Are prices still climbing or have they eased up a bit??? 43 43

[DC#]

Given how soft many FF books have been of late  - this one really over-performed 

 

[mjoeyoung]

On 1/29/2024 at 10:01 PM, DC# said:

Given how soft many FF books have been of late  - this one really over-performed 

On 1/29/2024 at 10:01 PM, DC# said:

I was going to post this anomaly as well.  Again, this looks like someone trying to prop up prices.  Last three sales in grade were  $12.5K, ~$16K and $15K.  Last time it sold for this price was Sept 2022.  A 5.0 sold for $22.5K THIS January.  A 3.0 sold for $13K this January along with a 2.5 for only $10K.  Why $24K?  Why not $36K like in May of 2022?  It would make as much sense.

[blazingbob]

Who is the "someone"?  I can say that someone is causing the drop in prices by selling Ugly copies.

Edited January 30 by blazingbob

[Stefan_W]

On 1/30/2024 at 10:46 AM, mjoeyoung said:

I was going to post this anomaly as well.  Again, this looks like someone trying to prop up prices.  Last three sales in grade were  $12.5K, ~$16K and $15K.  Last time it sold for this price was Sept 2022.  A 5.0 sold for $22.5K THIS January.  A 3.0 sold for $13K this January along with a 2.5 for only $10K.  Why $24K?  Why not $36K like in May of 2022?  It would make as much sense.

Maybe, but it is also a really nice looking 3.5 that presents a couple of points higher. This is the exact type of book that will go over GPA. 

[jimjum12]

On 1/30/2024 at 10:53 AM, blazingbob said:

Who is the "someone"?  I can say that someone is causing the drop in prices by selling Ugly copies.

I notice that too, about ugly copies. That 3.5 has exceptional QP and the color is rich. FF1's with that level of eye appeal usually do multiples of FMV. People who don't dig the FF, and there are MANY who still do, aren't going to pay attention to that sort of thing. That's the trouble with studies heavily based on numbers. GOD BLESS ... 

-jimbo(a friend of jesus)

[mjoeyoung]

On 1/30/2024 at 8:53 AM, blazingbob said:

Who is the "someone"?  I can say that someone is causing the drop in prices by selling Ugly copies.

The auction house for one.

On 1/30/2024 at 9:33 AM, Stefan_W said:

Maybe, but it is also a really nice looking 3.5 that presents a couple of points higher. This is the exact type of book that will go over GPA. 

It has nice color for a 3.5, and if this had sold for a few thousand over GPA, it would make sense.  Does it have nicer color that the last SIX 5.0s it sold for more than?  Structurally, the lower half has lots of problems, nevermind the water stains at the top.

[1Cool]

On 1/30/2024 at 11:33 AM, Stefan_W said:

Maybe, but it is also a really nice looking 3.5 that presents a couple of points higher. This is the exact type of book that will go over GPA. 

There are three CGC 3.5 up right now on E-Bay for between $20,000 (2 copies) and a $22,900.  The Heritage copy has slightly better page quality but I think the $20,000 copy sitting in an old design case is looking pretty nice.  Auctions can be strange with strange outcomes but since all 3 copies currently up on E-Bay take offer and I'd expect them to take a decent discount the $24,000 plus 20% buyers premium seems a tad strange.

[DC#]

This 3.0 sold on Elite for something under the $12.2K (Direct offer accepted) which is in the zone of the 3.0 that sold on Heritage in early Jan.     The 3.5 Heritage is definitely not the best low grade I have seen and is arguably a bit worse than the 3.0 Elite.   I agree with @mjoeyoung - doubling the GPA recents seems like a real outlier.    The third photo is the CGC scan of the Elite book

 

 

 

 

Edited January 30 by DC#

[Tom789]

This is a very low price for an ASM 238, about $500 lower than the most recent lowest, according to GoCollect.  But I think it's also a gift 9.8, with at least 2 spine ticks and a corner crease.  Reholder scam possibility?

The Amazing Spider-Man #238 (Marvel, 1983) CGC NM/MT 9.8 White | Lot #19908 | Heritage Auctions (ha.com)

 

[Stefan_W]

On 1/30/2024 at 7:15 PM, Tom789 said:

This is a very low price for an ASM 238, about $500 lower than the most recent lowest, according to GoCollect.  But I think it's also a gift 9.8, with at least 2 spine ticks and a corner crease.  Reholder scam possibility?

The Amazing Spider-Man #238 (Marvel, 1983) CGC NM/MT 9.8 White | Lot #19908 | Heritage Auctions (ha.com)

 

I don't know one way or another whether it is a part of a scam, but my 9.6 copy is better and my 9.4 copy is roughly level with that one. If it is legit I agree the grade was a gift. 

[mjoeyoung]

On 1/30/2024 at 6:02 PM, Stefan_W said:

I don't know one way or another whether it is a part of a scam, but my 9.6 copy is better and my 9.4 copy is roughly level with that one. If it is legit I agree the grade was a gift. 

Who's grading the graders?

[Stefan_W]

I just checked the grader notes on the ASM 238 that just sold on Heritage and they say "very light spine stress lines breaks color", so I think we can rule out foul play with this one. 

[MAR1979]

On 1/30/2024 at 9:55 PM, Stefan_W said:

I just checked the grader notes on the ASM 238 that just sold on Heritage and they say "very light spine stress lines breaks color", so I think we can rule out foul play with this one. 

Simply Pure incompetence

[DC#]

On 1/30/2024 at 6:55 PM, Stefan_W said:

I just checked the grader notes on the ASM 238 that just sold on Heritage and they say "very light spine stress lines breaks color", so I think we can rule out foul play with this one. 

Plus you aren’t re-holdering and keeping the Greenwich Collection sticker (post grading application).  
 

A lot of these Greenwich books have been coming thru Heritage over the past few months 

https://www.cgccomics.com/news/article/11931/greenwich-spiderman-poison-ivy-batman/

 

Edited January 31 by DC#

[SeniorSurfer]

On 1/30/2024 at 1:47 PM, DC# said:

This 3.0 sold on Elite for something under the $12.2K (Direct offer accepted) which is in the zone of the 3.0 that sold on Heritage in early Jan.     The 3.5 Heritage is definitely not the best low grade I have seen and is arguably a bit worse than the 3.0 Elite.   I agree with @mjoeyoung - doubling the GPA recents seems like a real outlier.    The third photo is the CGC scan of the Elite book

 

 

 

 

And for more comparison, here's the 3.5 with water damage that sold 1/22 on CL for $12,027:   Good colors (or at least a good scanner) but that water damage, along with the usual problems found in that grade, might make you go for the lesser grade with better eye appeal.  Classic case of "Buy the book.."  etc.  

 

[DC#]

To the question of whether the current holder scam would impact value of books like ASM 194, 238, and 300 - the 238 results noted above might be just about the book itself.    The 300 9.8 closed right in line with recent sales and above 90 day at $3360 and the 194 9.8 Newsstand ended bit higher than recent sales at $2880.  

[jimjum12]

On 1/31/2024 at 7:44 AM, SeniorSurfer said:

And for more comparison, here's the 3.5 with water damage that sold 1/22 on CL for $12,027:   Good colors (or at least a good scanner) but that water damage, along with the usual problems found in that grade, might make you go for the lesser grade with better eye appeal.  Classic case of "Buy the book.."  etc.  

 

CGC does a fine job, but sometimes I may disagree. The above is one case. I would feel guilty giving that book a 3.0 ... however, it does look like it would be upper mid grade without the water saturation. That's a tough call. Still, that water stain is FUGLY. GOD BLESS ... 

-jimbo(a friend of jesus)

Edited January 31 by jimjum12

[Stefan_W]

Hi folks, I mentioned earlier in this thread that I track my selling on Ebay carefully and things seemed down this year, but it was too early to draw any conclusions yet. Now that we are at the end of Jan I can provide a better look at selling so far in 2024 compared to early 2023. Please note that these are all lower end slabs that fall in the 75-300 range in general. 

Books sold:

2020-2021-2022 were all off the charts in selling so I am not including them in this breakdown. I basically hit the 10k mark in sales (which is when I stop using Ebay for the year) by late Jan and early Feb. I was selling books as fast as I could pack them up.

I felt the market drop in 2023 when I only sold 30 slabs on Ebay and 2 in local direct sales over the course of January. I did not end up hitting my selling goals until April. 

In Jan 2024 I only made 17 sales on Ebay but local sales picked up and I had about a dozen there. So while the number of sold books did not drop overall, the way I was selling them started to really shift back to where it was in pre-pandemic days. 

Prices:

The books from year to year were of similar quality, but I really noticed how much I had to mark down slabs from last year to this year. A lot of moderns lost 50% or more than their value over the past 12 months. I think this is why more local buyers were willing to open up their wallets - books are cheap now, and even cheaper in direct sales. 

Overall, the books I sold went for 27% less on average compared to last year - but this figure does not tell the whole story. People on Ebay gravitated to books that held their value a bit better than the others, and the overall price drops in listings was about double that when you take all the books I listed for sale into account.

Timing of Sales:

While sales were fairly consistent across Jan 2023, Jan 2024 was very sluggish at the start and has only started to pick up in the last couple of weeks. It is possible that the impact of the scam was that people shied away from buying for a little while and then largely forgot about it a couple of weeks later (this tracks with general human behavior), but there is really no way of knowing. 

Summary:

The market on lower end books, including mostly lower end post-1975 books, dropped a lot in Jan 2023 and continued to drop in 2024 although not as sharply. The positive side is that people are willing to open up their wallets again in local sales, which was something that did not happen as much at the height of the comic boom. The current market seems to be picking up again slightly so we will see if it catches up to 2023 levels. 

Thanks for reading. I hope this is all helpful to someone out there. 

Edited January 31 by Stefan_W

[DC#]

updated index for those interested.    I stopped doing my “Dow 30” analysis as this started becoming available as the tale was more or less the same.
 

 

 

[PopKulture]

On 2/8/2024 at 8:03 AM, DC# said:

updated index for those interested.    I stopped doing my “Dow 30” analysis as this started becoming available as the tale was more or less the same.
 

 

 

Is this your channel? Or just a similar approach?