high grade is not fun anymore

[fantastic_four]

Good luck with all your future 'purchases.'

 

[FlComicFan]

High grade comics are now a commodity to be passed back and forth You see the same books being repeatedly resold via Ebay/Heritage/Comic Link Who suffers? The end user which is the true collector who needs a book but ends up with it after its been flipped a few times or worse yet cleaned and pressed () I dont see the great fix for grading problems. People still can get stuck with hot potato books misgraded by CGC and now with the great clean and press conspiracy................... Were right back where we started only books cost a heck of a lot more than pre CGC. I bought myself a stack of comics at Mega Con from the dollar boxes and enjoyed myself much more so than sweating waiting what grade my books would come back as or waiting for the postman to deliver the latest overgraded books from my ebay buys.

[ninanina]

I've always been happy with a nice VF copy of a comic. When you see a slabbed 9.4 sell for $250.00 on e-bay and your able to pick up a raw 8.0 for $20.00 to me it'a a no brainer. Are we experiencing a cycle in the hobby?

 

I've read (somewhere on this forum) VF's lag behind as far as price jumps from year to year while NM's take off. After awhile, hi-grade collectors get tired of the rediculous prices, and start seeing the value in collecting VF's. Sure sounds to me that's what's happening reading this thread.

 

Whatcha' guys think? Too early to tell, or is this maybe just a beginning to rising prices for the VF comic.

[FlComicFan]

Sure collectors have a habit of comparing things value wise If the prices on NM 9.0 and up Silver Age and 9.4 and up Bronze hold up I expect VF to experience a lot of pressure from those who were pushed out of collecting the NM books. The collectors who had a dream of filling a run in NM will have a choice of either stopping where they are, getting out and quitting or settling for lower grades to complete their collections. I had a goal of completing most titles from the 1970's early 1980's That was the era I read as a kid and I wanted them back but in NM. In my zest for getting the best perfect NM copy I lost sight of the fun just from kicking back and reading a stack of books or better yet a run of a title. So now I own partial runs of dozens of titles in super high grades. My plan likely is I will keep what I have longterm as an ïnvestment" or until I tire of them sitting unloved in their mylars and buy reading copies to enjoy from now on.

[LucyBop]

Cats... I don't know what will happen in the future, but some of things I read here have been debated in the coin world for many years...

 

 

Slabb'd coins bring way ore money then raw, and the na-sayers for years and years have been predicting the fall of the market, everybody that buys plastic will lose, etc.

 

Hasn't happened, and the high prices have relatively remained with some gainers and a few values that have gone down as pops increase...

 

Correct me if I'm wrong but CGC really doesn't have any competition.... Unlike Coin Grading where there are many grading companys.....

 

And the Registry will keep values high and make the top grades even more valuable....

 

and as new sets are entered into the registry, move people will become involved, and more will buy, prices for high graded CGC books will rise....

 

I believe the time is here to submit those books, keep what you want for your personal collections, sell of others and cash in on the upcoming registry madness...

 

This is my opinion, time will tell..

 

Lucille

[joe_collector]

Slabb'd coins bring way ore money then raw, and the na-sayers for years and years have been predicting the fall of the market, everybody that buys plastic will lose, etc.

 

Hasn't happened

 

 

I assume coin collectors I know, who lost a bundle during the initial boom/bust period, are mistaken?

[LucyBop]

yeah, i assume so...

[joe_collector]

yeah, i assume so...

 

How long have you been seriously collecting slabbed coins?

 

The "slabbed coin crash" is not fiction, and we've had other long-term, serious coin collectors post their opinions on why it happened. So I'm really wondering what angle you're coming from.

 

Revisionist history, or you simply came to the show a bit late?

[joe_collector]

For the uninitiated, here's a market report that sums up the Boom/Bust graded coin market of the 1990's, which eerily follows the comic book pattern:

 

"In 1986, in the midst of a dead and dying coin market full of collector resentment came PCGS and NGC. They took it upon themselves to save the coin market once and for all. Now a coin would be encapsulated with a grade. To gain acceptance of the holders, and to give dealers a reason to keep the coins in the holders, a market was developed to give value to the “Slabs” over uncertified (or “Raw”) coins. A “Sight unseen” market was devised by the principles of PCGS and others. Dealers would post bids for slabs and be required to buy them on demand. A firm value was given to slabs based on this market. It must be remembered that the sole reason for starting the sight unseen market was to give slabs added value over raw coins.Submissions poured in.

 

Within a year, most dealers were on the slab bandwagon. PCGS and NGC were grading very tight. Coins which sold as MS-67 in 1979 were getting grades like MS-63 or MS-64. A coveted MS-65 was a real rarity in any series. Excitement filled the bourse floors once again. Sure, anyone who bought coins between 1978 and 1982 saw the grades of their coins go down 2 to 3 points, but hey, this was the new era. It’s was all starting fresh!

 

The coin market of the 1990’s.

 

New market forces were felt with slabs. The sight unseen bidders leap-frogged each other in an attempt to be the buyer of the coins being graded. Bid prices soared to unimaginable, and unsustainable highs. As the prices went higher and higher by nothing more than dealer speculation, a “bubble” market was created. As with any bubble market, the end was quick and unpredictable. By August 1990, coin sales had dried up and coin prices were in a free-fall.

 

No dealer wants to buy in a declining market. What caused the crash? Loans on coins. Shaky business practices. Overextended auction credit. Collector markets drying up. Hoards of Silver Dollars being graded - more than anyone could sell at $600 for MS-65’s."

[LucyBop]

I've been collecting since i was 8 years old......

 

slab's...

 

seriously for the past 4 years, but i did start in the early 90s with slabs...

 

 

so if your talking the 80s, your then correct....

 

so its not for me to say then, whom may have lost out......

 

there was a coin price crash in the late 80s if memory serves me right..

 

but it hit everything, and raw coins were most popular then... in my experience...

 

there has been mucho specualtion of slab'd coin collectors losing... for say the last 4 years...

 

it may still happen...... I don't see it happening though...

[Aman619]

boy, its really depressing hear most of you "giving up" on your comics collecting quests. Is this the final legacy of CGC-mania? The HG-chase burnout? It seems to me the issue here revolves those of you who set out to complete runs in 9.4 and up (depending on the era). So many tried at once that prices for commons shot upward and made the task ridiculously expensive. So maybe if all of you cool it, prices will come back to earth. Ive had a problem all along with paying $200 bucks each for books that were very recently $30 books---not to mention $80 books for $1000!

[delekkerste]

I've been collecting since i was 8 years old......

 

slab's...

 

seriously for the past 4 years, but i did start in the early 90s with slabs...

 

 

so if your talking the 80s, your then correct....

 

so its not for me to say then, whom may have lost out......

 

there was a coin price crash in the late 80s if memory serves me right..

 

but it hit everything, and raw coins were most popular then... in my experience...

 

there has been mucho specualtion of slab'd coin collectors losing... for say the last 4 years...

 

it may still happen...... I don't see it happening though...

 

[ninanina]

I've been collecting since i was 8 years old......

 

slab's...

 

seriously for the past 4 years, but i did start in the early 90s with slabs...

 

 

so if your talking the 80s, your then correct....

 

so its not for me to say then, whom may have lost out......

 

there was a coin price crash in the late 80s if memory serves me right..

 

but it hit everything, and raw coins were most popular then... in my experience...

 

there has been mucho specualtion of slab'd coin collectors losing... for say the last 4 years...

 

it may still happen...... I don't see it happening though...

 

 

Sooo....where are comic books right now on that graph?

[LucyBop]

that particular graph didn't effect me...

 

i was buying coins that didn't have high values to begin with... so heres where I didn't notice/feel prices plummet...

 

 

that graph doesn't sepcifiy what type of data we are looking at.

 

is it suggestng this for the entire market?

 

for a particular series?

 

in Franklin halves as I was building my Registry set about 1 year ago, prices were strong, and as pops increased they have cooled off some...

 

but no crash yet...

[LucyBop]

and the poitn I was making, let me make it real clear for people because i may have not been clear before,

 

is the CGC registry may increase values and create a market and attract many new players.....

 

just as the coin registrys have....

 

no price crash has occured since the advent of the registrys......

[delekkerste]

Sooo....where are comic books right now on that graph?

 

Trust me, you're better off not knowing. But let's just say that I think you're going to be off on your Hulk #181 prediction.

 

Gene

[joe_collector]

there was a coin price crash in the late 80s if memory serves me right..

 

but it hit everything, and raw coins were most popular then... in my experience...

 

Okay, we're in a CGC forum, talking about high-grade comics right?

 

Slabbed coins started in 1986, heated up, and by 1991 proceeded to crash and burn.

 

CGC started in 2000, prices have heated up, and.....

 

I'm not saying that there will definitely be a crash, only that 2004's graded coin collecting is almost 20 years ahead of where graded comics are right now, and not even close to a comparison point.

 

And oh yeah, the early boom/bust for graded coins was BAD, real bad.

[joe_collector]

but no crash yet...

 

Grain of sale people, grain of salt.

[LucyBop]

joe collector i don't know if your trying to engage me in anything other then a civil discussion?

 

are you?

 

your grain of salt remark should also be taken with a grain of salt..

 

 

I enjoy Collecting period....

 

I like the idea of professionally graded books...

 

I think CGC is good....

 

sure there is the potiential of a crash in any collectible market, stock markets, the US dollar........

 

one crah i do remember and got stung by was the silver run up by the Hunt brothers.....

 

I've still got some silver that i bought at 20 bucks a ounce.

[joe_collector]

boy, its really depressing hear most of you "giving up" on your comics collecting quests. Is this the final legacy of CGC-mania? The HG-chase burnout?

 

Nope, but in any "new market" there is always a bit of madness, along with the mistaken impression you are buying a "bulletproof collectible" that is in high demand.

 

Everyone takes their own time quantifying perception vs. reality, along with understanding many of these "high prices" are the result of speculation. At that point, nature usually takes it course.