Advice please: Blue Chip vs. Diversity 4 4

[Rick2you2]

 

8 hours ago, Stefanomjr said:

I'd rather have the best examples of stories/ artists I appreciate. 

Seems the popular rationale for picking up smaller examples is use them to trade or flip the art for a profit and work your way up towards the blue chip stuff.

However,  when you buy smaller examples that you like and then attempt to sell (maybe unsuccessfully) don't you then run the risk of having that art turn into just "inventory"? Won't your perception of the piece change? That would be my concern.

I'd just as soon invest in the stock market.  Highly liquid, valuations readily available. Make money there,  then buy your blue chip art... that's my plan. 

As far as downside protection... I'd assume,  on a long enough time horizon,  the smaller pieces are a safer bet.

I think you will enjoy OA more if you remember it is a hobby. Treating it as an investment is dangerous, particularly in lesser pieces, because the market can come to a dead end on them. I am not a dealer, by any stretch, but there seem to be a fair number of low priced pieces that simply don't move due to a lack of general interest. But, I have bought a few of them and I don't care if they go up or not because I like them.

 

[JadeGiant]

1 hour ago, Rick2you2 said:

 

I think you will enjoy OA more if you remember it is a hobby. Treating it as an investment is dangerous,

AGREED

[Stefanomjr]

3 hours ago, PhilipB2k17 said:

Stock market analogy? So, wouldn’t buying a lot of different art, some small caps etc., some foreign stocks, some fast growth, constitute diversifying your portfolio rather than rolling all of your funds into one or two blue chips? 

No,  not an analogy.  What I'm saying is I dont feel comfortable buying art for investment purposes. Maybe some people on the boards (with more experience and knowledge) can manage to suss out the scalps and flips... not me.  I buy art I like, valuations be damned. 

With that being said,  I did manage to sell the majority of some prelim art by an artist to then acquire published art by the same artist.  But that didn't happen by design.  So while I'm familiar with the concept of owning smaller pieces to then afford larger (blue chip)  works,  it's not something I'd feel comfortable repeating. I'd rather park my money in the actual stock market and then use gains there to purchase the art I like. 

 

Your comment is still valid... I'd assume a well diversified inventory of art would better stand the test of time. Emphasis on the word "inventory".

 

 

 

[Stefanomjr]

2 hours ago, Rick2you2 said:

 I don't care if they go up or not because I like them.

 

The best way to approach the hobby,  I think. 

[zhamlau]

I Don't think its fair to call this just a hobby though, and to not think about the investment value. These aren't 10 dollar match box cars or 3 dollar new issues. These pages are thousands to hundreds of thousands of dollars. They are BMW's and Round the World vacations we just happen to put in binders or hang on the wall.

When you spend more on a 11x17 sheet of paper then would on a new Ferrari, you have fully passed from the realm of "hobby" and moved onto "future retirement investment".

[JadeGiant]

13 minutes ago, zhamlau said:

I Don't think its fair to call this just a hobby though, and to not think about the investment value. These aren't 10 dollar match box cars or 3 dollar new issues. These pages are thousands to hundreds of thousands of dollars. They are BMW's and Round the World vacations we just happen to put in binders or hang on the wall.

When you spend more on a 11x17 sheet of paper then would on a new Ferrari, you have fully passed from the realm of "hobby" and moved onto "future retirement investment".

Fair point as well – the higher up the percentage of income scale you go, the more you probably should look at it this way.

 

Personally, I have found turning a hobby into an investment vehicle is dangerous and often a very slippery slope. For me, it is too easy to rationalize “investment” into potential purchases which takes away the objective nature of how I see an investment. It also causes me to look at my collection through a different lens when I buy the page as an investment. I would much rather look at the art and enjoy it and appreciate it for purely the nostalgic and aesthetic merits, than to look at it and wonder/worry if it has lost/gained value.

[Nexus]

I agree that all of this also depends on how one defines “blue chip”. It does appear that many (if not most) buyers/investors in the hobby will always knee-jerk favor covers over interiors. Especially panel pages. Market values bear this out. 

Which for someone like me is great. I’ve bypassed many an ok cover for what is (to me) a superior example of an artist’s work (and:or a more representative example from a run) in a panel page. And saved a ton in the process. I’ve traded many an ok cover for multiple interiors that I like better. I’m sure many/most would consider this trading down, but I believe my collection is better and more interesting for it. The only one I have to make happy with my collection is myself. As far as I’m concerned, the market works to my advantage.

Of all the galleries I watch on CAF, the ones I enjoy the most are the ones where the collector clearly has a discerning eye, especially for interiors. Don’t get me wrong, the cover-heavy galleries ARE impressive. But just because a piece is a cover, that doesn’t make it inherently superior to an interior to me. For that matter, just as I don’t consider all KILLING JOKE pages to be “A” grade, I don’t consider all McSpidey covers to be blue chip, either.

 

[1Toy2Many]

Most has already been said, but the one thing I try to remain cognizant of is the market right now versus the market 25 years ago.  If you're concerned with passing on a max piece to your grandkids in 50 years, then I'd say your "best" choice would be a museum piece that offers value to future aficionados outside of nostalgia.  It's a calculated gamble to know what those pieces will be, but there were many things 25 years ago that have decreased in value because the buyers have all aged out and the nostalgia is gone.  Only a select handful of historically significant pieces will dodge this fate, IMO. 

If your plan is on a shorter timeline, then the likelihood of nostalgia determining its value is still pretty high for an exit strategy.  Personally, I like a variety in my collection because each piece tells its own story, regardless of value.  I've had the same debate that you're having internally and I ended up keeping the bulk over the few/quality, simply because I currently find more comfort in the individual stories of each piece when compared to the comfort I'd have from a small handful of blue chips, for whatever that's worth to you.  Good luck, man! 

Edited September 4, 2018 by 1Toy2Many

[Rick2you2]

4 hours ago, Nexus said:

I agree that all of this also depends on how one defines “blue chip”. It does appear that many (if not most) buyers/investors in the hobby will always knee-jerk favor covers over interiors. Especially panel pages. Market values bear this out. 

Which for someone like me is great. I’ve bypassed many an ok cover for what is (to me) a superior example of an artist’s work (and:or a more representative example from a run) in a panel page. And saved a ton in the process. I’ve traded many an ok cover for multiple interiors that I like better. I’m sure many/most would consider this trading down, but I believe my collection is better and more interesting for it. The only one I have to make happy with my collection is myself. As far as I’m concerned, the market works to my advantage.

Of all the galleries I watch on CAF, the ones I enjoy the most are the ones where the collector clearly has a discerning eye, especially for interiors. Don’t get me wrong, the cover-heavy galleries ARE impressive. But just because a piece is a cover, that doesn’t make it inherently superior to an interior to me. For that matter, just as I don’t consider all KILLING JOKE pages to be “A” grade, I don’t consider all McSpidey covers to be blue chip, either.

 

You have raised something I have long agreed with: panel pages are under appreciated. Comics are a story-telling medium in which the art is supposed to advance the story. A cover may look great, but it doesn’t do that. So when I find an artist who knows how to effectively use borders, unorthodox panel shapes, pop outs and the like in a way which emphasizes speed, or pauses, or drama, I love it. An artist who can interject interest into a standard 6 panel with lots of dialog is an artist in every sense of the word, as well as being a great craftsman. I love them, too.

[Pete Marino]

One thing I just want to throw out there.  With prices where they are today, I get that people look at these pages as investments.  But I would be really scared if more than a few percent of your net worth was tied up in comic art.  This is a volatile asset.  As we've all seen over the years, there's a lot of in demand art that keeps just going up in price.  But there are also are a lot of people with vested interests, and dealers that prop up the market as well.

At the end of the day, this is a hobby for me, and if I had the hopes and dreams of my long term quality of life tied up in OA, I don't know if i could sleep well at night. 

It reminds me of another "can't miss" collector that I used to work with.  A woman I worked with and her husband were from Wisconsin, right outside Green Bay.  They had 75% of their assets "invested" into Brett Favre memorabilia, this was when he was a super-stud-star.  Before the special texts to cheer leaders, before he went to the Jets.  I saw her spiral downward once Favre's career went down the drain.  I have no interest in that stuff, so I have no clue if the prices rebounded.  But none the less, watching it 1st hand, I walked away from that project with her story as a personal life lesson.

Long story short, if something seems like such a great deal that you don't get why everyone wouldn't invest in it.  If it's too good to be true, it might just be.

Edited August 29, 2018 by Pete Marino

[Stan Singh]

On 8/28/2018 at 9:24 PM, Pete Marino said:

One thing I just want to throw out there.  With prices where they are today, I get that people look at these pages as investments.  But I would be really scared if more than a few percent of your net worth was tied up in comic art.  This is a volatile asset.  As we've all seen over the years, there's a lot of in demand art that keeps just going up in price.  But there are also are a lot of people with vested interests, and dealers that prop up the market as well.

At the end of the day, this is a hobby for me, and if I had the hopes and dreams of my long term quality of life tied up in OA, I don't know if i could sleep well at night. 

It reminds me of another "can't miss" collector that I used to work with.  A woman I worked with and her husband were from Wisconsin, right outside Green Bay.  They had 75% of their assets "invested" into Brett Favre memorabilia, this was when he was a super-stud-star.  Before the special texts to cheer leaders, before he went to the Jets.  I saw her spiral downward once Favre's career went down the drain.  I have no interest in that stuff, so I have no clue if the prices rebounded.  But none the less, watching it 1st hand, I walked away from that project with her story as a personal life lesson.

Long story short, if something seems like such a great deal that you don't get why everyone wouldn't invest in it.  If it's too good to be true, it might just be.

That is an interesting example and a well proposed argument for not looking at OA as an investment. But the other posters are also correct when they say that OA should be looked at like an investment. Any asset, for lack of a better word, that is as expensive as some OA pieces are deserves to be treated with as much deliberation as possible and should be measured in monetary value alongside emotional value when considering buying, trading or selling. Just like an investment should be. These pieces of paper have value like any other asset and should be treated as such. To those who disagree with that, I have to ask... have you ever traded a piece that is worth significantly more for a lesser piece just because you like the lesser piece more? Likely not because you still had to consider the value of these things. When you are forced to consider an item's 'value' you are forced to treat them like an investment and watch them and hope they go up. Just like any investment. If you HAVE made a practice of trading higher value pieces for lower value ones, PM me. I would like to get to know you better     

[JadeGiant]

35 minutes ago, Stan Singh said:

That is an interesting example and a well proposed argument for not looking at OA as an investment. But the other posters are also correct when they say that OA should be looked at like an investment. Any asset, for lack of a better word, that is as expensive as some OA pieces are deserves to be treated with as much deliberation as possible and should be measured in monetary value alongside emotional value when considering buying, trading or selling. Just like an investment should be. These pieces of paper have value like any other asset and should be treated as such. To those who disagree with that, I have to ask... have you ever traded a piece that is worth significantly more for a lesser piece just because you like the lesser piece more? Likely not because you still had to consider the value of these things. When you are forced to consider an item's 'value' you are forced to treat them like an investment and watch them and hope they go up. Just like any investment. If you HAVE made a practice of trading higher value pieces for lower value ones, PM me. I would like to get to know you better

I hear you and see where you are coming from. There can be a blurry line between investment and gamble. When you start using words like hope and emotion I think you start skewing toward gamble and away from investment. At least that’s how I look at it. Sure, thinking about potential future value of any large purchase should be part of any significant financial outlay. When I make a larger purchase, I am making an assumption that I will recoup some of my investment if I should decide to sell but I am also OK with taking a loss if that should be the case. The emotional gain of the art can translate to a financial loss and this is a balancing act I accept. Does this play out very often? So far, no (at least in what the market tells me my art is worth vs what I paid) but I have only held my art and not sold. Who knows that the future holds? That said, I view this exclusively as a hobby which helps to shape my view on purchases. I know a lot of people look at a lot of their purchases and are able to buy low and sell high (on average, across the board) and use this to fund purchases that are more emotionally based. For those who can do that, I applaud them. For me, I’d rather just buy for enjoyment. All approaches are good in my book! $.02

 

gam·ble

1.     play games of chance for money; bet.

2.     take risky action in the hope of a desired result.

 

 

in·vest·ment

1.     the action or process of investing money for profit or material result.

 

[PhilipB2k17]

Whether something is a Blue chip or not is not too relevant to me as a collector. I'm not playing in that sandbox, unless a decent amount of the modern stuff I have been buying somehow becomes significantly in demand. Probably not, though. Odds are very much against it.

[Stan Singh]

13 minutes ago, JadeGiant said:

I hear you and see where you are coming from. There can be a blurry line between investment and gamble. When you start using words like hope and emotion I think you start skewing toward gamble and away from investment. At least that’s how I look at it. Sure, thinking about potential future value of any large purchase should be part of any significant financial outlay. When I make a larger purchase, I am making an assumption that I will recoup some of my investment if I should decide to sell but I am also OK with taking a loss if that should be the case. The emotional gain of the art can translate to a financial loss and this is a balancing act I accept. Does this play out very often? So far, no (at least in what the market tells me my art is worth vs what I paid) but I have only held my art and not sold. Who knows that the future holds? That said, I view this exclusively as a hobby which helps to shape my view on purchases. I know a lot of people look at a lot of their purchases and are able to buy low and sell high (on average, across the board) and use this to fund purchases that are more emotionally based. For those who can do that, I applaud them. For me, I’d rather just buy for enjoyment. All approaches are good in my book! $.02

 

gam·ble

1.     play games of chance for money; bet.

2.     take risky action in the hope of a desired result.

 

 

in·vest·ment

1.     the action or process of investing money for profit or material result.

 

I agree wholeheartedly. My point is that it OA can be both a gamble and an investment while still being a hobby. Frankly arent all investments a gamble to some extent? There are no sure things out there. Not ones that will bring any real return that is.  

[Nexus]

I try not to confuse luxury items with investments.

[Pete Marino]

1 hour ago, Stan Singh said:

That is an interesting example and a well proposed argument for not looking at OA as an investment. But the other posters are also correct when they say that OA should be looked at like an investment. Any asset, for lack of a better word, that is as expensive as some OA pieces are deserves to be treated with as much deliberation as possible and should be measured in monetary value alongside emotional value when considering buying, trading or selling. Just like an investment should be. These pieces of paper have value like any other asset and should be treated as such. To those who disagree with that, I have to ask... have you ever traded a piece that is worth significantly more for a lesser piece just because you like the lesser piece more? Likely not because you still had to consider the value of these things. When you are forced to consider an item's 'value' you are forced to treat them like an investment and watch them and hope they go up. Just like any investment. If you HAVE made a practice of trading higher value pieces for lower value ones, PM me. I would like to get to know you better     

I think we agree more than disagree.

There is a difference between value and investment though.  When I say Investment, i'm not talking about 5 or 10 year time frame, i'm talking about long term investment in terms of retirement planning.  I still think there is current (and hopefully future) value in comic art. And, yes I use the current value of my art to hopefully upgrade the art here and there.

The point I was getting at was I'd be very concerned if a large percentage of my long term plans were hinged on the value of comic art continuing to go up so I could retire at a reasonable age.  Also, I'm sure views are much different when you are up on Mt Olympus buying those blue chip pieces of art.  Vs myself who's not even on the same plane of existence.

Edited August 30, 2018 by Pete Marino

[Stan Singh]

50 minutes ago, Nexus said:

I try not to confuse luxury items with investments.

Not everyone has enough money to make that distinction though... To some people (me) the hope that a luxury item increases in value over time helps to justify the spending of money on said luxury item.

[Carlo M]

On ‎8‎/‎29‎/‎2018 at 2:15 AM, Rick2you2 said:

You have raised something I have long agreed with: panel pages are under appreciated. Comics are a story-telling medium in which the art is supposed to advance the story. A cover may look great, but it doesn’t do that. So when I find an artist who knows how to effectively use borders, unorthodox panel shapes, pop outs and the like in a way which emphasizes speed, or pauses, or drama, I love it. An artist who can interject interest into a standard 6 panel with lots of dialog is an artist in every sense of the word, as well as being a great craftsman. I love them, too.

Definitely +1.  Covers and splashes are beautiful and they display better on a wall.  But comics are a sequential art form, and interiors  amix of storytelling and art are great examples,

[JadeGiant]

[Stan Singh]

23 minutes ago, JadeGiant said:

 

23 minutes ago, JadeGiant said:

aka...human nature