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My road to success (Moving Update 2)

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uchiha101

45,148 views

This thread will be about my journey to the million dollar comic and the struggles, failures and successes that come with it since many boardies requested it I will not longer post my transactions but try what revat said :). I also have a bunch of inspirational people two of them being Walt Disney and Steve Jobs because I want to be the next rags to riches story not to the degree of Steve Jobs or Walt Disney but I want to make a million dollars buying and selling a comic and making enough money with this venture to never again say I can't afford something :)

 

Thoughts and plans

Sell my comics

Sell IH 180 CGC 5.0

 

Milestones I want to reach

Get my first four figure sale

 

To see old comments for this Journal entry, click here. New comments can be added below.

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24 minutes ago, uchiha101 said:

There were three months while I was working for myself that no one was buying things or if they did it wasn't close to enough to pay my rent and other expenses so I used the card

You had three months trying to support yourself with "sales" - and you had to go into debt for it. While not directly on the card, this means you were "paying" yourself with high interest DEBT and is very related to your "business" .....  This is a sure fire sign that the business is not viable for providing for you.

If you were half as dedicated to a day job as you are to your other endeavors ----  you would not be having all of these issues...  

You want to swear off something for a year - make it your comic/video/cypto dreaming.  Get a job where you can earn a consistent pay check . This is a foundation that you can THEN  add extra activities to later.....

 

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35 minutes ago, W16227 said:

You had three months trying to support yourself with "sales" - and you had to go into debt for it. While not directly on the card, this means you were "paying" yourself with high interest DEBT and is very related to your "business" .....  This is a sure fire sign that the business is not viable for providing for you.

If you were half as dedicated to a day job as you are to your other endeavors ----  you would not be having all of these issues...  

You want to swear off something for a year - make it your comic/video/cypto dreaming.  Get a job where you can earn a consistent pay check . This is a foundation that you can THEN  add extra activities to later.....

 

Well, everything was going fine till people weren't buying at all. I've already said that I'll be working on all these problems this year well most.

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49 minutes ago, uchiha101 said:

Well, everything was going fine till people weren't buying at all. I've already said that I'll be working on all these problems this year well most.

Everything is NOT going fine if a dry spell at the office  means you are living on a credit card for three months.....    Some people live paycheck to paycheck - for various reasons - but the responsible ones who have to pull out the card for an emergency then PAY IT BACK as they plan for these things...... 

If people are not buying - then what are you changing??? -because something is wrong...  Hulk 180s sell all the time. Heck - around 25 CGC ones sold in the last month... 

 

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2 hours ago, W16227 said:

Everything is NOT going fine if a dry spell at the office  means you are living on a credit card for three months.....    Some people live paycheck to paycheck - for various reasons - but the responsible ones who have to pull out the card for an emergency then PAY IT BACK as they plan for these things...... 

If people are not buying - then what are you changing??? -because something is wrong...  Hulk 180s sell all the time. Heck - around 25 CGC ones sold in the last month... 

 

The thing you're talking about is in the past. I've sold my hulk 180 a long time ago and it was one of the first things I've sold. But I do know when they separated eBay into the Canadian and US one I've been getting fewer views and sales.  I've been looking into and trying different selling platforms, adding OBO's to things I wanted to sell quicker, made shipping a bit cheaper. I'm not the only one having problems with sales though. Though like I said that's in the past as most of all the big ticket items have been sold and that I'm on social assistance. 

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On 12/15/2018 at 1:08 PM, uchiha101 said:

 

4. Found my new and current gf which died and came back. I know you won't believe this but that's what happened. 

 

I probably shouldn't ask, but what does this mean?

She died and came back?

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26 minutes ago, october said:

I probably shouldn't ask, but what does this mean?

She died and came back?

Yeah, this was a very confusing sentence!

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i know i might regret asking this...

if you have a milestone of:

Get my first four figure sale

 

and you own a:

IH 180 CGC 5.0

Which is worth well over 2k in the market, why are you acruing credit debt, when you could sell the book (while simultaneously accomplishing one of your goals and milestones)?

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5 minutes ago, miraclemet said:

i know i might regret asking this...

if you have a milestone of:

Get my first four figure sale

 

and you own a:

IH 180 CGC 5.0

Which is worth well over 2k in the market, why are you acruing credit debt, when you could sell the book (while simultaneously accomplishing one of your goals and milestones)?

that is good advice, the interest on debt will accrue at a higher rate than the book will and you can be much less stressed without the debt. You can always reacquire the book when it is a better time financially but the interest piles up quickly. The money you save on interest alone is significant if your credit card rate is high.

Do the math at your specific interest rate...if it is 20% and you pay off $2000 of debt you save $400 a year as well as not accruing compounded interest. Will the book go up $400 every year? It did spike a year or two ago but that is iffy while the interest is a definite.

Edited by Bird
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15 minutes ago, miraclemet said:

i know i might regret asking this...

if you have a milestone of:

Get my first four figure sale

 

and you own a:

IH 180 CGC 5.0

Which is worth well over 2k in the market, why are you acruing credit debt, when you could sell the book (while simultaneously accomplishing one of your goals and milestones)?

Hulk 180 is a $300 to $400 book in 5.0. 

Edited by october
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15 minutes ago, october said:

Hulk 180 is a $300 to $400 book in 5.0. 

Aw , I read it as 181... OK proceed with your downward spiral!

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1 hour ago, miraclemet said:

i know i might regret asking this...

if you have a milestone of:

Get my first four figure sale

 

and you own a:

IH 180 CGC 5.0

Which is worth well over 2k in the market, why are you acruing credit debt, when you could sell the book (while simultaneously accomplishing one of your goals and milestones)?

There are two problems with that. It's a hulk 180 and I already sold it long ago. It's just that I can edit that first post anymore.

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4 hours ago, october said:

I probably shouldn't ask, but what does this mean?

She died and came back?

If you're really that intrigued pm me and I will tell you

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21 hours ago, uchiha101 said:

If you're really that intrigued pm me and I will tell you

No no no, I just tuned into this thread, and you can't throw out a cliffhanger like potential zombie girlfriend, then say "pm me".  That's just cold.

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Wow, this is an interesting thread. I too recently started to buy and sell comics. My goal is similar to that of the originator of this thread. So far I have made approximately $7,000 in the past three months simply selling comics I collected as a kid, and purchasing and flipping smaller comics for a profit. I agree debt is always a bad thing to play with. I'd say your goal of having enough money to not have to worry about life is reasonable. Be confident in your vision and don't worry about the people who say you can't do it. However, much of the advice amidst the negative is correct. Stay out of debt, and play with your own money. If you have a fair amount of comics now, sell those and target your potential investment issues. Use your starting money from the comics you sell as your investment capitol. STAY OUT OF DEBT, especially now! I also agree that purchasing of comics seems to be slowing, and I believe this is systemic of something much more compounding in the market. So please be careful. Just my two cents. (What do I know?) Hope it helps. Good luck uchiha101!

As for me, i'm trying to complete my set of Peter Parker the Spectacular Spider-Man #1-263 + Annuals, Variants, and Canadian issues in CGC 9.8 WP or Better Condition. If anyone has any leads, tips or assistance they can offer i'd be grateful! 

 

Sincerely, 


Brian W (slpfi27) 

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16 hours ago, slpfi27 said:

Wow, this is an interesting thread. I too recently started to buy and sell comics. My goal is similar to that of the originator of this thread. So far I have made approximately $7,000 in the past three months simply selling comics I collected as a kid, and purchasing and flipping smaller comics for a profit. I agree debt is always a bad thing to play with. I'd say your goal of having enough money to not have to worry about life is reasonable. Be confident in your vision and don't worry about the people who say you can't do it. However, much of the advice amidst the negative is correct. Stay out of debt, and play with your own money. If you have a fair amount of comics now, sell those and target your potential investment issues. Use your starting money from the comics you sell as your investment capitol. STAY OUT OF DEBT, especially now! I also agree that purchasing of comics seems to be slowing, and I believe this is systemic of something much more compounding in the market. So please be careful. Just my two cents. (What do I know?) Hope it helps. Good luck uchiha101!

As for me, i'm trying to complete my set of Peter Parker the Spectacular Spider-Man #1-263 + Annuals, Variants, and Canadian issues in CGC 9.8 WP or Better Condition. If anyone has any leads, tips or assistance they can offer i'd be grateful! 

 

Sincerely, 


Brian W (slpfi27) 

I think the problem is (and it's not your fault), is that while you may have generally similar goals, your starting points appear to be vastly different*.  Your story, while reasonable and no doubt mirrors the experience of many collectors here, has allowed the OP to think that he can reproduce your success (and that of many others) fairly easily. 

You appear to have genuine knowledge and experience with comics, as well as a collection to start from, aka both financial and mental capital.  I would venture to say you likely have a reasonable job and education.  The OP has admitted to having psychological, emotional, and learning issues, has invested (poorly) in comics and video games whilst on government assistance, cannot get or keep a minimum wage job, lives with his parents into his late 20's,  has family issues, and is almost certainly being catfished.  And gotten into bitcoin at most likely the worst possible time.  And has admitted to all of this publicly (aside from the catfishing) on a comics website whilst espousing that he would like to sell comics on consignment for people.

 

* Before the migration, there was an old journal from the OP that was hundreds of pages filled with all sorts of misadventures, and this thread has continued that 'progress', a tradition unlike any other.  If you can find it, you should read it.  It will shake you to your core.

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19 minutes ago, revat said:

 

 

* Before the migration, there was an old journal from the OP that was hundreds of pages filled with all sorts of misadventures, and this thread has continued that 'progress', a tradition unlike any other.  If you can find it, you should read it.  It will shake you to your core.

There's a ink to it, at the top of each page of this journal.

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On 1/8/2019 at 7:20 PM, uchiha101 said:

The thing you're talking about is in the past. I've sold my hulk 180 a long time ago and it was one of the first things I've sold. But I do know when they separated eBay into the Canadian and US one I've been getting fewer views and sales.  I've been looking into and trying different selling platforms, adding OBO's to things I wanted to sell quicker, made shipping a bit cheaper. I'm not the only one having problems with sales though. Though like I said that's in the past as most of all the big ticket items have been sold and that I'm on social assistance. 

1. If you are expecting to rely on buying and selling things to make a living, then you have to have a business model that can weather the occasional down period. Some industries have natural slow periods, collectibles is not quite as predictable, so you have to always be ahead, in preparation for the possibility of having a "behind" month. 

2. You made $159 profit (or in other words your salary) in 7 hours. Im not sure how spot on your timing is (did you include time spent searching that didnt result in a purchase?) That return breaks down to a pay rate of $22/hr. Now if you spent more time than that... you're salary is less. 

3. Also remember you are picking the "cream of the crop" best ROI stuff, so if you invest more time, the ROI starts to decrease as you have to start buying less profitable stuff (since you already bought the more profitable stuff) so your rate of pay decreases with the more time you spend doing it, unless you have an infinite number of places to flip from (and granted the internet is pretty vast, but even it is finite). 

Remind me, are you not working an actual job so that you can continue to collect social assistance? (in other words if you get a job, the assistance stops)

If this is your intended career, why only spend 7 hours on it (I assume this was over a week, but maybe it was less? more?) . You also run into the problem of transport once you've gone through all of the local places for flipable items (I assume you dont have a car?), and if you are relying on picking up items online and then having them shipped (rather than local pickup) you eat into your profit, and your timeline for flipping... 

 

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36 minutes ago, miraclemet said:

Remind me, are you not working an actual job so that you can continue to collect social assistance? (in other words if you get a job, the assistance stops)

If this is your intended career, why only spend 7 hours on it (I assume this was over a week, but maybe it was less? more?) . You also run into the problem of transport once you've gone through all of the local places for flipable items (I assume you dont have a car?), and if you are relying on picking up items online and then having them shipped (rather than local pickup) you eat into your profit, and your timeline for flipping... 

 

Doesn't this seem like a contradiction?  If he's avoiding a job but building a "career", wouldn't that DQ him from further social assistance?  Makes me wonder if any of that flipping income is being reported.

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11 minutes ago, mattn792 said:

Doesn't this seem like a contradiction?  If he's avoiding a job but building a "career", wouldn't that DQ him from further social assistance?  Makes me wonder if any of that flipping income is being reported.

Oh I 100% assume that the flipping income is not being reported. And (to a degree) I understand why, since it's no where close to a steady revenue stream. 

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On 1/9/2019 at 9:23 PM, mattn792 said:

No no no, I just tuned into this thread, and you can't throw out a cliffhanger like potential zombie girlfriend, then say "pm me".  That's just cold.

It's better that way. However, if you are interested all you need to do is pm or you're not really that curious to know what the cliffhanger is as you say you are ;)

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On 1/9/2019 at 11:59 PM, Karl Liebl said:

Do you have any good books for sale?  Post some, maybe I can help you out? CGC slabs only...

Thank you for the offer but I don't have anything one would consider good. My only CGC slab is FF 53 CGC 3.5

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On 1/10/2019 at 2:24 AM, slpfi27 said:

Wow, this is an interesting thread. I too recently started to buy and sell comics. My goal is similar to that of the originator of this thread. So far I have made approximately $7,000 in the past three months simply selling comics I collected as a kid, and purchasing and flipping smaller comics for a profit. I agree debt is always a bad thing to play with. I'd say your goal of having enough money to not have to worry about life is reasonable. Be confident in your vision and don't worry about the people who say you can't do it. However, much of the advice amidst the negative is correct. Stay out of debt, and play with your own money. If you have a fair amount of comics now, sell those and target your potential investment issues. Use your starting money from the comics you sell as your investment capitol. STAY OUT OF DEBT, especially now! I also agree that purchasing of comics seems to be slowing, and I believe this is systemic of something much more compounding in the market. So please be careful. Just my two cents. (What do I know?) Hope it helps. Good luck uchiha101!

As for me, i'm trying to complete my set of Peter Parker the Spectacular Spider-Man #1-263 + Annuals, Variants, and Canadian issues in CGC 9.8 WP or Better Condition. If anyone has any leads, tips or assistance they can offer i'd be grateful! 

 

Sincerely, 


Brian W (slpfi27) 

Thanks and don't worry none of the money on my credit card was used to buy comics but living expenses when my sales slowed down to almost nothing. I have been burned quite a few times buying more than I can handle and I have learned my lesson much to the disbelief of many boardies on here. The advice of using the money I've made from the sales of the comics and video games is what I'm doing while working down the previous comic book debt I have. I would say that markets of all sorts are going through a correction period and with the government shutdown many people are tightening their belts and buying what they really need. Since most of my business and sales are from the US.

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4 minutes ago, uchiha101 said:

It's better that way. However, if you are interested all you need to do is pm or you're not really that curious to know what the cliffhanger is as you say you are ;)

Lame.  I'll just make up my own story then.  Utilizing your avatar...I'll guess that she lives in Ukraine, TASS reported her dead, but a few days later she showed back up on Skype perfectly alive. 

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4 hours ago, miraclemet said:

1. If you are expecting to rely on buying and selling things to make a living, then you have to have a business model that can weather the occasional down period. Some industries have natural slow periods, collectibles is not quite as predictable, so you have to always be ahead, in preparation for the possibility of having a "behind" month. 

2. You made $159 profit (or in other words your salary) in 7 hours. Im not sure how spot on your timing is (did you include time spent searching that didnt result in a purchase?) That return breaks down to a pay rate of $22/hr. Now if you spent more time than that... you're salary is less. 

3. Also remember you are picking the "cream of the crop" best ROI stuff, so if you invest more time, the ROI starts to decrease as you have to start buying less profitable stuff (since you already bought the more profitable stuff) so your rate of pay decreases with the more time you spend doing it, unless you have an infinite number of places to flip from (and granted the internet is pretty vast, but even it is finite). 

Remind me, are you not working an actual job so that you can continue to collect social assistance? (in other words if you get a job, the assistance stops)

If this is your intended career, why only spend 7 hours on it (I assume this was over a week, but maybe it was less? more?) . You also run into the problem of transport once you've gone through all of the local places for flipable items (I assume you dont have a car?), and if you are relying on picking up items online and then having them shipped (rather than local pickup) you eat into your profit, and your timeline for flipping... 

 

1. I'll be asking the reseller groups and my local LCS's when their slow months are to get an idea generally of what I should expect.

2. I didn't consider adding the time spent that didn't result in a purchase but only about 4 hours have been added to that. Since I'm using my money only I don't spend very long anymore going through things.

3. I do understand that. There are a few places that I always check up and go to. I do have a death pile of stuff that I still need to sell. would stop once I would get one.    

4. Well as I said earlier because I'm using my own funds it limits how much I can buy and sell and yes it was the period of 2 months. I don't have a car myself but if I paid my dad he would take me where I need to be. The problem is that for lower end stuff this becomes a problem because it's already thin profits as it is and paying for gas on top of the basically means it's not worth my time which is why I'm searching for items with higher profit margins. 

So I'll give you an example. When the video games market was hotter and more active if there was something on Kijii or Craiglist that I saw that I could even double or triple my money, or sell that same day I went for it. Even with the cost of paying for the ride there made it worth it. Now with the price of everything has gone up and the video game market having been slowed down and in a correction, I can't do that anymore unless it's something really profitable or that I can sell the same day.

 

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