Have any of you guys ever...
 

...sold a partial set or a complete set and then really regretted it later on? Did you/have you rebuilt? I am there right now. It is so frustrating to have been so close only to be thinking about starting over a couple of years later. Ironically, I don't sell much but one of the few times that I did...

LOL sold my partial 1939 Playball Registry set on ebay a few weeks back, took a beating on it and have regretted it massively.

I'm not a set collector as much as I want to be. With that being said one of the few sets I've built was a really sharp 1955 Bowman baseball set. I sold the set in the late 90's when I started getting in to high-grade graded cards and I've regretted it ever since. I've started PSA graded 1955 Bowman sets a couple of times in the last 10 years but always get bored and sell.

That was a very nice looking set. I wish I could've gotten in on that. A little over two years ago I sold my partial 60/72 '41 Play Ball set. I used the money to fund something non-card related. Fast foward to now, and I am starting to look at commons again with the thought of beginning once more. I love that set, but it just seems so far back to where I was. Of course the journey is half the fun I guess. I am liking the look of the T205s also, so we'll see.

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Yes, years ago I sold a low grade 48 Bowman set I'd put together. Really low grade, Musial had paper loss on the front, Berra was colorized. Maybe as a Padre, since his jersey was yellow. And a bunch of the cards were waxed and nearly round from flipping. Hardly paid anything for any of them, the Musial was $2 !

Haven't rebuilt it, but I'm about 1/4 of the way there with some nice commons.

Steve B

Wow! Those $2 Musials are few and far between! [emoji3] Good luck as you build your set. I love stories like that.

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I sold my Topps 1957-1980 sets last year, but find myself picking up a favorite here and there...probably have a couple of hundred singles soo far...not sure where it will go...just letting some catch my eye...can't absolutely rule out building them again.

I did keep my 1954-56 Topps sets and would really, really regret it if I ever gave those up and had to rebuild them.

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Great topic ! I've always been a postwar baseball kinda guy and was wondering from some experienced set builders. What's a nice set to build in say ex-mt shape that isn't super hard to complete ? I guess you could say I'm a little intimidated by trying. I've always liked the looks of 57 topps and 71.

59 Topps fits your criteria.

1948 Bowman - currently building it casually again for the third time (finished it twice). 1959 Topps probably qualifies too; I got within 50 cards of finishing around 2007, but sold it before completion. I will never try again to finish any Topps set past 1956....

Lee

Lee, among other projects I am about 60% complete on '65 Topps. That is a lot of cards/commons. Not sure I will venture past the early 1950s again.

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I think theres a difference in my regret whether i sold my cards at an auction or private sale. If its a private sale, not only may i miss the cards i may also wonder what kind of a 'deal; or 'beating' you referred to occurred as it was a voluntary sale.

If it was an auction with no reserve than i already know that my fate of the cards are going to be sold at price whether i like it or not so i dont really worry about taking a 'beating' as i already know that risk. In a private sale i dont have to sell unless i get my price so that avoids any regret at least on the sale price but will still miss the cards.

I got to 520 on T206s in 2006/2007. Sold most of them to fund my purchase of LIonel Carter's Plank in Mastro April 2007. Then sold the Plank a few years later. Now I'm back climbing up the mountain (I'm back to 501 as of this writing).

I don't regret the sales - I do still miss certain cards. Ironically, I sold my Red and Green Cobbs this past February as they were starting to go up. That sale is the biggest regret I have in collecting thus far. They were so beautiful, and even though they're readily available -- not with that eye appeal.

Thanks for all the stories so far. You all are making me feel a little better. I loved that '41 Play Ball partial set, and I am getting the encouragement to climb that hill again. However, I am also liking T205s more and more. Like I mentioned in my original post, I don't sell often. But I have thought about selling some postwar to fund getting back into '41 and starting T205. The thought has occurred to me though that if I do that, I might regret those sales, too! If I can be patient and get past the holidays, I will probably hang onto what I have and just start buying into those two prewar sets.

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Oh yeah...

I built and liquidated the 1954 Topps set twice. The first time was right after college and I was nervous about moving and wanted some ready cash. The second time I did it was a few years ago and I did OK but sold some of the HOFers way too soon. Whenever I see a PSA 7 Aaron RC selling price I tend to throw up a little in my mouth. That said, I am back up to about 30 of the stars. And yes, I have an Aaron, albeit much lower grade.

Sometimes you just have to laugh at the timing. I got very frustrated chasing a T220 silver border set. I needed one of the two SPs to finish it literally for decades. I finally threw in the towel and liquidated the set. Wouldn't you know it, that GDMF card is coming to auction in November.

Your GDMF T220 was my D355 last year :) .....it happens. Now I am collecting type cards but not every darned one I don't have, as before. I don't think we can second guess timing. Hindsight is always 20/20....

A couple of years ago I was halfway through a 1933 George C Miller set and have regretted it everyday since. I had several PSA 4's including Foxx and even one PSA 5. I have been tempted to start it again but man that is one tough set if you are looking for cards with nice eye appeal.......maybe again someday......

GCMs are a very tough set especially anything above vg......I have no desire to build a set but do have desire for a few more type cards I have been wanting....

This has helped!
 

I am glad this thread popped up.
I have been working on a 1939 PlayBall set for the past 4 years. I have 101/161 cards, all VG-EX to EX-NM with all HoF and stars graded PSA/SGC 4-6 (except DiMaggio and Williams both PSA 3.5). I am down to needing mostly the high number cards, which are very difficult to find in the 4-5 graded range that I can afford.

As a side note to Aquarian, I was watching your eBay listing closely as there were many high# that I wanted, but could not afford to pick this up and then have to try to sell the stars/HoFers that you had.

OK, back on track. Just over the last 2-3 weeks, I have been thinking about selling my 1939 PlayBall set (except the Williams). I am not in a money crunch, just have put this WAY on the back burner for my collecting. Now that I read this thread, I think I will just keep it sitting in my collection for a while. I know I would regret selling it, even if is not my focus of late.

Dave

Believe it or not, I've been chasing the 1970 Topps Super football card set for a couple of years. The reason I am still (3) cards short is due to the fact that it is hard to get some of these cards well centered. I'm not normally a centering nut, but this issue features guide/cut lines around the edges on front that show up as print lines if they aren't perfectly centered. And although I figured it would be easy, I have found out how tough it is to get a whole set of 35 of these cards without those annoying print lines.

I'm still thinking about throwing in the towel on this set, but I can't quite bring myself to part with it yet.

Sometimes seeing something on this board will ignite or reinvigorate a collecting niche for us. The good thing about collecting cards is there is no right or wrong way. You can sell and buy them back again, if so desired. It's been done on many occasions...Here are a few S74 miscuts that stayed from the first collection.....I guess I was interested more than anyone else. :)

http://luckeycards.com/ps74x2miscuts.jpg

1923-24 Tomas Gutierrez
 

Wow... I sold my backup set of the TG set a couple of years ago and not only did it "only" bring $50k, I have felt pain over it for years. That set took more than a decade to build, is AMAZINGLY rare and (in my mind) way more valuable. A number of the cards only had two copies known.

At the time, I felt like I could let these duplicate go, but found it way more painful that I expected.... Odd, but true...