What is the weirdest encounter you have had to buy books?

[Gatchaman]

Last year Craig's List listed a yard sale in Olympia that had comic books. We went and they guy selling the books didn't even have them ready. There were a couple more guys there and they all looked like they just woke up from an all night bender. The guy with the comics had a box full that he was going through one at a time trying to decide which ones to sell and which ones to keep. In, like, 10 minutes he only put out 2 comics. I got tired of waiting and told him how I felt about what he was doing and he told that I could then go to the local store and pay more than he was charging.

 

[Gatchaman]

I went to another sale that listed comic books and it was like 6 comics in a shoe box.

 

The greatest one that I hate the most are the ones that list on CL that they are having a yard sale that has comic books and you drive over 20 or more miles to get there first only to find they had sold them last night or before and they didn't take the time to remove that from the listing and then go as far a acting like no harm done.

[ebtorres]

I once went in a cbs and the whole time I was browsing, Gary Busey was following me around staring at me. Awkward...

[chrisco37]

Answered a Craiglist ad (how many posts start this way? ) for a semi-local guy selling books. He lived in a neighboring town that is pretty affluent, but when I got to his street it was a kind of sketchy dead end street and as GPS took me down it I saw this one house I was saying "please don't be that house, please don't be that house,...." and yeah, it was THAT house.

 

He met me out front and walked me around back and opened up one of those storm cellars and said "come on down, the comics are down here" and disappeared.

 

So as I stood there for a second and decided what to do, I finally just said "Huh, so this is how I die," and walked down.

Nicest guy. Spent like 45 minutes down there. Bought a 1/2 box of books from him for like $20... easily $150-$200 worth of stuff.

 

But the story is worth WAY more than the books!

 

The bolded part made me laugh.

[AJD]

I was trolling through Australian comics on eBay one day and saw a totally clueless listing of early Phantom comics (probably the most sought after of all Australian comics). I was thinking of a flip and contacted the seller as she (as I later discovered) mentioned she had lots of Australian comics to list when she got time. We got emailing, and I found she had 'lots of Disneys with odd prices' - almost certainly pre-decimal (before 1966) copies I surmised. Early Australian Disneys are pretty collectable too.

 

Anyway, I helped her out by pointing her to an online grading guide and a Phantom price guide. In return, she offered to sell me the box full of Disneys provided I met her to pick them up. So... I found myself meeting her in a carpark outside the Safeway in the rattiest part of an already ratty nearby town. She had two young kids with her and it was well over 100 degrees F. The kids were heat distressed and she - rightly - wanted to get them home ASAP. I gave the kids some water I had in the car and had a quick rifle through the box - thirty seconds tops. The comics were flat in the box and it was a tightish fit, so I had no real idea what was in the bottom half. The top half was mostly 1960s Disneys in VG to Fine shape, mostly $5-10 books.

 

She wanted $300 for the lot, and I estimated that there were 50-60 comics in there. The kids were looking unwell so I took a deep breath, handed over $300 and more water and crossed my fingers. They were out of there in a shot.

 

When I got home, I took the books out. They got older and in better shape (!) as they went. I guess the kids had pulled out a few and treated them roughly then lost interest before they got down into the stack. I pulled out $400 worth for my collection (five or six books), sold the best of the rest on eBay for another $450 and sold the remaining 35 books as a bulk lot for $300.

 

OK, not the Mile High collection, but a pretty good outcome. I emailed her a few days later and asked about the kids. Verbatim reply: 'Oh, their allright, their just whingers'.

 

[Count Zero]

I once went in a cbs and the whole time I was browsing, Gary Busey was following me around staring at me. Awkward...

[1Cool]

Answered a Craiglist ad (how many posts start this way? ) for a semi-local guy selling books. He lived in a neighboring town that is pretty affluent, but when I got to his street it was a kind of sketchy dead end street and as GPS took me down it I saw this one house I was saying "please don't be that house, please don't be that house,...." and yeah, it was THAT house.

 

He met me out front and walked me around back and opened up one of those storm cellars and said "come on down, the comics are down here" and disappeared.

 

So as I stood there for a second and decided what to do, I finally just said "Huh, so this is how I die," and walked down.

Nicest guy. Spent like 45 minutes down there. Bought a 1/2 box of books from him for like $20... easily $150-$200 worth of stuff.

 

But the story is worth WAY more than the books!

 

The bolded part made me laugh.

 

I've had a couple of these moments when you just mentally recorded the surroundings since this could be the last thing you see. The last time I met someone in an ok neighborhood I left the money hidden in the car and called my wife before and after I left the place. Good times.

[mrwoogieman]

There was the time I looked over an old EC collection. The fat old man owner sat shirtless next to me at the kitchen table as I checked over the books. Man was his back hairy!

 

[Quicksilver Signs]

My weirdest was an ad on kijiji selling 32 boxes of 1940's comics, listed in the ad were an insane amount of DC & Timely awesomeness. The ad was a big hoax strung along for a few days by someone who thought comic dealers were lowest of the low.

 

This person went so far as to create 2 email accounts to communicate with the drooling collectors/dealers. This was back in January or Feb of last year, I posted about it on the boards here, much debated.

[Robot Man]

I don't know if this was weird but it sure was unforgettable...

 

Many years ago before Craigslist or computers in order to get books you either placed an ad in the local paper or what I did. Place a wanted to buy notice on the bulletin board of the local supermarket.

 

I got a call from a woman who wanted to sell her son's comics. We agreed upon a day and time and I went over. She told me they were out in the garage.

 

The garage was kind of old and a bit rickity but in we went. The collection wasn't super old at the time but consisted of books from about 1955-1965 probably a couple hundred. She told me that they belonged to her son who was killed in Vietnam and had been there since he left. We struck a very fair deal and I gave her my condoleces and assured that I would give them a good home.

 

While in the garage I noticed what appeared to be a sports car covered by a cover. I asked her about it and she said it was her son's pride and joy. I asked her if I could see it and she pulled off the cover. It was an early '60's Ferrari. I about wet my 17 year old pants! I asked her if I could buy it and she said no that it ment so much to him that she wanted to keep it. She was a very nice lady and I did understand, but I knew when to back off.

 

I still think about it and wonder what ever happened to it...

 

 

[1Cool]

I don't know if this was weird but it sure was unforgettable...

 

Many years ago before Craigslist or computers in order to get books you either placed an ad in the local paper or what I did. Place a wanted to buy notice on the bulletin board of the local supermarket.

 

I got a call from a woman who wanted to sell her son's comics. We agreed upon a day and time and I went over. She told me they were out in the garage.

 

The garage was kind of old and a bit rickity but in we went. The collection wasn't super old at the time but consisted of books from about 1955-1965 probably a couple hundred. She told me that they belonged to her son who was killed in Vietnam and had been there since he left. We struck a very fair deal and I gave her my condoleces and assured that I would give them a good home.

 

While in the garage I noticed what appeared to be a sports car covered by a cover. I asked her about it and she said it was her son's pride and joy. I asked her if I could see it and she pulled off the cover. It was an early '60's Ferrari. I about wet my 17 year old pants! I asked her if I could buy it and she said no that it ment so much to him that she wanted to keep it. She was a very nice lady and I did understand, but I knew when to back off.

 

I still think about it and wonder what ever happened to it...

 

Very similar story. Close to a decade ago I buy a stack of books from a guy and we decide to do the deal at the gym since we both go to the same gym. A older lady sees the comics and says she has boxes full of old books (10 centers). The guy I'm buying the books from is still sitting there and he offers to go see the collection if I don't want it. We both end up going right over together to go see this mega collection.

 

Ends up being 5 or 6 long boxes of 90s drek. I must have missed all the 10 cent books. On the way out she says she has a car for sale also. Takes us to the garage and pulls a tarp off a black 1979 smoky and the bandit Pontiac Trams AM. T-tops - red flaming bird - beautiful car. She wants $3,000 for it since the underside is completely rusted. The other guy and I decide to split the cost and flip it for double ASAP. I show up a day later with my cash and the other guys wife made him not buy his half. I ran to the bank and got his half and rode home in style. I ended up flipping it for $6,200 in a couple weeks. You never know what you will find when you go to see a collection.

[Robot Man]

Another story from long ago.

 

Ran a newspaper ad and I guy called me up saying he had tons of old comics. I went over to his house and went in a dark dirty garage. There were piles of magazines, books, photos ect. (Literally the whole garage full). He pointed me to the comics. I was heavily into EC's at the time and he showed me full runs! He wanted to sell them by whole run. Of course being young, I didn't have that kind of money so I talked him into selling me just the whole run of annuals for $100. (all the money I had). He also threw in the run of Piracy & the 2 3D issues because I had shown an interest in them. I remember a ton of early GA stuff too but I really wanted the EC's. I had to put back a nice Submariner #1 for $40 because I just had no more money.

 

I asked if I could come back in a month or so when I saved up some more money and he said sure. A couple months later, I had as much cash as I could drag up or borrow and I called him. No answer for a couple of days so I decided to go over. I got there and no one answered the door. I looked in the window and the place was empty. I went out to the garage and looked in the window and it was cleaned out! Now this garage was PACKED!. Where did it all go so fast?

 

Annother one I think about that got away...

[october]

Went over to a guy's house one morning to buy stuff, around 9:00 am. His wife answers the door and she is completely smashed. He and I looked through his comics while she babbled to us for awhile, then started slamming Bud Lights in the back yard and passed out on a lawnchair. Really nice guy, but pretty awkward situation.

[ttfitz]

Another story from long ago.

 

Ran a newspaper ad and I guy called me up saying he had tons of old comics. I went over to his house and went in a dark dirty garage. There were piles of magazines, books, photos ect. (Literally the whole garage full). He pointed me to the comics. I was heavily into EC's at the time and he showed me full runs! He wanted to sell them by whole run. Of course being young, I didn't have that kind of money so I talked him into selling me just the whole run of annuals for $100. (all the money I had). He also threw in the run of Piracy & the 2 3D issues because I had shown an interest in them. I remember a ton of early GA stuff too but I really wanted the EC's. I had to put back a nice Submariner #1 for $40 because I just had no more money.

 

I asked if I could come back in a month or so when I saved up some more money and he said sure. A couple months later, I had as much cash as I could drag up or borrow and I called him. No answer for a couple of days so I decided to go over. I got there and no one answered the door. I looked in the window and the place was empty. I went out to the garage and looked in the window and it was cleaned out! Now this garage was PACKED!. Where did it all go so fast?

 

Annother one I think about that got away...

 

You left out the part where you went by the local police station and they told you that house had been abandoned for 20 years, since the collector guy who owned the place died in a traffic accident.

 

Do di do do, do di do do....

[kav]

Then the stories from the books...started happening to him.....

[Doohickamabob]

I love these stories... I have nothing that compares.

 

One annoying situation from recent memory was an older dude who replied to one of my ads by saying he had a few boxes of old comics. I talked to him on the phone and tried to get more information out of him, and he was vague.

 

I asked the cover price and he said "10 cents," so that was a good start. I asked if he could mention any titles, and he said they were in some boxes and his phone wasn't near them (I guess he was using a landline), and he had health issues, so could I just come over to look at them? Argh, fine. I got directions and drove many miles to his apartment, met him outside and walked up several flights of stairs behind a man who was clearly pretty ill and wearing only a stained T-shirt, shorts, a robe, and sandals over his socks.

 

We get to his apartment and he says, "there are the comics," and he gestures to a couple of small boxes that are mostly normal books (Tom Clancy type stuff), with a slim area of one box that are some low-value, low-condition western pulps. I say, "Where are the comics?" and he points to the pulps. Then he asks, "Aren't those comics? They say 10 cents."

[zuulioso]

Found a big collection on Craigslist a few years back out in West Virginia. I emailed the guy, then spoke to him on the phone for a bit. He was clearly an older gentleman. He claimed to have a lot of books. I can't remember how many but it had to be 40-50 long boxes. Initially I think he said wanted $8k for it but getting any real useful information out of him of what was in the collection was difficult. I would get answers like "Oh there are a bunch of Avengers. I have a 10 here and a whole bunch of others." The best I could ascertain was that it seemed like a good portion of the collection was silver.

 

So, I took the three hour drive out into the sticks. It was a beautiful drive and when I arrived at the super tiny shack in the middle of nowhere I was both scared and excited. I thought maybe it could be a score! The man came out and he was easily in his late 60s to early 70s and was super nice.

 

I went into the house and it was all comics. Boxes in every single room all over the place. I was too excited to ask why or how they were even there. To this day I really wonder about it but I went through them and though there were no major keys it was a solid collection. Lots of really nice early silver, bronze, and copper books.

 

The problem was he wanted to look up every single book I showed interest in online. I think he was using newkadia as a price source. It didn't go well. At one point as I was browsing he decided he wanted to show me his rifle. Pulled it out, emptied the bullets from it, and handed it to me. Uh... neat. Thanks?

 

He told me stories of how he was trying to raise money to bring his future bride over from somewhere overseas. He showed me a picture and she was like 28. Ha! He also served me chili. It was really a strange experience. He was truly harmless but still the whole scenario made me uneasy.

 

When it came to negotiations I already knew there was no way that I could buy the whole collection because he had retracted on the initial value and said they were worth way more. In the end I got maybe $800 of books for $500. Not what I wanted but I got some great books for my collection and in the end we both walked away feeling like we got ripped off. I think he did better than I did!

 

Sorry for the wall of text.

 

 

[Doohickamabob]

This sounds like a wonderful premise for a sit-com: The old hayseed with the comics collection he doesn't really understand, the city slicker whippersnapper comics fan looking for a score, and the zesty Russian bride who move in together leading to all sorts of wacky comic hijinx.....and romance?

[ThreeSeas]

Not really much of a story, but..

 

A few years ago I answered a Criagslist ad to buy some some Archie digests. I got the guys house and as we were talking this little old lady comes out using her walker, inching along. He pointed to her and told me "Ma's my backup, in case someone tries to rob me". I had my young kids in the car and said "they're my backup". We both chuckled. Nice guy and mom.

 

I picked up a little over 400 digests for $100, so not a bad deal as this filed a big hole in my digest collection and he was happy to be rid of them.

[ttfitz]

The problem was he wanted to look up every single book I showed interest in online. I think he was using newkadia as a price source.

 

Yeah, they list current Overstreet prices on their website, so they are a good source if you want to know what Guide is for something.