The Cardboard Investment

Why Hello There Ebay

  Now that I was aware of what had happened over my decade long absense from the hobby, I decided it was time to look through my childhood collection to see if I had any treasures waiting to be found. I was now more confident with my abilities on ebay, and I was immediately hooked back into the hobby. I flipped through page after page of my card albums and pulled out all the big name players I remembered as a kid. Now with a stack of sure to be valuable cards, I took to Ebay to see what the cards that I had saved were now worth. The first thing I found was instant disappointment. Almost nothing I had collected was selling for more than a dollar. There were hundreds of every card I had listed on Ebay and almost all my cards were pretty much worthless. One thing I did find while looking for a hidden treasure, was get a first hand look at the evolution of sports cards. I was now finding those cards that were autographed by the players, and also seeing the cards with a little piece of their jersey cut up and embedded in the cards. This was all new to me, but I knew I needed some of these in my collection. The other thing I noticed was that some of these new cards were actually selling for a lot of money, some were selling for hundreds of dollars right out of the packs.

  Sharing my new found discoveries about the sports card market with a classmate, he revealed to me that his Uncle had passed away recently and he had inherited a very large collection of cards. Now feeling like an expert since selling the other collection I came across, I offered my services to sell the cards he had inherited. My friends Uncle was more than just a collector, he was an investor and flipper. He had probably been in the hobby since he was a kid, and it was evident that he was more than just a collector. I went over and picked up over 10,000 cards to bring home and sort through. There were cards going all the way back to the 1960s and others that were more modern. There were inserts and sets I had never seen before, while others I was already aware were worthy of my time to try and sell. He had player lots of some of the hottest rookies from the late 1990's and early 2000's, some partial card sets, and more cards than I knew what to do with. It was going to take hours, maybe even days, for me to research, list the cards on ebay, and then package them up to be sold. I had already gotten a taste of the thrill of finding a hidden gem in a box of cards, and now I had the chance to relive it all over again.

  I spent hours searching different cards I had received in this collection and tried to learn about what might be worth something and what really wasn't. I found out how to really find what something was selling for and not just what someone was asking. There was a number of things you had to know and look for if you were going to find deals and also sell your cards for the most money. My friend was going to let me keep half the money and I was using all my profits to buy more cards.

  Buyer's didn't want a lazy seller and I had to make sure my listings were neat, well described and included adequate pictures to show the condition of cards. I played around with auctions, but soon found being patient with a buy it now or best offer option would give you the best sale price most of the time. I started to build my collection as I used the majority of my expendable money on buying cards off Ebay.

  My friends collection included a lot of cards encased in hard plastic holders. I had seen card protectors like top loaders, but had never seen anything like this. They were popping up all over Ebay and soon I would learn what these  graded cards were really all about.