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What's the best method to value a larger collection when making an offer.
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163 posts in this topic

I very very rarely am offered a collection to look at, but today I get to look at one.  It'll all be Silver and I think it's about 13 long boxes.

The guy I'm buying from has spent a decade going thru his dad's storage units scattered all over the country.  I bought a bunch of Marvel Key Silver from him about a decade ago (Hulk 1, Xmen 1, TTA 27) so I know there's good stuff in the mix.  Most in the 6.0-8.5 range.

He (luckily) kept my number from all those years ago and gave me a call yesterday because he just opened another unit and found more comics (how these units have been kept current on payments I have no idea).

When I bought from this guy years ago it was a slow process, usually with me only getting 20 comics at a time, mostly because his wife wouldn't let him sell them all at once.  I bought from him over a year until the comics ran out.  But he told me that sooner or later he expected to open another unit and see more comics because his dad loved comics.

I'm going to try to pitch to him to sell them all to me this time in one fell swoop.

Do any of you pros have a good method you use to value large runs of comics.  I want to give the guy a great price that he'll be happy with, but obviously I want to be able to make my money back and still have a nice collection of comics.

Edited by gadzukes
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17 minutes ago, TwoPiece said:

Does he have a price in mind or is he asking you to throw out the first figure?

I tried that "What kind of price are you looking for?" method with him years ago and his wife wouldn't have it.  They always wanted me to give the first figure.... sometimes they took it and sometimes they negotiated it up.

I still did pretty good when I bought from him years ago, but I never got "the deal of the century" on anything.

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1 minute ago, gadzukes said:

I tried that "What kind of price are you looking for?" method with him years ago and his wife wouldn't have it.  They always wanted me to give the first figure.... sometimes they took it and sometimes they negotiated it up.

I still did pretty good when I bought from him years ago, but I never got "the deal of the century" on anything.

It's always tough negotiating when you have to throw out the first figure.

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From a general negotiating tactic, you have a track record of dealing with his wife ( she's clearly the alpha). You bought comics over a year period from them. So i'm sure you know what price point makes her want to sell.

13 long boxes, sounds like they're going to want a big number. If you got some nice keys last time, i would assume you will have at least some in these 13 boxes. If his dad loved comics that much, I am sure he may have had multiple copies of the same comic, so picking up duplicates of what you bought before might be a good thing. ( why store them in multiple sites??)

So Silver keys in the 6-8.5 range as you know is not that bad at all. Put your best number up front so they know you're serious. For them to think of you after several years means they at least know you will "take care" of the comics and would not have thought of you if they didn't like dealing with you in my opinion.

I agree with you tell them you want it all or none and that "X" is the number. ($100-150/box?)

My 2 cents

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Really depends on the keys in this situation.  It's actually a tricky situation since you could go in a spend a ton of time picking out all the keys and offering a fair price for them and then offer $1 a piece for the rest and see how it goes but they could take that info and shop them around to see if they can get more.  13 long boxes of unpicked Silver-Age books will probably not be cheap so make sure you have a ton of capital available to make a take it all offer.

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If they don't want to sell all at once I would cherry pick the keys and semi keys and 1st offer of 50% what they're worth but be willing to negotiate up to 75%. 

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7 minutes ago, Casablanca said:

From a general negotiating tactic, you have a track record of dealing with his wife ( she's clearly the alpha). You bought comics over a year period from them. So i'm sure you know what price point makes her want to sell.

13 long boxes, sounds like they're going to want a big number. If you got some nice keys last time, i would assume you will have at least some in these 13 boxes. If his dad loved comics that much, I am sure he may have had multiple copies of the same comic, so picking up duplicates of what you bought before might be a good thing. ( why store them in multiple sites??)

So Silver keys in the 6-8.5 range as you know is not that bad at all. Put your best number up front so they know you're serious. For them to think of you after several years means they at least know you will "take care" of the comics and would not have thought of you if they didn't like dealing with you in my opinion.

I agree with you tell them you want it all or none and that "X" is the number. ($100-150/box?)

My 2 cents

YES!  The wife is the Alpha.... however, the last time I bought from him years ago he said that they were getting divorced.  I'm not going to wish that on them, but there might be a chance that I will only be dealing with him so maybe the negotiating will be easier.

($100-$150/box?) :roflmao: ..... I'm pretty sure that's not going to happen.  I meet with him in an hour so I'll be interested to see what he has.

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10 minutes ago, gadzukes said:

YES!  The wife is the Alpha.... however, the last time I bought from him years ago he said that they were getting divorced.  I'm not going to wish that on them, but there might be a chance that I will only be dealing with him so maybe the negotiating will be easier.

($100-$150/box?) :roflmao: ..... I'm pretty sure that's not going to happen.  I meet with him in an hour so I'll be interested to see what he has.

Good Luck!..look forward to the update!

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24 minutes ago, 1Cool said:

Really depends on the keys in this situation.  It's actually a tricky situation since you could go in a spend a ton of time picking out all the keys and offering a fair price for them and then offer $1 a piece for the rest and see how it goes but they could take that info and shop them around to see if they can get more.  13 long boxes of unpicked Silver-Age books will probably not be cheap so make sure you have a ton of capital available to make a take it all offer.

I may have to start a quick sales thread here on the boards to build up some quick capital.  I'm only bringing $2k cash with me today.

Edited by gadzukes
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9 minutes ago, gadzukes said:

I may have to start a quick sales thread here on the boards to build up some quick capital.  I'm only bringing $2k cash with me today.

good luck!

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1 hour ago, gadzukes said:

I very very rarely am offered a collection to look at, but today I get to look at one.  It'll all be Silver and I think it's about 13 long boxes.

The guy I'm buying from has spent a decade going thru his dad's storage units scattered all over the country.  I bought a bunch of Marvel Key Silver from him about a decade ago (Hulk 1, Xmen 1, TTA 27) so I know there's good stuff in the mix.  Most in the 6.0-8.5 range.

He (luckily) kept my number from all those years ago and gave me a call yesterday because he just opened another unit and found more comics (how these units have been kept current on payments I have no idea).

When I bought from this guy years ago it was a slow process, usually with me only getting 20 comics at a time, mostly because his wife wouldn't let him sell them all at once.  I bought from him over a year until the comics ran out.  But he told me that sooner or later he expected to open another unit and see more comics because his dad loved comics.

I'm going to try to pitch to him to sell them all to me this time in one fell swoop.

Do any of you pros have a good method you use to value large runs of comics.  I want to give the guy a great price that he'll be happy with, but obviously I want to be able to make my money back and still have a nice collection of comics.

I recently bought a decent lot of comics (3.5 long boxes) of mostly bronze and some silver age Spideys. There weren't any major keys, but there were some minor ones. Rather than try and value the lot (which would have taken too long), I threw out a number I was comfortable with based on an average price per book. In my case that ended up at just about $2/book. In the end I think we were both happy with the transaction: I got a good deal and he didn't have to worry about pricing out each book and got immediate cash. 

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I know he is probably at the site already, but in my limited experience I find talking helps. I say something like "I bought a collection recently for $x.xx per book but it had more/less keys in it than this one" and see how they respond. If you thought, without saying it to me, that something is worth $100 and I tell you that it is worth $150 you tend to move up and if I tell you it is worth $50 you tend to move down, so use that tendency as well.

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Interestingly, I have a fairly similar collection, consisting of late silver age and early bronze, mostly 7.0-9.0, covering 13 book shelves. 

I am almost done doing an inventory.  When I sort my books by individual value, I find:

- The 10 most expensive books constitute 9% of the total value of the collection

- The 20 most expensive books constitute 13% of the total value of the collection

So I suggest you take the previously stated advice to look through all the boxes, find the keys, and price them out carefully.  You may then consider applying the percentages stated above to estimate the value of the entire collection.  Good luck.

 

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4 hours ago, Phicks said:

Interestingly, I have a fairly similar collection, consisting of late silver age and early bronze, mostly 7.0-9.0, covering 13 book shelves. 

I am almost done doing an inventory.  When I sort my books by individual value, I find:

- The 10 most expensive books constitute 9% of the total value of the collection

- The 20 most expensive books constitute 13% of the total value of the collection

So I suggest you take the previously stated advice to look through all the boxes, find the keys, and price them out carefully.  You may then consider applying the percentages stated above to estimate the value of the entire collection.  Good luck.

 

When I buy a collection I tend to pay what the value of the best 4 or 5 comics is. So if I can sell those 4 comics for $200, I'll offer $200. Keys sell quickly, and the rest of the box is all profit. 

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5 hours ago, RCheli said:

When I buy a collection I tend to pay what the value of the best 4 or 5 comics is. So if I can sell those 4 comics for $200, I'll offer $200. Keys sell quickly, and the rest of the box is all profit. 

We tend to do the same, of course it all depends on how many keys are there and how many non-key books are there, but in general it's a quick way to value a collection.

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