Did Dylan grade this book? You gonna return it? (I do love that book though, just not the grade they told you it was)

1.8, pretty cool book

So that they can use the same pic on e-bay and avoid people returning a book because it is not the exact same serial number found in the e-bay pic.

All the info can be found here and they will send the books to CGC for you https://cfpcomics.com/

Firstly, for this book I doubt a press would make a difference since the issues (tears and colour break creases) won't be removed. I would say this is a 4.5 regardless of press or not. The cost of pressing 10 books is 100$, a 100$ press won't get you the same results you would get from a professional. Also, when you send your book in for a press, there will also be cleaning and ironing for spine reallignment. If you don't have any GA or SA books, then spine roll wont be much of an issue but cleaning is sometimes indispensable for 80s and 90s books and it will make the difference between a 9.0 and a 9.6-9.8 which is where the big value difference is for books from that era (see example below of before and after dry cleaning). Going through the trouble of pressing and slabbing a book that still has some light surface dirt advantages no one since that pressed comic still has potential to be better but now someone is stuck having to buy a slabbed comic, crack it and send it to a presser again when only cleaning is necessary.

Mycomicshop is very accurate at grading within the range you are buying.

To Bart Allen, I especially like that in your new layout, the Mr Mind appearance is put first since that is the most important aspect of this book.

Thanks. 3.0 to 3.5 then. It's ugly and CGC will not like those staples, but if thst is lots of foxing anf not staining then I csn see it getting 3.5. Very curious what it would be slabbed.

man, those guys really are the best.

Those scans are terrible, I would need better pics. But from what I can see, I would say something between 3.0 and 4.0. And an ugly 4.0 at that.

Ok, well if you are getting them graded, then avoiding e-bay will be super easy, barely an inconvenience. You can just ship them all to be consigned to comiclink. They tend to mainly take graded books for consignment. I used them before and it worked well. BUT if you want to maximize revenue then grading them would not be wise at all. I see endless amounts of wastefull slabs where people who sent some comics to get graded and because they are not as high a grade as they think they are (check your book, if you see a rounded corner, a single tick on the spine, any place on the cover that breaks a little colour, your book is not "high grade"), end up selling for less than they paid to get them graded. I make it a habit almost of buying slabs that could simply not have been profitable to anyone aside from the grading company. If you want to maximise revenue, then it's only logical to keep your costs down as much as possible and sending them in for grading increases costs substantially with 0 guarantee that those costs will be recuperated. Yes, you could spend $40 getting a book graded that would sell for $200, but you could also just sell that non graded book for $180. Or worse, you spend $40 getting a book graded that would sell for $50 regardless if it is graded or not. Or even worse than that, you spend $40 getting a book graded that will sell for $30 regardless if it is graded or not. Clearly no member on these boards would send books like that in, but we see them dumped on auctions all the time and it must mean that someone out there found a collection, thought they hit gold and sent them in for grading hoping to maximise revenue when instead they just maximised their costs. I am assuming no one sends books in wanting to lose money and yet I see more people losing money than making money when getting books graded. So, you can avoid extra costs and just get maximum revenue by sending the keys to My Comic Shop under consignment. They will even grade it for you. They are my main choice when I want to sell a non graded book and want to make the most from it while avoiding e-bay.