Any idea why ebay is giving away so much free money lately?

[Ronnie73]

Originally Posted by JollyElm

I'm pretty sure the ole save 15% scenarios could be just a bit of fairy dust. Virtually every time one is listed, I get gung-ho and jump all over it, but am I truly saving anything?? Dunno. I usually use sites like PSA Auction Prices Realized to get a decent idea of what I should expect to pay for certain cards I want to grab up. A week or two ago there was a discount, so I purchased a couple of Mantles (generally, all other things aside, at the cheapest/close to the cheapest prices listed for the particular grades) and, man, the pricing was nowhere near what it 'should have been.' Of course, Mantles are highly sought after, so it's just the wild west out there. The comparably graded ones I DIDN'T buy were overpriced into the ionosphere.

I guess it boils down to how much stock you put into tools like VCP, etc. If something 'should be' available for $100, yet all of the cards (and there are many) on ebay are listed for $200 and higher (and none are OBO), you gotta wonder how realistic said tools are. So we save 15% on a card that is purposefully way 'overpriced' to begin with?? The $100 price tag in this scenario doesn't reflect reality at all. If I want the card, then it's going to cost me two c-notes, not one. The whole thing is kind of funny in a way.

With the latest 15% off special, I bought these three 1961 cards:
PSA 8 #572, Brooks Robinson All Star, which was netted for about $90
PSA 8 #580, Al Kaline All Star, which was netted for about $85
PSA 7 #417, Juan Marichal RC, which was netted for about $100

The first two look real nice and are basically always listed for the 'before' price I paid for them. The Marichal is a little O/C and there's a bit of scuffing on it at the border from the printing process. The label shows it to be an early card graded by PSA. You could argue a little that I bought the slab rather than the card, but the other 7's were $200 and up, so I went for it to knock it off of my need list. Not sure how I did VCP-wise, but I think I did pretty well on the trio...but in reality, did I?? Dunno.

I understand questioning if you really saved anything. I have to assume mostly everyone is making smart purchases and getting a card that was fairly priced to begin with and then getting a true savings of 15% off with a max savings of $50 after that. My savings of $100 over the last two specials with Luke were carefully planned out. First, making sure it's actually a card I truly want and need, which in that case, there are usually more than just one card. Next, looking at past sale prices, how often the cards come up for sale, and determining the true populations between all the cards interested in. By doing all of that, I'm sure to get a card I need at the best price possible while the card being the most uncommon and likely the most difficult to purchase in the future if not purchased at that moment. By following these simple steps, I've never made a T206 purchase I've regretted but I've regretted not purchasing other T206's that come up and score high with my calculations but maybe at the time I can only afford one of two cards. The card I don't purchase, ends up being purchased very quickly by someone else, while other cards that didn't score as high, still sit there unsold.