The hobby morale is low video

[JustinD]

Originally Posted by destijl03

I'll go ahead and admit up front that I'm not familiar with the ebbs and flows of the hobby as most here are. I'm a data analyst by profession, so I love looking at all of the research and analyses that have already been done over the years here on N54, as well as some of my own. I agree with you that most card prices will come back down to pre-pandemic levels, especially modern cards (Ohtani may be the outlier). But with pre-war vintage, that I'm not so sure about. What I see when I look at pre-war vintage sales data back to 2005 is that cards were severely undervalued in comparison to other eras and their respective price increases over time leading up to the 2020-2021 boom. I think that the current value of pre-war vintage is the new baseline. I personally don't see those values falling to pre-pandemic levels, but again I'm not familiar enough with the ebbs and flows to feel confident in that assessment.

I would agree to disagree, but that is just dandy. I like to follow my own drummer at times.

I feel (again for the room, "I") much like the investor group of a few years prior to this, things will settle. I think the elephant in the room is that modern crashed so quick and so soon, that exactly like the stragglers of the meme stock game they could not accept the change.

If you pay attention to the Geoff Wilsons and all the flippers of modern, they are currently treating vintage like it was gold or mutuals as a safe investment until their speculative 'rookie gold refractors' rocket to the moon again. It's a hedge bet causing the boost in current interest and true collectors are buying up because of FOMO.

The adrenaline rush of flipping for 100k more in the next auction just won't be there in the coming year to regain the losses they have incurred in those massive Zion PSA buys. They will move on, just like they went from crypto to nfts to meme stocks back to crypto and cards...the beat goes on. The extra demand they are causing by the shift to vintage will slowly subside.

It will happen again in the future, it always follows a cycle...but FOMO is not something to panic about. The amount of borrowing that many of them did because they thought this was "sure thing" is what brought down PWCC. The credit card bills and HELOCs currently maxed in an inflationary market is going to bring some serious piles of cards to market in the coming year. Shirts will be lost and that's just life. Liquidate...bankruptcy...new get rich quick scheme...circle of life. If the FED was not handcuffed by political election pressures we would have much higher interest rates than now...what will happen after November 2024 if consumer spending continues the current pressure?

If you are collecting mid-grade like most of us...its most logically coming down. The high grade will sit in collections for years until the owners feel they can break even. That stuff will be missing like DB Cooper unless someone dies, especially if it was bought in the past 3 years.

These are my opinions only, real economic or investment advice you have to pay for....

[Touch'EmAll]

Morale is low. Uh, ok, to some degree. Depends on which boat you're sitting. Did you buy pre-pandemic, during pandemic, recently post-pandemic. Did you buy top tier pre-war HOFers, did you buy post war vintage, did you buy modern. All depends on what you bought and when.

But whatever you did in the past, too late to change, water under the bridge.

Now the big question is what do you do from this day forward? What is your budget. What cards do you prefer. What cards do you honestly think have good chance increasing in value - short term and/or long term.

Yes, I can see if you were unlucky with past purchases, your morale is probably low. But there are some people who were lucky where the morale is still quite good.

Fortunately, I guess us dinosaurs here on Net54 have a nice stash from years ago. Morale is decent. Got lucky I guess.

[packs]

Originally Posted by Touch'EmAll

Morale is low. Uh, ok, to some degree. Depends on which boat you're sitting. Did you buy pre-pandemic, during pandemic, recently post-pandemic. Did you buy top tier pre-war HOFers, did you buy post war vintage, did you buy modern. All depends on what you bought and when.

But whatever you did in the past, too late to change, water under the bridge.

Now the big question is what do you do from this day forward? What is your budget. What cards do you prefer. What cards do you honestly think have good chance increasing in value - short term and/or long term.

Yes, I can see if you were unlucky with past purchases, your morale is probably low. But there are some people who were lucky where the morale is still quite good.

Fortunately, I guess us dinosaurs here on Net54 have a nice stash from years ago. Morale is decent. Got lucky I guess.

Quite honestly if this is the boat you're in then you haven't been collecting for very long. The majority of us are LONG time collectors used to a hobby with an average uptick in prices that has gone out of whack entirely over the last three years.

Every card in my collection has appreciated 4,5 6 or 10 times over but the problem is that the same is true for everything I want to buy.

That's why people are low on the hobby. You're talking about investments while most of us are just trying to collect.

[Exhibitman]

What all of this discussion points to is that you can't really straddle the fence between collector and investor, or be agnostic about the finances of your collection, not at today's values. If you are a collector and you know you aren't selling off your cards in the foreseeable future absent a calamity, then this is all an academic exercise. If you are an investor, you have to move in and out of things as the money seems to flow, hopefully by anticipating trends and buying or selling into them, hopefully unsentimentally. It isn't easy to make those distinctions, but in life not a lot is easy peasy. Frankly, not being able to decide whether to sell vastly profitable cards, or whether to buy a five-figure card, are wonderful problems to have.

[Yoda]

I believe Dutch tulips are starting to wilt. Since I am Yoda, I can speak in metaphors.

[RCMcKenzie]

Originally Posted by Yoda

I believe Dutch tulips are starting to wilt. Since I am Yoda, I can speak in metaphors.

Man, that's deep. My morale is good. Having fun as normal. FWIW

[Seven]

Originally Posted by Yoda

I believe Dutch tulips are starting to wilt. Since I am Yoda, I can speak in metaphors.

Is this some reference to Tulip Mania, and the fact that Student Loan payments are coming back in full force, thus affecting the card market? Or am I reading too deep into things?

[Exhibitman]

Originally Posted by Yoda

I believe Dutch tulips are starting to wilt. Since I am Yoda, I can speak in metaphors.

Starting to wilt, tulips are.

[Snowman]

Hobby morale is not low. SCR Ryan's morale is what's low. With regard to everything and everyone. All the time. It's sad.

[todeen]

Originally Posted by JustinD

If you are collecting mid-grade like most of us...its most logically coming down. The high grade will sit in collections for years until the owners feel they can break even. That stuff will be missing like DB Cooper unless someone dies, especially if it was bought in the past 3 years....

DB Cooper is nice imagery, but it shows our age. What's something more modern? Art theft?

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[ullmandds]

market sure seems to have lost it's zeal for late 70's high grade topps commons...babe ruth...not so much!!!!