Tips On Going Through Magic Cards?

[Lazyboy]

Klozd24/7 (Brad) is an expert on Magic. Look him up.

 

So am I. I have sold thousands of cards from my home and over the past 4 years have probably made around $10,000 from them and none of them were moxes or the Lotus.

 

I sell about $10K a week, but my advise was considered !

Mike, you have a store, and told him to just take them and sell them to a store.

 

The other part of your post about him having no chance to properly value the (whole) collection by himself was good and true, but selling any big money cards for maybe 60% of their value (to anybody but me ) is

 

Plus, stores certainly won't offer any less for sorted collections.

[mikephoen]

Klozd24/7 (Brad) is an expert on Magic. Look him up.

 

So am I. I have sold thousands of cards from my home and over the past 4 years have probably made around $10,000 from them and none of them were moxes or the Lotus.

 

I sell about $10K a week, but my advise was considered !

Mike, you have a store, and told him to just take them and sell them to a store.

 

The other part of your post about him having no chance to properly value the (whole) collection by himself was good and true, but selling any big money cards for maybe 60% of their value (to anybody but me ) is

 

Plus, stores certainly won't offer any less for sorted collections.

 

Stores may pay less for the really big stuff, but its highly highly unlikely that this collection has any true high end stuff. It was given away after all. Even in the very early days people knew their P9 stuff was valuable.

 

We pay 75% of our sell price for the really big stuff, which is at most 10% less than you could net yourself if you have a good ebay account. I would be willing to bet there is at least one store in the Bay area that pays a comparable price.

 

Most likely this collection is going to have a lot of cards that stores will pay 25cents to $2 for, which a non-store could never ebay effectively. An actual experienced traded might be able to get better value by parting it out and trading at FNM for the next year, but for the inexperienced, it would be a big waste of time. If the OP values their time at $0, then have at the sorting exercise.

 

I have a number of customers who follow up every kijji lead and buy from the 'savvy' kijji expert who isn't going to get 'ripped off' by the stores, and then bring the stuff to me for cash.

 

At the very least a store could tell the OP if the collection is even worth sorting, or if it should just go in the recycling.

[thirdgreenham]

Pov, just be careful not to tap the Prodigal Sorcerer.

[mikephoen]

Pov, just be careful not to tap the Prodigal Sorcerer.

 

Every time you Twiddle your Bone Flute, god kills a kitten.

[Gatchaman]

Klozd24/7 (Brad) is an expert on Magic. Look him up.

 

So am I. I have sold thousands of cards from my home and over the past 4 years have probably made around $10,000 from them and none of them were moxes or the Lotus.

 

I sell about $10K a week, but my advise was considered !

Mike, you have a store, and told him to just take them and sell them to a store.

 

The other part of your post about him having no chance to properly value the (whole) collection by himself was good and true, but selling any big money cards for maybe 60% of their value (to anybody but me ) is

 

Plus, stores certainly won't offer any less for sorted collections.

 

The best way I learned about magic cards and their values was to go through them. You will bet familiar with them and learn of their values.

 

You can't buy and sell magic cards like you do comic books. Just because they are old doesn't mean they are worth money either. The player base and supply and demand are what drives the price for these cards. I have seen cards jump from 50 cents to $20 over night and some drop in price because they phase out of a playing tier. There are multiple playing tiers for the cards and those who play the tiers set the prices by how many people are looking for the cards for the decks they play. So, there are a lot of cards that have $5-$150 that are constant sellers and will always maintain their values because of the playability. They sell fast.

 

It is foolish to take your cards to a store. Most of them, if they choose to buy them, will offer 1/2 cent for common and commons and 20 cents for bulk rares. I use to own a gaming store. I had a gentleman that sold me a collection go around the Seattle area to local stores that said they tried to offer him very little and even one store try to steal some of the cards from him.

 

There are a lot of people who know that a lot of money can be made from selling these cards and will want to get them cheap from you so they can make money on them. My advice would be to educate yourself and see what is in demand. See what they are worth. Some gaming sites have buy lists that will give you a fair price if you don't know where to unload them.

 

Since I have educated myself I find these cards everywhere and make some good extra money on them. Here is a link of some of the sales I had - Magic Cards sold.

[brendanb438]

My best pickup of the year was near the beginning of it from someone brand new selling on eBay. The guy listed a MINT revised set for $150 shipped BIN and I jumped on it. Found out he had around 92 additional dual lands he wanted to sell that were mostly near mint or mint. He only wanted $17 each for them. This same person sold me unopened Alliance booster boxes also at $50 a pop. All because he was too lazy to list his own auctions on eBay.

 

Also forgot I had this pic still

 

 

Someone came up to me with a small stack of cards asking $30 for it. All I saw was the near mint Underground Sea on top. This was the middle of last year and I said sure. Once I saw what was there I offered to give him more money (didn't have any more cash on me) got his cell # and texted him a couple days later but he never responded.

[Bronty]

wow nice

[brendanb438]

I tried texting and calling the guy multiple times over a 2 week period and he never responded. Was going to give him another $300 which still is a hell of a buy for that stack.

 

One of the oddest buys of this year was a Craigslist ad. Some guy had an ad up looking to sell 5 unopened boxes of Zendikar and he was asking $60 a box. I talked him down to $50 a box if I took them all.

 

Well I meet up with him and give him the cash for the 5 boxes and he is like hey I have another if you want it. I didn't have anymore cash on me and told him that so he said well I have no use for it so here take it. 6 unopened boxes for $250 total. I turned around and started to sell them on eBay at $85 each.

 

About a week later he texts me saying he has 6 more boxes. At this point I am thinking he is screwing with me and tell him I can't really use that many more but I guess I will give $30 each thinking there is no way in hell he would sell at that price and he did. I meet up with him and give him cash for an unopened case of 6 boxes.

[Gatchaman]

My best pickup of the year was near the beginning of it from someone brand new selling on eBay. The guy listed a MINT revised set for $150 shipped BIN and I jumped on it. Found out he had around 92 additional dual lands he wanted to sell that were mostly near mint or mint. He only wanted $17 each for them. This same person sold me unopened Alliance booster boxes also at $50 a pop. All because he was too lazy to list his own auctions on eBay.

 

Also forgot I had this pic still

 

 

Someone came up to me with a small stack of cards asking $30 for it. All I saw was the near mint Underground Sea on top. This was the middle of last year and I said sure. Once I saw what was there I offered to give him more money (didn't have any more cash on me) got his cell # and texted him a couple days later but he never responded.

 

I found 3 force of wills in somebody's 5 cent box. At a yard sale I got 26 revised dual lands for $310.

[DailySuperpower]

One of the oddest buys of this year was a Craigslist ad. Some guy had an ad up looking to sell 5 unopened boxes of Zendikar and he was asking $60 a box. I talked him down to $50 a box if I took them all.

 

Well I meet up with him and give him the cash for the 5 boxes and he is like hey I have another if you want it. I didn't have anymore cash on me and told him that so he said well I have no use for it so here take it. 6 unopened boxes for $250 total. I turned around and started to sell them on eBay at $85 each.

 

About a week later he texts me saying he has 6 more boxes. At this point I am thinking he is screwing with me and tell him I can't really use that many more but I guess I will give $30 each thinking there is no way in hell he would sell at that price and he did. I meet up with him and give him cash for an unopened case of 6 boxes.

 

Sounds like he stole them... just sayin.

[brendanb438]

Just not sure where he would have been stealing cases of Zendikar from after they were already out of rotation / distribution. The more I think about it they probably were.

[mikephoen]

Just not sure where he would have been stealing cases of Zendikar from after they were already out of rotation / distribution. The more I think about it they probably were.

 

He probably works at Walmart or a card store. I generally turn down sealed product in those kind of quantities (unless I know the guy) as it's almost always stolen.

[mikephoen]

My best pickup of the year was near the beginning of it from someone brand new selling on eBay. The guy listed a MINT revised set for $150 shipped BIN and I jumped on it. Found out he had around 92 additional dual lands he wanted to sell that were mostly near mint or mint. He only wanted $17 each for them. This same person sold me unopened Alliance booster boxes also at $50 a pop. All because he was too lazy to list his own auctions on eBay.

 

Also forgot I had this pic still

 

 

Someone came up to me with a small stack of cards asking $30 for it. All I saw was the near mint Underground Sea on top. This was the middle of last year and I said sure. Once I saw what was there I offered to give him more money (didn't have any more cash on me) got his cell # and texted him a couple days later but he never responded.

 

People are so dumb. Depending on the mix of Duals, retail would be in the $7000 to $10,000 range for 92 duals. He could easily get 50-60% of that from the big online dealers, and even more from dealers like me. BTW, if you still have those duals, I'm always buying!

[brendanb438]

My best pickup of the year was near the beginning of it from someone brand new selling on eBay. The guy listed a MINT revised set for $150 shipped BIN and I jumped on it. Found out he had around 92 additional dual lands he wanted to sell that were mostly near mint or mint. He only wanted $17 each for them. This same person sold me unopened Alliance booster boxes also at $50 a pop. All because he was too lazy to list his own auctions on eBay.

 

Also forgot I had this pic still

 

 

Someone came up to me with a small stack of cards asking $30 for it. All I saw was the near mint Underground Sea on top. This was the middle of last year and I said sure. Once I saw what was there I offered to give him more money (didn't have any more cash on me) got his cell # and texted him a couple days later but he never responded.

 

People are so dumb. Depending on the mix of Duals, retail would be in the $7000 to $10,000 range for 92 duals. He could easily get 50-60% of that from the big online dealers, and even more from dealers like me. BTW, if you still have those duals, I'm always buying!

 

I ended up flipping them in playsets on eBay to get the most money out of them possible.

 

I had some really good pics of them but the only pic I can find still is one he sent me was some of them spread out.

 

 

Dang I am upset I can't find my picture I took of them all when I received them. All the duals of blue/x where almost all mint and unplayed.

 

Also forgot I had another solid buy off Craigslist around this time from guy who had a mint Collector's Edition set along with sets of Alliances, Visions, Mirage, Urza's Saga and a mix of around a dozen Duals, 8 Sol Rings and some other random stuff. He wanted $300 for everything.

[thirdgreenham]

 

 

 

There's a bunch of cash.

[Artboy99]

one of my best purchases was from Ebay believe it or not. I was looking for old original legends stuff and found a seller selling rares from packs he was opening. Seems he had a case of legends and opened the boxes and packs and was simply listing the opened stuff on Ebay. His listings stated the rare, and said it would come with the uncommons and commons. He clearly didn't know that some uncommons were valueable, and I bought over a hundred lots. I ended up with a dozen mana drains, 6 underworld dreams, etc and they were beautiful pack mint examples.

He had no clue what he sold until I thanked him via my feedback and listed some of the cards he sold me.

 

Live and learn

[brendanb438]

 

 

 

There's a bunch of cash.

 

 

That group of dual lands helped me jumpstart my really nice Walking Dead comic collection. Crazy how much money is in that picture for just some cards.