Marks & Erasures

[Bliggity]

I'm looking at a T card that is currently sitting in a SGC 20/1.5 holder due to initials written in pencil on the back of the card. The card otherwise presents very nicely and would probably grade 4(MK) by PSA. I plan to hold onto the card and would probably "liberate" it and erase the initials just for my own preference in looking at it regularly, assuming I could do so with no paper loss.

BUT...if I decide to sell it later, what effect would the erasure have on its ability to grade? Is that an automatic "A" from SGC and PSA? If the resale value were to take a substantial hit with an erasure as opposed to leaving the writing in place, I'd probably just leave it.

Thanks!

[LKeeler]

Just my two cents. I have purchased SGC graded cards graded in the SGC 50 range where after cracking them out noticed marks had been erased. I re-submitted to PSA expecting a PSA 4 (mk) and came back with no qualifiers and straight PSA 4 or 5. Hard to explain but tells me nothing is automatic or always consistent! :)

[swarmee]

An erasure (when detected) should gain the MK qualifier, but they're not always caught, I guess.

[4815162342]

http://www.net54baseball.com/showthread.php?p=1000251#post1000251

[steve B]

One of the cards I asked SGC about when I went to the Shriners a while back was a T206 that I thought was better than the 40 it got. I figured 50, maybe 60 on a good day. I've had it since the early - mid 80's. They pointed out the erased pencil mark that must have been very light to begin with. I'd had it that whole time and never spotted it. so the 40 made sense.

Steve B

[Harford20]

I purchased 3 T206 cards with VG fronts, but had pen marks "mostly" erased from the back. I sent them to PSA expected 3-4 MK grades. As the erasure took off some of the back tobacco label ink on each, PSA would only grade "Authentic" as they considered them altered.