Is this really a buyer’s market?

[packs]

Originally Posted by cardsagain74

I know that vintage prices have faltered some at the big AHs lately, but I don't get these arguments of ebay being so stagnant now. Have been looking to fill a few holes in the vintage collection for awhile (stuff like a Bart Starr rookie around grade 4, low-mid grade Maravich rookie, basically stuff in the $100-$800 range), and there have been about ten '57 T Starr rookies sold at around comps in just the last two weeks. Some auction and some BIN.

Similar story with the other '50s-'70s vintage I watch.

I guess it depends on what you collect. There are far less pre-war cards on eBay than ever before. I just searched "Ty Cobb T206" and there were 22 results for auctions (not buy it now). Of those results, only 2 cards have bids. The rest have high opening bids that people aren't interested in placing.

But five years ago I feel like you would have found 10 or 12 competitive Cobb auctions at any given time, all starting at $1.

[bcbgcbrcb]

Similar to what everybody else has mentioned here, my eBay vintage card sales are also up the last couple of years. But, I am picking and choosing which cards are for sale there, this week, I sold a Norm Van Brockton RC in a PSA 3 holder, a 1986 Donruss The Rookies Barry Bonds in a BGS 9.5 holder and a Mickey Cochrane RC in an SGC 3 holder. At the same time, I have opted to hold on to my 39 PB Ted Williams, 07 Cobb RC, etc. you get the idea. I think we are losing track of the purpose of this thread, whether or not buyers are fully able to take advantage of down market prices as numerous content creators are portraying on YouTube. I say not because eBay selection is nothing close to what it was a couple of years ago. You can settle for what’s out there, mostly low-end appeal for the grade or overpay for high eye appeal and there is no bargain being had that way. So again, I ask where is the buyer’s market that is being promoted so highly.

Let’s just call it like we see it, market was overheated and corrected and things are very tough in the hobby these days for most (except maybe the 6 and 7 figure buyers).

[packs]

Originally Posted by bcbgcbrcb

Similar to what everybody else has mentioned here, my eBay vintage card sales are also up the last couple of years. But, I am picking and choosing which cards are for sale there, this week, I sold a Norm Van Brockton RC in a PSA 3 holder, a 1986 Donruss The Rookies Barry Bonds in a BGS 9.5 holder and a Mickey Cochrane RC in an SGC 3 holder. At the same time, I have opted to hold on to my 39 PB Ted Williams, 07 Cobb RC, etc. you get the idea. I think we are losing track of the purpose of this thread, whether or not buyers are fully able to take advantage of down market prices as numerous content creators are portraying on YouTube. I say not because eBay selection is nothing close to what it was a couple of years ago. You can settle for what’s out there, mostly low-end appeal for the grade or overpay for high eye appeal and there is no bargain being had that way. So again, I ask where is the buyer’s market that is being promoted so highly.

Let’s just call it like we see it, market was overheated and corrected and things are very tough in the hobby these days for most (except maybe the 6 and 7 figure buyers).

Again, I think it depends on what you're buying. If you're into modern basketball, then it truly is a buyer's market. Mainstream rookies of modern players like Lebron have come WAY down.

Here's an article from 2021 that captured the trend even then:

https://www.one37pm.com/popular-cult...rts-cards-2021

[bcbgcbrcb]

You are absolutely right there, nobody knows the down modern (and vintage almost equally) basketball market like I do. Back in 2021, I bought one card each, every one was a rookie patch/jersey auto graded 8 or higher (except one 2001 Jordan that ended up grading an SGC 5 of the following players: Steph Curry, Kevin Durant, Luka, Joker, Giannis, Harden, Lillard, Kyrie, A Davis, Trae, 4 Ja’s, along with non-autos of: LeBron, Kobe, Jordan, Hakeem, Barkley, Duncan, Dirk, K Malone. Let’s say I spent $56K for all of those, which is pretty accurate, I sold everything this year as prices continued to plummet all year long before they got down to zero and grossed roughly $19K. That’s close to a 70% loss on everything mentioned there. Does anyone think I made the wrong player choices on who to buy? And, this is not including the Wilt, Oscar, West, Kareem, Dr J and Bird/Magic that are all down roughly the same percentage but I have decided to hang on to those thus far.

Nothing has taken a beating like the basketball card market as that was the most overinflated to begin with and most manipulated by particular influencers, auction houses, players, sneaker heads, and fractional share companies. That’s why I started a separate thread a week or two ago looking to name names of who was responsible for this.

[packs]

I wasn't immune either, but to a lesser extent. I paid up for this Jordan but not so much that I'm too upset about it. My thoughts at the time were "what if this is like my chance to buy a 52 Topps Mantle before it takes off and I don't take it?" I guess I also have the luxury of being able to hold onto it long enough to make out in the end too:

[raulus]

Originally Posted by bcbgcbrcb

You are absolutely right there, nobody knows the down modern (and vintage almost equally) basketball market like I do. Back in 2021, I bought one card each, every one was a rookie patch/jersey auto graded 8 or higher (except one 2001 Jordan that ended up grading an SGC 5 of the following players: Steph Curry, Kevin Durant, Luka, Joker, Giannis, Harden, Lillard, Kyrie, A Davis, Trae, 4 Ja’s, along with non-autos of: LeBron, Kobe, Jordan, Hakeem, Barkley, Duncan, Dirk, K Malone. Let’s say I spent $56K for all of those, which is pretty accurate, I sold everything this year as prices continued to plummet all year long before they got down to zero and grossed roughly $19K. That’s close to a 70% loss on everything mentioned there. Does anyone think I made the wrong player choices on who to buy? And, this is not including the Wilt, Oscar, West, Kareem, Dr J and Bird/Magic that are all down roughly the same percentage but I have decided to hang on to those thus far.

Nothing has taken a beating like the basketball card market as that was the most overinflated to begin with and most manipulated by particular influencers, auction houses, players, sneaker heads, and fractional share companies. That’s why I started a separate thread a week or two ago looking to name names of who was responsible for this.

Phil - I had forgotten about your misadventures in modern basketball. Probably just repressed the memory as a coping mechanism. That is a kick to the shorts for sure.

Hopefully not many of us have to endure this level of economic punishment.

[Snowman]

Originally Posted by packs

I guess it depends on what you collect. There are far less pre-war cards on eBay than ever before. I just searched "Ty Cobb T206" and there were 22 results for auctions (not buy it now). Of those results, only 2 cards have bids. The rest have high opening bids that people aren't interested in placing.

But five years ago I feel like you would have found 10 or 12 competitive Cobb auctions at any given time, all starting at $1.

I think this has more to do with the relative value of the cards themselves than anything else. Once a card eclipses a certain threshold, eBay often loses its appeal as a selling platform for a lot of sellers. 5 years ago, those cards were quite a bit cheaper, and thus eBay was a more attractive option for them as a seller. Today, more of them are being sent to the bigger auction houses where they typically fetch stronger hammer prices. But in my experience, for cards below the $1,000 level or so, eBay still flourishes.

That said, I wish more higher end transactions occurred on eBay. Because the selling fees are SO much lower there. It only costs me about $500 to sell a $15k card on eBay. Whereas it's about $1500 to $3k in fees at the big AHs.

[Peter_Spaeth]

Originally Posted by Snowman

I think this has more to do with the relative value of the cards themselves than anything else. Once a card eclipses a certain threshold, eBay often loses its appeal as a selling platform for a lot of sellers. 5 years ago, those cards were quite a bit cheaper, and thus eBay was a more attractive option for them as a seller. Today, more of them are being sent to the bigger auction houses where they typically fetch stronger hammer prices. But in my experience, for cards below the $1,000 level or so, eBay still flourishes.

That said, I wish more higher end transactions occurred on eBay. Because the selling fees are SO much lower there. It only costs me about $500 to sell a $15k card on eBay. Whereas it's about $1500 to $3k in fees at the big AHs.

How are you paying only 3 percent?

[Snowman]

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth

How are you paying only 3 percent?

You just need to pay for an ebay store. Which is $21.95 per month. Once you have a store, you get 1,000 listings per month with no insertion fees and your selling fees are 12.35% on the first $2500 and just 2.35% on anything after that to cover the payment processing fees. It's a great deal. I sold one of my 48 Leaf Jackies there for $15k and my total fees came to $602.50.

A lot of people don't know this. I have buyers trying to negotiate with me on other platforms and they always assume I'm paying 10-15% in ebay fees until I tell them otherwise. They're always surprised. Ebay should market their fee structure to this hobby. I bet it would get a lot of nice high end cards back to their platform. Many of the large AHs are basically just stealing money from us, IMO. The smaller auction houses that deal with mostly lower value cards, it makes sense. But with the big ones who won't even return your phone call for less than $25k, those guys are just robbing everyone blind.

[Exhibitman]

Originally Posted by Snowman

You just need to pay for an ebay store. Which is $21.95 per month. Once you have a store, you get 1,000 listings per month with no insertion fees and your selling fees are 12.35% on the first $2500 and just 2.35% on anything after that to cover the payment processing fees. It's a great deal. I sold one of my 48 Leaf Jackies there for $15k and my total fees came to $602.50.

If you have cards to sell worth substantially more than $2500 each, the store makes sense. If not, you are paying 13.25% on the entire amount paid including taxes and shipping plus $0.30 per order.

[Snowman]

Originally Posted by Exhibitman

If you have cards to sell worth substantially more than $2500 each, the store makes sense. If not, you are paying 13.25% on the entire amount paid including taxes and shipping plus $0.30 per order.

Another good option for cards above $1,000 is to send them to Probstein. He only charges 5% total fees for anything above that threshold. But ya, if you're selling cheaper cards, then you're going to be paying high fees pretty much anywhere, except for MySlabs, which is about 5%. But buyers expect a discount there, so you'll pay for it one way or another. Sorta like selling at shows.

[Gorditadogg]

Originally Posted by Snowman

Another good option for cards above $1,000 is to send them to Probstein. He only charges 5% total fees for anything above that threshold. But ya, if you're selling cheaper cards, then you're going to be paying high fees pretty much anywhere, except for MySlabs, which is about 5%. But buyers expect a discount there, so you'll pay for it one way or another. Sorta like selling at shows.

Well, you can sell them on Net54 and pay nothing


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[Exhibitman]

Interesting tidbit re modern-ish cards. I say "ish" because modern to me and modern to a collector who started in 2020 are entirely different things. I have quite a nice stack of 1996-1999 baseball stars and numbered parallels and I was pricing them for sale at shows using recent eBay pricing. Prices are not down across the board for modern-ish baseball parallel and limited cards. Most prices are down but some players and some issues are doing just fine, particularly non-RC Jeter and Griffey, many of which have gone up since I last checked them about 15 months ago. A few of the limited and popular late 1990s cards are actually going up. Modern boxing is up; it never really caught the COVID wave.

My sample is limited, just a few shows, but the 1980s-1990s cards are popular with younger collectors and collectors of modest means. One thing that bodes well for vintage is that I see kids excited to get modern cards reproducing the classics that they cannot afford (Topps and Bowman golden age) and commons from older and obscure sets.

I am talking raw cards, not slabs, BTW.

[todeen]

Originally Posted by Exhibitman

Interesting tidbit re modern-ish cards. I say "ish" because modern to me and modern to a collector who started in 2020 are entirely different things. I have quite a nice stack of 1996-1999 baseball stars and numbered parallels and I was pricing them for sale at shows using recent eBay pricing. Prices are not down across the board for modern-ish baseball parallel and limited cards. Most prices are down but some players and some issues are doing just fine, particularly non-RC Jeter and Griffey, many of which have gone up since I last checked them about 15 months ago. A few of the limited and popular late 1990s cards are actually going up. Modern boxing is up; it never really caught the COVID wave.

My sample is limited, just a few shows, but the 1980s-1990s cards are popular with younger collectors and collectors of modest means. One thing that bodes well for vintage is that I see kids excited to get modern cards reproducing the classics that they cannot afford (Topps and Bowman golden age) and commons from older and obscure sets.

I am talking raw cards, not slabs, BTW.

Late 1990s #'d Barry Larkin are still strong. A Fleer Brilliants 24 Karat with printing line, not graded, went for more than $1k on ebay this month. 64 bids.

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