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For all you folks who paid THOUSANDS for HG Hulk 181...
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75 posts in this topic

Where is Collector Joe I really miss you two team tagging this kind of deal!!!!!!

 

I don't know...it's all I can do to try and take away the Kool-Aid punch bowl by myself! tongue.gifgrin.gif27_laughing.gif

 

Gene

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Here's the problem.

 

There is a $40.00 comic out there right now that will sell for $1000.00 in about 20 years. I don't know which one it will be. If I did (know for sure) I'd get in line for my 10 or 20 copies. And sure, you can say it'll never happen and it will sound very much like all those 80's collectors that said Bronze Age will never be worth anything.

 

You're in the same environment now as we were back then.

 

It's not too late.

 

Go for it. grin.gif

 

The only thing that I would add here is that Wolverine thanks to extremely talented professionals has become a Marvel franchise. I can't think of a $40 book that features anyone nearly as important - worse, I can't think of anyone that was introduced recently that would be a franchise player even with a good creative team, but I am also not as down with my comics as I could be . . .

 

DAM

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Does anyone know of specific examples in any collectibles field (painted art, statuary, stamps, coins, cards, etc) where a massive loss of value occurred comparable to a drop from $1000 to $40? I'm only familiar with comics myself and can't think of such a drop in their history to this point, but I'm sure there are examples of this in the more long-established fields.

 

I'm sure there are lots of examples of this in the art market; anybody know of any specific drops?

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The value of 181 will continue to rise so long as Wolverine cements himself (via movies, video games, etc.) a place in US pop culture, the way Batman, Hulk, etc did decades before. A problem with Wolverine is that he's newer than the classic characters, so there's still generations of people around today who did not grow up with him (how many of us had/have an older family member who collected comics as a kid and talk about Fantastic Four or The Flash but wouldn't know Wolverine if he smacked them in the face), and of course Hulk 181 is not all that rare. But he's probably one of the last mega-stars to come out of Marvel or DC, so I don't see the issue ever slowing down completely, IMO.

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FF the only thing remotely close in the art field is when either, a fake original is made and sold.. or the painter turns out to be someone other than it's signed by.

 

Brian

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Does anyone know of specific examples in any collectibles field (painted art, statuary, stamps, coins, cards, etc) where a massive loss of value occurred comparable to a drop from $1000 to $40? I'm only familiar with comics myself and can't think of such a drop in their history to this point, but I'm sure there are examples of this in the more long-established fields.

 

I'm sure there are lots of examples of this in the art market; anybody know of any specific drops?

 

If you are talking about a drop of 25X to X, ($1000 to $40), I can think of a couple comics, right off the top of my head:

 

Fish Police 1, was selling for $40-50, now sells for MAYBE $1

Red Fox 1, was selling for $40-50, now sells for MAYBE $1

Elflord 1, was selling for $80, now sells for MAYBE $2-3

Troll Lords 1, was selling for $50, now sells for a quarter. On a good day. If you're lucky.

 

Obviously these are all highly speculative BW explosion books, but they did sell for these insane prices (I made a pretty penny on Fish Police), and now they're deader than Marley (who was dead to begin with!).

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I'm sure there are instances in sports cards where this happened. Maybe someone like a Jose Canseco, Terrell Davis, O.J. Simpson, etc. where they either got a career threatening injury, or ended up in jail.

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I thought O.J Simpson cards became extremely hot after the trial? Could've sworn 60 Minutes or something did a special interest story about OJ memorabilia being white hot after the trial..?

 

Brian

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If you are talking about a drop of 25X to X, ($1000 to $40), I can think of a couple comics, right off the top of my head:

 

Fish Police 1, was selling for $40-50, now sells for MAYBE $1

Red Fox 1, was selling for $40-50, now sells for MAYBE $1

Elflord 1, was selling for $80, now sells for MAYBE $2-3

Troll Lords 1, was selling for $50, now sells for a quarter. On a good day. If you're lucky.

 

Just to drive this point home, I have never ever heard of any of these less Fish Police. . . . confused.gif

 

DAM

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. . . and of course Hulk 181 is not all that rare. But he's probably one of the last mega-stars to come out of Marvel or DC

 

HarrisonJohn - you said what I was trying to say - with the exception of Venom, who else is a MEGA star (and Venom is no Wolvie)? Please dear God don't say Rogue / Gambit / Bishop, X-Flavor of the month . . .

 

Kinda sad, huh? It seems like the superhero genre was much more vibrant in the golden/silver age. Flip side - who would have even imagined a Vertigo 25 years ago? 893scratchchin-thumb.gif

 

DAM

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. . . and of course Hulk 181 is not all that rare. But he's probably one of the last mega-stars to come out of Marvel or DC

 

HarrisonJohn - you said what I was trying to say - with the exception of Venom, who else is a MEGA star (and Venom is no Wolvie)? Please dear God don't say Rogue / Gambit / Bishop, X-Flavor of the month . . .

 

Kinda sad, huh? It seems like the superhero genre was much more vibrant in the golden/silver age. Flip side - who would have even imagined a Vertigo 25 years ago? 893scratchchin-thumb.gif

 

DAM

 

Well outside of comics I'm very interested in the music industry, and you once had Elvis and The Beatles, now what is there? J. Lo and 50 Cent? After a while it's just imitations, and then imitations of the imitations. The originals are what stick around.

 

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FF the only thing remotely close in the art field is when either, a fake original is made and sold.. or the painter turns out to be someone other than it's signed by.

 

Brian

 

There were some pretty serious drops in the modern art market when the economy went south. People were dumping works by trendy artists left and right. Stuff that used to sell for millions was being sold for a quarter of its worth almost overnight. Of course this was stuff mostly done by modern artists where people buy works based on aesthetic and trend. REAL classics by what I term "dead" artists hardly ever depreciate like that.

 

Edited by Lofwyr
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There were temporary drops as you said, but the drops left the pieces still fairly valuable regardless. I was under the impression FF was talking about a drop of value where the piece became basically worthless?

Btw, this also happened to be the period when I picked up a few nice pieces at ridiculously low prices.

 

Brian

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Anyone wanna buy a group of Aircel books? Elflord, etc. available...

 

(a buck each...)

 

Do you have any true NM copies of Adventurers #1 (alt cover), or Elflord #1?

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If you are talking about a drop of 25X to X, ($1000 to $40), I can think of a couple comics, right off the top of my head:

 

Fish Police 1, was selling for $40-50, now sells for MAYBE $1

Red Fox 1, was selling for $40-50, now sells for MAYBE $1

Elflord 1, was selling for $80, now sells for MAYBE $2-3

Troll Lords 1, was selling for $50, now sells for a quarter. On a good day. If you're lucky.

 

Obviously these are all highly speculative BW explosion books, but they did sell for these insane prices (I made a pretty penny on Fish Police), and now they're deader than Marley (who was dead to begin with!).

 

Definitely a good thought that made me think about what I meant. There's a huge difference between losing $49 when a $50 book goes back down to $1 and losing $960 when a $1000 book goes back down to $40. Even a little kid can afford to take a $49 hit, but only the affluent can claim to not care about a $960 loss.

 

I wonder whether some of the early Golden age comics which are uncommon but haven't been featured in any kind of media for a long time will eventually lose their value in 30-40 years once the people who grew up with them have passed on. I'm sure there must be period pieces that have gone up and then back down in the art world that could be comparable to this.

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Does anyone know of specific examples in any collectibles field (painted art, statuary, stamps, coins, cards, etc) where a massive loss of value occurred comparable to a drop from $1000 to $40?

 

I actually meant this to be a tongue-in-cheek counterpoint to Nina-squared's post, but I'm glad to see that people are discussing the jist of it seriously.

 

I don't think any comics have, to date, yet crashed from $1000 to $40, but then again, until fairly recently (last decade, give or take a few years), there haven't been too many books worth more than $1000. While it is entirely possible/probable that we won't ever see a drop that extreme for comics that are valued that highly today, that's not to say that it could never happen. Sure, it won't happen if the future looks close to the recent past...I don't know about you, but I think the next 30 years is going to look very different from the past 30 years, including for the comic collecting hobby.

 

I would add, in addition to the excellent Aircel and Valiant examples, that there are countless examples to be cited of once-valuable things falling 80-100% in value, from Dutch tulip bulbs in the 17th century to Internet stocks in 2000-2001. Back in 1989, the patch of land in Japan where the Emperor's palace is located was worth more than all the land in California combined - absolutely mind boggling. I'm quite sure it's worth nowhere near that today. Today's gold can easily be tomorrow's trash...value can be very transitory indeed...buy low, sell high...keep your eyes on the road ahead and not in the rearview mirror...ok, this is starting to sound like a string of bad fortune cookie sayings... tongue.gif

 

- Gene

Edited by delekkerste
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