Sending in signed books 1 1

[revat]

47 minutes ago, PickleRick1216 said:

I don't want to take over this thread but my interest in this topic is as follows.

I was the second person to get to cherry pick out of a 2000 book estate sale collection. I messaged the estate executor within 5 minutes of her Facebook marketplace posting and because I am active duty military she made an exception and allowed me to come cherry pick a few books (she wanted to sell the books as a lot and soon after I left she sold them for around $5000). She had a full Walking Dead and Watchmen run but I focused on various early less than issue 100 Xmen and a near complete 100-300 run (missing a few keys).

She told me her late brother was a security guard in Tampa and "was Stan Lee and the other guys favorite security guard" during comic conventions in Tampa for the last several decades. As a result many of the books in his collection had unverified signatures. I can't swear on their authenticity because I wasn't there at signing so they deserve a green label. I want to get them slabbed because I am active duty military and I move a lot so the slabs help protect my collection in transit. I was able to buy all of these books between $5-$25 each. After combing through past sales on gocollect it seems that a green label signature seems to cut roughly 25-50% off of fair market value of an equivalent grade blue label although some sold at FMV at the time.

Pics below. Would anyone else have picked up these unverified signature copies for $5, $15 and $25?

The signatures appear to be in the shape of Chris Claremont and Jim Shooter. I have roughly 25 more raws in similar shape that I haven't inventoried and pictured yet.

 

 

1. Yes, pretty reasonable to buy these for $5 to $25 per.

2.  Thanks for recognizing there’s other reasons to slab some of your comics, like preservation in some cases.  To that end, while slabs offer protection, the slabs themselves are heavy and and might break in transit (which admittedly is better than damaging the comic).  So it’s possible that a high quality Mylar sleeve and solid boxes might be just as good (certainly lighter, cheaper, and take up less space than slabs).  Something to consider....

3.  Factor in the practicality of submitting.  If you’re active duty, 4-6 months can be a loooooong time to wait to get your comics back.  A lot can happen in terms of your geography.  You probably are already super cognizant of that, just sayin....

4.  The cost/benefit or preferred profits based on your personal situation.  Example:  If you could sell one of your $10 for $40 today, that’s a 300% profit, $30 gain. But if you got it graded, it would cost you an extra $40 but then you could sell for $100, your profit is now just 100% but you got $20 more of profit.  So you spent $40 to make $20 more.  Is that extra $20 profit worth the time of filling out paperwork, risk of damage, money investment, opportunity cost of tying up your money, risk of bad grade or market fluctuations?  The answer is m:  it depends on you the person.  Note those numbers could be different for every comic and your collection preferences could factor in too.  But that’s how I look at it.

 

good luck 

 

 

[Fisionbomb]

On 5/21/2021 at 8:32 PM, Fisionbomb said:

I have 2 modern fast track unwitnessed signed books SFG at the moment where I requested a universal grade. Both books by my estimation are AT LEAST 9.4 (except for the sig) if not higher. Should only be another week or two and we'll have an answer on how much a signature drops the grade. (Assuming my estimations are correct AND they honor the request) I'll do my best to remember to post the results here.

Books aren't yet in hand, but the grades are in. They DID honor the "please don't grade as qualified" request, both books received universal 9.0 with label text ""Rob Schrab" written on cover in marker".

[Msgarmar]

8 hours ago, Fisionbomb said:

Books aren't yet in hand, but the grades are in. They DID honor the "please don't grade as qualified" request, both books received universal 9.0 with label text ""Rob Schrab" written on cover in marker".

Thanks for sharing - what are your thoughts? Surprised/happy with the grades? 

[Fisionbomb]

10 hours ago, Msgarmar said:

Thanks for sharing - what are your thoughts? Surprised/happy with the grades? 

Well I wasn't entirely sure what expect... I'd prefer higher grades of course, but I think 9.0 is fair. (Assuming these were in fact 9.4+ without the sig) I'm kinda surprised and definitely happy that they honored my request. 

[William-James88]

On 5/19/2021 at 4:31 PM, thehumantorch said:

I'd send any book with an unwitnessed signature to a different company that uses signature experts to determine authenticity.

Sadly, I've yet to see a time where that was worthwhile since that extra validation is costly. I do own a few of those, but that's because I placed a low bid on auctions and won. So I don't mind owning those types of books at all but whoever was at the other end of that transaction lost money.

 

[csaag]

53 minutes ago, William-James88 said:

Sadly, I've yet to see a time where that was worthwhile since that extra validation is costly. I do own a few of those, but that's because I placed a low bid on auctions and won. So I don't mind owning those types of books at all but whoever was at the other end of that transaction lost money.

 

Over the last 2 years I've watched a handful of auctions for Jack Kirby verified books (cause I have one) that have reached several hundred to over a thousand dollars.  I think there's certainly a market - especially for bigger name artists who weren't around when the SS series came to be.    That's about the only real benefit of the service I see

[revat]

22 minutes ago, csaag said:

Over the last 2 years I've watched a handful of auctions for Jack Kirby verified books (cause I have one) that have reached several hundred to over a thousand dollars.  I think there's certainly a market - especially for bigger name artists who weren't around when the SS series came to be.    That's about the only real benefit of the service I see

Agreed.  It depends on the book and the condition and the signer of course, but there are definitely plenty of situations where it makes sense, although many many more where it doesn’t make sense.

 

[William-James88]

1 hour ago, csaag said:

Over the last 2 years I've watched a handful of auctions for Jack Kirby verified books (cause I have one) that have reached several hundred to over a thousand dollars.  I think there's certainly a market - especially for bigger name artists who weren't around when the SS series came to be.    That's about the only real benefit of the service I see

I was referring to books that you can have a comparable SS yellow label to, since the discussion here was about Donny Crates. I thought of editing my post to make that clear but felt it would be obvious. Though I do still wonder if any of those Kirby Signed books would have made much less money either sold raw or in a blue or green CGC holder.  Is that what your several hundreds to a 1000$ comment was referring to? Like how much more people get for sending it to cbcs?

Edited June 22, 2021 by William-James88

[csaag]

3 minutes ago, William-James88 said:

I was referring to books that you can have a comparable SS yellow label to, since the discussion here was about Donny Crates. I thought of editing my post to make that clear but felt it would be obvious. Though I do still wonder if any of those Kirby Signed books would have made much less money either sold raw or in a blue or green CGC holder. 

Would one even know it, for a CGC slab, since he signs on the splash page vs the cover?  Does CGC note "name XX" written on page 1? I've never come across any while scanning for sales

[William-James88]

17 minutes ago, csaag said:

Would one even know it, for a CGC slab, since he signs on the splash page vs the cover?  Does CGC note "name XX" written on page 1? I've never come across any while scanning for sales

If it's signed on a splash or inner page, it will still get a blue label and there wont be a mention of it.

And I get what you mean now, since Kirby didn't sign on the cover. 

Anyways, for fun, here's some losing profit evidence by going the CBCS route rather than CGC (just tangentially related to the discussion but I have fun with it).

Amazing Spider-man 361, all 9.4, all sold within the last month or so.

Yellow label at CBCS with 1 sig sold for 360

Yellow label at CBCS with 3 sig sold for 375

 

Blue Label CGC sold for 400

Since it costs to witness a sig (and costs more for witnessing more), it would have been more worthwhile to just send to CGC and not spend any money on the signings.

 

 

Edited June 22, 2021 by William-James88

[Fisionbomb]

22 hours ago, Msgarmar said:

Thanks for sharing - what are your thoughts? Surprised/happy with the grades? 

I'll try to remember to post detailed pics once I have them back (registered mail so it may be a week or more) so folks can chime in regarding the condition/grades. Maybe we can get a better estimate of how much a signature knocks down the universal grade.

[djzombi]

5 hours ago, K.P.D. said:

 

 

Thanks for that.  Very, very closely related: I have several issues of Swamp Thing Vol. 1 signed by Wrightson in ink at the bottom of the first page.  

[Fisionbomb]

On 6/22/2021 at 8:33 PM, Fisionbomb said:

I'll try to remember to post detailed pics once I have them back (registered mail so it may be a week or more) so folks can chime in regarding the condition/grades. Maybe we can get a better estimate of how much a signature knocks down the universal grade.

Best I can do for pics. I believed all books to be 9.4 or higher without the sig. Hopefully this helps to gauge how much a cover sig drops the grade on a blue label request. 

Interiors were definitely clean and free of defects.

No graders notes.