Post your Garage Sale/Flea Market/Antique Mall Finds Here 60 60

[october]

3 hours ago, Jimbo749 said:

One man's trash and all that... I'm trying to complete my set of the first Terminator series from NOW.

 

I like Ralph Snart. 

[1Cool]

1 hour ago, Shawnismaximus said:

Pretty crazy that he can't make his money back when only paying 5 to 10 cents a comic!  Really sounds like a cautionary tale for buying indie comics. I'm new to buying collections (I'm going to set up a booth at my towns local comic-con this summer), and I really don't know much about indie. Any advice on what to look for when looking through indie books? Any titles that are big sellers?

I'd definitely not do it unless you are a huge indy collector and want to bulk up your own collection.  Indi books sounds great but when people at shows only want to complete sets of main titles and they pass on anything they have not heard of before you get stuck with a ton of books that won't even sell for 5x$1.  I bought 80 long boxes for $20 a box and they were mostly 90s overstock with a bunch of Malibu, Valiant and thankfully a bunch of the main titles.  I ended up donating the 36 long boxes of indi books over 3 years since they just would not sell.  The guy called me a year later and wanted to sell me another 65 long boxes but I passed since I knew he had picked even harder thru the last batch.  He started at $20 a long - I said no.  He called back a week later and dropped them to $15 a long box - I said no.  He called a month later and said his LCS would not take them and offered the last batch for $10 a long which was tough to pass up and would have probably grabbed them if he was local.  Not sure what he ended up doing with them but when you can't sell indi 90s books for $10 a long box you know how tough it is to sell those books.

[Shawnismaximus]

8 minutes ago, 1Cool said:

 Not sure what he ended up doing with them but when you can't sell indi 90s books for $10 a long box you know how tough it is to sell those books.

Yeah that's actually pretty mind-blowing. The long box itself is worth like five bucks lol. 

[jsilverjanet]

I don’t consider the ultraverse, Malibu or valiant titles “Indy”

[srezvan]

Picking through the clearance bin of my LCS.

[spreads]

19 hours ago, revat said:

I think you should be able to make the money back, but its just a matter it being worth the time and effort.  If have a regular set-up at local shows or flea markets, it should be doable to have dollar boxes or quarter boxes (or fill up a long box for $X), or if you itemize your tax deductions, you can donate X books per year for a few years to maximize your deductions.  But yes, at some point it may not be worth storing the comics or lugging them around to shows, at which case hopefully you can put out a craigslist ad and minimize your losses selling by the longbox (or group of longboxes). 

If you just do online sales....you're boned.

So, we're in Canada where the Tax Rules don't afford us that opportunity or I would glady take advantage of it.  I setup at regular shows too, my cost is minimal and I was able to move a good number of dollar books marked down to 50 cents each, but these were almost all Marvel/DC.  To move these indy books - and they have to have big runs of titles, not random books here and there - you have to price them in the 25-50 cents each, maybe a buck each if it's a more popular indy book (Image/Valiant).  If you're overall average selling price works out to 25 cents each, it's definitely not worth the time/effort.  

[spreads]

18 hours ago, 1Cool said:

I'd definitely not do it unless you are a huge indy collector and want to bulk up your own collection.  Indi books sounds great but when people at shows only want to complete sets of main titles and they pass on anything they have not heard of before you get stuck with a ton of books that won't even sell for 5x$1.  I bought 80 long boxes for $20 a box and they were mostly 90s overstock with a bunch of Malibu, Valiant and thankfully a bunch of the main titles.  I ended up donating the 36 long boxes of indi books over 3 years since they just would not sell.  The guy called me a year later and wanted to sell me another 65 long boxes but I passed since I knew he had picked even harder thru the last batch.  He started at $20 a long - I said no.  He called back a week later and dropped them to $15 a long box - I said no.  He called a month later and said his LCS would not take them and offered the last batch for $10 a long which was tough to pass up and would have probably grabbed them if he was local.  Not sure what he ended up doing with them but when you can't sell indi 90s books for $10 a long box you know how tough it is to sell those books.

This 1000%.  Anyone interested in buying collections needs to read this post. 

What people don't understand is how much time it takes just to go through them - I'm not even talking about bags/boards or pricing them out.  I spent probably 20 hours of my time alone helping him - no idea how much time he's spent.  He has the ideal setup, runs periodic garage sales out of his house so no cost and limited time in moving/storage but even with all that it's still not worthwhile.  I guess if you were retired and had nothing else to do, but then you run the risk of significantly injuring yourself if you're the only one lugging that many longs around. 

If I could get those for basically free and get a tax write-off and hopefully donate the comics to schools/hospitals/churches, etc. I would do it.  But at that it would still be a pretty significant use of my time  - basically goodwill.  

Edited December 16, 2017 by spreads

[spreads]

22 hours ago, Jimbo749 said:

One man's trash and all that... I'm trying to complete my set of the first Terminator series from NOW.

Hey if I had a set of those I would ship them to you at just the cost of shipping, but for me to store obscure stuff like this that the odd person would not want it it's easier to dump in a cheap box or get rid of it.

 

21 hours ago, Shawnismaximus said:

Pretty crazy that he can't make his money back when only paying 5 to 10 cents a comic!  Really sounds like a cautionary tale for buying indie comics. I'm new to buying collections (I'm going to set up a booth at my towns local comic-con this summer), and I really don't know much about indie. Any advice on what to look for when looking through indie books? Any titles that are big sellers?

There is a lot of good stuff that will sell, and a lot of good stuff that won't sell.  Go through the copper and modern forums and read some threads on titles, you'll get an idea..

Edited December 16, 2017 by spreads

[rsouxlja7]

Picked up 10 longboxes of books that are bagged 4-10 to these storage bags and no boards. Let the bagging and boarding commence...

[Shadow Images]

59 minutes ago, rsouxlja7 said:

Picked up 10 longboxes of books that are bagged 4-10 to these storage bags and no boards. Let the bagging and boarding commence...

 

[FlyingDonut]

On 12/15/2017 at 2:08 PM, Shawnismaximus said:

Pretty crazy that he can't make his money back when only paying 5 to 10 cents a comic!  Really sounds like a cautionary tale for buying indie comics. I'm new to buying collections (I'm going to set up a booth at my towns local comic-con this summer), and I really don't know much about indie. Any advice on what to look for when looking through indie books? Any titles that are big sellers?

Yes. Don't buy them unless you know what you're talking about. 

[FlyingDonut]

On 12/15/2017 at 4:16 PM, 1Cool said:

I'd definitely not do it unless you are a huge indy collector and want to bulk up your own collection.  Indi books sounds great but when people at shows only want to complete sets of main titles and they pass on anything they have not heard of before you get stuck with a ton of books that won't even sell for 5x$1.  I bought 80 long boxes for $20 a box and they were mostly 90s overstock with a bunch of Malibu, Valiant and thankfully a bunch of the main titles.  I ended up donating the 36 long boxes of indi books over 3 years since they just would not sell.  The guy called me a year later and wanted to sell me another 65 long boxes but I passed since I knew he had picked even harder thru the last batch.  He started at $20 a long - I said no.  He called back a week later and dropped them to $15 a long box - I said no.  He called a month later and said his LCS would not take them and offered the last batch for $10 a long which was tough to pass up and would have probably grabbed them if he was local.  Not sure what he ended up doing with them but when you can't sell indi 90s books for $10 a long box you know how tough it is to sell those books.

At $10 per box long you should start thinking about it because the actual boxes themselves have some value.  

[1Cool]

13 minutes ago, FlyingDonut said:

At $10 per box long you should start thinking about it because the actual boxes themselves have some value.  

He lived all the way over near Chicago so I just couldn't justify the time and van rental cost.  The boxes were pretty ratty and falling apart so I don't know if I would value them over $2-$3 a box.

[oakman29]

On 8/20/2017 at 9:02 PM, DarkPhantom13 said:

Came up empty at the swapmeet/flea market this week. However i did come across a lady who listed a bunch of her husbands old comics on Offerup. One of them was a copy of Uncanny X-Men #304 signed by Jack Kirby and Dan Panosian with COA from Dynamic Forces and X-Men #1 reprint in original folder. Been wanting to get this for a good while now but kept losing it on ebay so i was pretty happy when she only wanted $30 for it!

A Kirby signature for 30 bucks? Damn some people just fall into sheit, and come out smelling like a rose.

[jsilverjanet]

38 minutes ago, FlyingDonut said:

Yes. Don't buy them unless you know what you're talking about. 

Posts like these make me wish we had a “love “ option instead of the “like” option

 

Edited December 17, 2017 by jsilverjanet

[jsilverjanet]

I’ve seen the xmen 1 reprint with Kirby signature but I’ve never seen xmen 304

cool

[ProcessedMeatMan]

Picked these up from a local thrift sore. $2 each. Highlights: 10 NM copies of X-Men 137, 3 Moon Knight #1, Marvel Spotlight 1, 6-10, two copies of Marvel Team-Up 95, DC Comics presents 26,  a bunch of Swamp Thing... and more! There were runs of books with the keys missing, so someone got there before me

[spreads]

58 minutes ago, ProcessedMeatMan said:

Picked these up from a local thrift sore. $2 each. Highlights: 10 NM copies of X-Men 137, 3 Moon Knight #1, Marvel Spotlight 1, 6-10, two copies of Marvel Team-Up 95, DC Comics presents 26,  a bunch of Swamp Thing... and more! There were runs of books with the keys missing, so someone got there before me

Wow, nice grab.  Reminds me of that antique shop several months back where I picked-the hell out of a copper/bronze collection.  

Do you think someone got there and went through the books, to leave all of what you grabbed behind at $2 each?  It's possible whomever dumped these books off there never had those keys....1st Series Swamp Things, DCCP 26, Transformers 1, these aren't exactly newly hot books....?

[ProcessedMeatMan]

7 minutes ago, spreads said:

Wow, nice grab.  Reminds me of that antique shop several months back where I picked-the hell out of a copper/bronze collection.  

Do you think someone got there and went through the books, to leave all of what you grabbed behind at $2 each?  It's possible whomever dumped these books off there never had those keys....1st Series Swamp Things, DCCP 26, Transformers 1, these aren't exactly newly hot books....?

Yeah. It's possible they weren't there to begin with. I got there early and was the 2nd or 3rd person to start digging. Looking through was intense... I'd find a run of Star Wars, 3-4 copies each of damn near ever issue from #4 to #107... all the 42s are gone. Same thing with Spectacular Spider-man (all the 64s gone), ASM... all the 265s gone. It was nerve wracking! But I love it

[spreads]

1 minute ago, ProcessedMeatMan said:

Yeah. It's possible they weren't there to begin with. I got there early and was the 2nd or 3rd person to start digging. Looking through was intense... I'd find a run of Star Wars, 3-4 copies each of damn near ever issue from #4 to #107... all the 42s are gone. Same thing with Spectacular Spider-man (all the 64s gone), ASM... all the 265s gone. It was nerve wracking! But I love it

Oh okay, then if you know of it being a recent dumping and there were other people scrambling to find comics then maybe.  It's hard to believe someone actually sat down and went through it looking for keys to leave some of those behind.  With my find, the collection was there for a full year (I found 5 copies of SSM 64) so it's super unlikely anyone actually looked at them....