How many cards total in your collection?
 

Just curious. Obviously there are different type collectors.

Currently 17 cards in my collection.

But that is because I focused on fewer but higher quality cards(within my budget)

I used to have a lot more cards but decided to change my focus and how I collect.
I used to have so much money tied up in a lot of cards that when some of the higher end cards I wanted I could not get because I was not liquid and I could not sell them fast enough.

So I liquidated all of them and then slowly and strategically started to get 1 quality card at a time.

300 prewar cards but post war, have thousands in my Topps Cubs collection 1951 to current.

Is this talking about total cards you have, or cards you really care about? I have about 15,000 cards in the first category, and more like 3,500 in the second. Most of my cards aren't worth much.

More than I can afford.

Are you asking about just pre-war cards, or all cards? Many collectors who have sizable pre-war collections will possibly have sizable post-war (1942-1980) collections, as well as also possibly having what I call junk-era (1981-1999) and modern (2000-today) collections. Also, are you strictly talking cards or are you including PCs, exhibits, pins, stamps, silks, felts, etc.?

And if anyone does any type of set collecting, getting to 1,000 cards is nothing. I would have suggested adding a couple more levels, say 5,000 and then 10,000 cards/items as well.

My leftover junk wax era common boxes alone would vault me into the top category. Not sure if that’s what you’re truly asking, though.

Probably just under 500. I have a very specific list of what I want my collection to look like and don't really deviate from it that much.

I estimate in the 500-1000 range. It used to be more, but most of it was junk wax or shiny stuff and I jettisoned that a while ago to focus on vintage. Fewer cards total, but more high-value ones.

Freaking addicts! I am well over a thousand...
and let's don't talk about that previous collection.

This was my plan, although not at the level of your cards. And then I got sucked into rabbit holes and which I had fewer cards. Sigh. Fun problem I suppose.

This is exactly what I did. I traded almost all of my cards the last few years to focus on Cobb and WaJo. I have 37 total cards. 23 are Cobbs or WaJos. Probably will get rid of most of those 14 non Cobb/WaJo. Might keep 5 of them.

Chad

I have about 500 prewar cards and thousands of postwar cards.

I'm always surprised when collectors have under 10,000 cards. :) I'm somewhere in the 50,000-100,000 range and my collection is WAY smaller now than it was in the 80's.

Wow

I am now better understanding the Thread we have going on about Inheritance and how complicated it can be to sell, or split etc.

I know alot of people with tons of cards but I never realized so many not only had over a thousand but some over 10K plus.

I would not know how to keep track of them, locate specific ones that I want to look at or sell, keep track of what the cost of each was etc. let alone my "estate" doing it for me.

WOW I am impressed with thee forums level of Card Addicts and those truly dedicated to the chase of a card and the completing of sets.

I haven't counted my modest collection of cards, but I will estimate somewhere between 500 and 1,000 all total. I have:

1 notebook/binder of 1953 Bowman, complete set

1 notebook/binder of pre-war up to 1976, no sets just cards I like

1 album of tobacco, n172, n284, n28, t205, t206, t207 and steam locomotives, of all things

Here is my collection, and where I keep them. Some of my stuff will be going to the safe deposit box soon.

t206 set, over half way there. 1933 Goudey set and t205 set, over a thousand.

This is fascinating to me. Jeff, what did your collection look like before you sold it off to focus more?

Mine are definitely not all high value. Last weekend I bought over 10,000 cards at an estate sale for $60. Mostly 90's football, with some 80's baseball (including an 85 Topps complete set) thrown in. Still going through them. It's been good cheap fun.

My answer is a paradox, since the question does not distinguish among pre-war, post-war and junk wax:

Not nearly enough and way too many.

Actually I was all over the place as an early collector. Always focused on pre 1930’s stuff but I chased cards of early Hall of Famers cards, autographs, photo’s. But never focused on a set, or an item or type of item.

Started by seeing friends collections and then going into baseball card shops thru out Long Island and got Mostly Raw cards but got addicted to graded cards so to my lack of experience, easier to compare and determine pricing, easier to sell. Had all different Stars from all different sets. But then I wanted a Joe Jackson Rookie CARD And other rare jackson Cards. But was not liquid and missed out on them.
Sold/traded all and had my first Joe Jackson Rookie card low grade but it was my 1 and only card and I was hooked. Then I wanted 1 Ruth card earlier the better. So I got a nice 1921 e121 Ruth throwing Pose ( I believe it was an SGC 5). So now 2 cards over budget but done and happy. Then picked up some other nice cards and again small collection and nice for me.

Then before I knew it I was addicted and got some other cards ie Pinkerton Joe jackson. But I really wanted a Redsox Ruth Card. So I sold my all my Jackson’s (regret selling the Pinkerton Joe jackson) and my 1921 Ruth and some stocks and bought the Ruth Rookie card I have now.

From their I tried staying focused on my goal of a Ruth Card of every year if possible and every joe jackson card I could get if possible.

So those are and always will be my priorities

But along the way I want to try and get rare cards of some of the big stars from the early days.

Like everyone I sometimes see something I like but not in my focus area and buy it then need to flip it to get back on track. Sometimes that causes me to miss cards.

I budget myself to approx 2 cards a year but this year so many auctions with so many cards I want and that I have not seen in years and/or may never see again for a long time.

So I blew it the last 90 days or so and bought to many cards but no regrets all within my target and focus of my collection

Until the next auction with the next card I want. But now I will probably have to sell something to buy something or trade something (which is tough because I get attached to my cards) and it is tough because I feel like if I sell a card then it takes away or diminishes my collection.

My card count 9 Joe jackson, 4 Ruth, 2 Wagner, 1 Cobb, and 1 Mathewson.

So what do I trade or sell for my next card is a tough call for me.

But that is the joy of collecting

453 =
333 Hall of Famers +
120 Significant Others

-Scott

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Very unique Jeff! Don’t know if I could do what you’ve done but super cool.

But that is part of the fun. Digging through an old box or binder you maybe hadn't looked at in 5, 10, 20 years, and re- discovering something you forgot you had. It is a similar rush to opening a pack of cards and getting a surprise seeing what you pulled.

I had over 25,000 at one time + 1000 + memoribilia pieces. Sold most, now down to maybe 100 because 19th. Century is what I collect now.

Prewar is probably 400 ish?

up to i970? Probably 3000?

After that.... I might be up around 50,000 maybe more

About 65 pre and post war cards, another 10-15 memorabilia cards.
I collect other stuff tho.

How about "how many pre-war cards in your collection?" or "how many hundred year old cards in your collection?"

Hmmm

My browser bookmark takes me to ‘new posts’ so as sometimes happens I missed seeing the forum as being prewar. I voted >1000 since I have most Topps sets from 1957 they the early 80s in binders and many fb and hockey sets as well.

Limiting it to prewar I’d answer ‘about 100’, the majority being t206 and t205.

how many
 

1 to 10 cards ?.....wow , seems awfully small number for a collector

wait...
 

How many of a single card issue and number?

Not sure if I am a "collector" or a "hoarder" - but I'm guessin over 100K

I voted 500-1000, but realistically I think the answer you are looking for is ~300.

I have 794 cards tracked and itemized individually. these range from a green cobb to a 1981 Topps Mike Kenn RC (football). When I got back into collecting I did not know the difference between a mint looking card and a PSA 9. So when I started looking at card values, I pulled out way too many cards into individual holders. I figured every card worth around $30 should be in its own holder. little did I know most were really worth $1.

This does not include the 1000s more I have in complete sets : 89 Fleer, donruss, topps, upper deck, every traded/update set from 82 - 89, etc...

Part of the problem with my initial question/poll is that pre war seems way too restrictive. And vintage is way too subjective.

I assume people started using prewar terminology in the 70s. But that’s now 50 years ago.

Cards from the 1970s might be junk but they are now probably vintage.

Maybe some day pre war will be moved forward to mean Vietnam War. Who knows.

I knew I was somewhere near 500, so I did a quick inventory -

N-cards (7)
T3 (9)
T200 (4)
T205 (112)
T207 (22)
T209 (16)
E90-1 (6)
E92 family (68)
M101-2 (66)
1915 CJ (6)
E121 (33)
R310 (7)
1934 Goudey (38)
1953 Bowman (209)
Other (20)

Looks like I'm at 623. Can you tell I'm a spread-too-thin set collector?

Recalculating

Pre war I have 157, but post war including junk wax era the stacks are too tall to count.

I'm in the same boat as a lot of folks with well over 1k cards. Many of these are from from my younger collecting days(70's & 80's). I have around 40 pre-war cards. Mostly T206 HOF.

An interesting poll, with reference to this board, would be to make the poll be for cards from 1945 and earlier. I still have over 1000 :) but I am sure many don't when they don't add in their post war stuff.

I probably have less than 10 post war cards. I wouldn't count this one in that poll.
.

pre war: 540
post war thru 1969 : 520
70's : 2100
80's : 1750
90's: 4500

I have between 12 and 15 cards in my collection. I also had quite a bit more but also choose to liquidate and choose quality over quantity and it's made collecting much more enjoyable for me.

I use to have a lot of cards (not nearly as many as most of you) but eventually I would sell a few at a time to go and chase one bigger card. Rinse and repeat. Then it came to a point that I have to save to buy something new because I just don't want to sell anything else in my small collection. I am very happy with the ones I have. There are a few more that I really want and thankfully with prices being more stable and even lowering on many, I can still grab some as the ship as not apparently sailed yet for those.

Damnit Steve, thanks for phucing up my day and making me feel like an old fart. Holy crap, I never really thought about "the 1970s" like that and then being reminded that's now 50 years ago. :eek::eek::eek:


Now I gotta go find that thread about what I'm going to do with my cards before I croak...:p

My prewar part is in the 50-100 range, but my Ripken collection alone is somewhere north of 3,500 cards.

Have about 15 1989 Fleer factory sets so there's about 10,000 right there. ( I got a good deal on them!)

All in I'd have to guess more than 50,000.

Now that I see that in writing, I realize that maybe I should thin the herd a little. :rolleyes:

Any estimate about how many different Ripken cards that comes to without duplicates? That’s amazing.

Like many others, pre-war is a much smaller number than total. Somewhere just under 100 seems right for 1930s and earlier.

A few years ago, I actually had my total collection under 100 cards, but then the pandemic hit and I had too much time on my hands and anxiety to relieve. And then I discovered Japanese baseball cards. And now my young son is also interested in baseball, so we collect RCs for Ohtani, Guerrero Jr, Wander Franco, et al. Now my collection is truly over the place:

Prewar: >100

1940s-70s American: ~350
1940s-60s Japanese: 2000+

New cards (with my son): ~150

Hi

Just curious what kind of cards are in your 12 to 15 card collection

Pre-War: 3
1940s: 1 (Furillo RC)
1950s: 19
1960s: 54
1970s: 40 (Mostly Jim Palmer & Brooks)
1980s: 20 (Rickey RC and the tail end of Palmer's career)
1990s: 3 (RCs for Chipper, Pudge & Shaq)
2000+: 35 (a Miggy RC and a smattering of Topps Heritage)

175 cards.

I've got a handful of loose cards around, but those could be thrown out/donated tomorrow, so I didn't think counting those was the point of the exercise.

Since I got back into collecting 7-8 years ago, I've had to keep telling myself to be intentional about quality over quantity. If I ever needed to (now is a good time to go read the thread on inheritances/passing on your collection/etc), quality is SO much easier to liquidate than quantity. I've also found in that time, that I enjoy a lower quantity of higher quality cards just as much as a higher quantity of cards.

I don't really collect sets anymore. I stick to nice-looking cards of HOF, and where the budget allows, HOF rookies.

Pre-war items were not on my radar at all until I joined net54 a few years back. I'd love to collect more pre-war, and I've bought 2 HOF tobacco cards in the last 6 months, but with my current collecting budget, pre-war HOF are tough to come by. Maybe one day...

For now, I'll acquire nice cards as they come up for sale, all while enjoying the journey, and the people, and the cards I already have. I'm younger than a lot of card collectors, so time is on my side.

It looks like I have the following 665 items that are part of sets from Pre WW II era...but I have quite a few other items like cancelled checks, tobacco packs, a signed business card, a signed letter, as well as programs, books, magazines, etc. from that era and even a Piedmont Tobacco chair.

My post WW II cards from sets would be at least 125,000 if I included baseball, football, basketball, hockey, non sports...not gonna count the "junk" duplicates in boxes in the attic that I need to get rid of.

B18 Blankets (21)

N107 (1)
N114 (1)
N115 (1)
N116 (1)
N124 (1)
N128 (1)
N131 (5)
N135 (3)
N140 (1)
N212 (1)
N213 (1)
N245 (22)
N257 (2)
N258 (2)
N259 (2)
N343 (1)
N356 (1)

P2 Sweet Caporal Pin (1) Young

R319 Goudey (1) Foxx

S74 Silks (11)

T36 Auto Drivers (3)
T88 Mutt & Jeff (1) Oh You Cubs
T100 Silhouettes (1) Fireman
T201 Double Folders (19)
T202 Triple Folders (2)
T205 Gold Borders (293)
T219 Champion Pugilists (158)
T227 Series of Champions (68)
T330 Piedmont Art Stamps (38)

WG-5 National Game (1) Bender




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Pre-War-2300+
Pst-War-60,000+