My Timeless Question For The Ages

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chefjason

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So here it is, I've been asking myself this question since I started trolling ebay years and years ago, or else thats what it seems, I have been searching for certian players, and have run into a bit of a low point, as there are a number of cards on ebay and else where, other boards and such, and with beckett pricing being the last word, those cards have been stuck at the same price for years, and i mean 3 or more with out ever moving, I know this because I check all the time to see if its a different seller or not and usually I can remember where a card is, and a rpetty good memory for recorded/confirmed sales. my timeless question is this " if you where sitting on a card for a year or more at the same price, when do you cut loose and re-price it to sell? and yes I am well aware of all that goes on behind the scene, maybe the seller wants his money back and is not willing to let it go, or maybe they just dont care if they sell it..etc, ive heard them all, but I would like to hear ehat some of you guys think on this subject, personally if I list something on the bay or on the boards and it doesnt sell in a certian time from, usually a month or so, I drop the price to garner more interest and possibly a sale, some money is better than no money right? anyway lets hear some theories.
Jason
oh and my pc is brandon sutter, and his cards that do sell, even the high end ones do not even come close, to the BV's stated in a certain magazine. check I dare you. lol

****this question does not apply to superstars who's cards seem to hold value, this is more about cards that start out hot/good and fall off the map after a couple months after release date.*****
case in point, there is a Brandon Sutter Ultimate shield on ebay, BIN 1500 ish, umm I dont think so. whats your best guess to this cards value, and please no insulting comments about buyers/sellers,
 
I luckily haven't had to deal with this much as a buyer. As a seller, I have one card in my listings right now, a Brendan Shanahan logo patch card. I have it listed at a price that I think is fair. But if I hold it from now until I'm dust, I'm fine with that as well. It's a cool card to have around, but for the right price I'm willing to let it go. So with that explanation, I guess I would fall into the "I don't care if I sell it" category with respect to that one card. If I hold it cool, if not c'est la vie.
 
Yeah some cards do fall in the "if I don't get a good price I don't mind keeping it" category. I have a few of those myself. Others I've had in the past I get tired of flipping by in the trade box & I just move it to put the $ (or trade) towards something else that will hopefully move better to help me buy & trade for the cards I want.
 
Unless the card is pc, I am more than willing to lower my price even if it means loosing money.

A good example is a subban dominion. When I was building my set, I ended up having two of them. Both costed me $400+ to acquire, in the end I sold one of them for $215.

But I have come across sellers that won't budge and keep saying "that's my cost and I can't loose money on it" there was a card I really wanted....the card has dropped significantly in value since it was first launched, but the seller wouldn't budge at all. I offered 20% more than market value and he said no.....

I too, do not understand......
 
As for the sutter, I honestly think its <$600....there have been several similar caliber players that have sold from $300-600 which leads back to why I don't like 1/1s...they are only worth what one is willing to pay....
 
While $1500 may seem high, it's not an unreasonable amount. All it will take is a little hot streak or playoff run, and somebody may bite. Right now, I doubt the card would sell for more than $500, but it sounds to me that the seller is willing to hold onto it on the chance he gets hot. Perhaps he has a significant amount of money into it, and would rather hold onto it than take a loss. Either way, I understand where he is coming from.
 
Good Luck Jason!

I made a fair offer.
We will see who gets this super nice card in the long term :-)

As for my value, It shall be kept private.

The only way this card will be worth $1500 is if Sutter wins some major HW.

Mike
 
I personally will hold some cards for years if I don't get what I want for them or what I have into them. Others I could care less. It's a combination of how much I like the card and what I paid as to just profit. There's been many a times I've taken a $100+ hit on a card just because I want it gone and there are other times I won't take a $1 loss.

You have to ask the one most important question "Am I bored with it yet"?
 
Maybe a little comparison for you on the Sutter. I have the Ladd/Sharp CUP dual shield, and it's not autographed.

The seller originally wanted $1,000. I showed him our records of shield prices and suggested the Ladd/Sharp would end up in the $400 range. We agreed on $500. Hope that helps!
 
While I cannot speak for the 1/1 aspect of the conversation, I can speak to the other aspect of not repricing something. My reason for not repricing something is ebay is a crap shoot and if someone is not interested in something this time around, it doesn't mean that no one is interested. It just means that the person who is interested in it did not look at it this time around.

I have had several examples where I have listed card the first time when it was discounted, and it sold the second time at my full asking price.

I have also had a handful of time when I was watching/wanting a card and for one reason or another I didn't purchase it then six months later I finally pony up and buy it.

This is just my opinion from selling exclusively on Ebay for the past year...there is no rhyme or reason, it is just ebay. Once again, from a non- 1/1 point of view.
 
This is an interesting topic.
I will answer it in under each category below.

Personal Collection

For my PC guys, I am learning to wait it out and eventually the cards seem to come by my desk at some point. I have about 20 cards show up in my pc in this manner. I have been fortunate enough that many many many people know who I collect and they will eventually drop the cards off to me for a fair value.

Selling cards
If i know the person well and the card is going to a good home, I will lower my price to make it happen. If it is someone who is just plain mean, I won't bother trying to work out a deal. I much rather take the card and stick it in a box for eternity if it comes to that.
To give an example, I had a customer who loved my Adrian Peterson Auto /5. the card books at 300 but I sold it for 100 knowing how much that person loved this player and was a swell person to boot.

In general with beckett pricing

I pretty much list everything at or just below beckett values and include a best offer option. If I think the offer is fair I will let it go. If I get a really low offer I don't bother trying to negotiate. I know Beckett is frowned upon by many but you don't realize how many people still refer to that book as gospel. I get it at the expo ALL the time.

Its different strokes for different folks.
 
I live in the "Anomaly Linden" world. I've seen cards of his with outlandish prices on them. And I can sadly say that I have on occasion paid outlandish prices to acquire some of his cards. But I haven't had buyer's remorse.......yet. So it hasn't been too outta control.

I've seen cards sit......and sit.......and sit for a long time because the "Linden Tax" being charged is just too high. Does the price ever come down? Sometimes. But most of the time I have lost interest in the card and have moved on. Anything with a print run over 5 and I'm past it in an instant. The 1/1's? That's a tough one.

What are those cards worth? If one person pays "x" amount for a 1/1.....does that set the bar? Sadly it might. But when I look at a 1/1 listing, I look at it from the standpoint of "What is it worth TO ME" as opposed to trying to compare it to other cards from that product. What that card might be worth to a non-collector or what it might be worth in comparison to a bigger star in that set just doesn't cut it when I go to decide what the card is worth to me.

Do I think it's silly when one of his cards goes for twice what a Lemieux or Sakic might go for from the same set? Yup. And the legend gets built that way. But I won't compromise what that final dollar figure is to me.

I would rather never own the card if it means overpaying for it and having a bad case of buyer's remorse. There will always be another card coming down the pipe.

Common sense to me says - if something is not selling, you should lower your price to get rid of it. But this hobby lacks common sense quite often. Like I said......I'm a Linden collector.

:beer:
 
You could likely buy a full Brandon Sutter game-worn jersey for less than $1,500, a photoshoot shield for that price? Hell no.

Being a collector of ITG cards almost exclusively I know all about sellers who list cards at one crazy price and never budge. It's sad that most (though not all) of the big ITG dealers have very nice cards listed for years and years because they won't let anybody else tell them what a fair price is. I would also think that some money is better than no money but apparently some sellers just don't care or are too stubborn to let themselves look "weak" and lower a price.
 
FrozenInferno said:
You could likely buy a full Brandon Sutter game-worn jersey for less than $1,500, a photoshoot shield for that price? Hell no.
Click to expand...

There however lies a different debate. I have a Fedorov gamer in my collection however that is the only one I care for or cared for when I was collecting him. As a player collector my goal was every possible card I could attain. Did I overpay on some cards? You can bet your arse I did. I remember paying $400+ for an 04/05 HG #/10. It all comes down to your collection. Is the piece a must have?
 
No No No.....The other Steve said:
There however lies a different debate. I have a Fedorov gamer in my collection however that is the only one I care for or cared for when I was collecting him. As a player collector my goal was every possible card I could attain. Did I overpay on some cards? You can bet your arse I did. I remember paying $400+ for an 04/05 HG #/10. It all comes down to your collection. Is the piece a must have?
Click to expand...

Yes that was my opinion on it, it all comes down to someone's perceptions and interests. This time last year if you gave me $1,000 and told me to pick between a shield card and a gamer I probably would have picked the shield. Now that my interest in gamers is growing I would pick the jersey instead. If someone isn't interested in that kind of thing and really, really need that shield card then it's up to them what they are willing to pay. Whether or not the seller agrees with that price is the problem in this case :)
 
BigBarracuda said:
Maybe a little comparison for you on the Sutter. I have the Ladd/Sharp CUP dual shield, and it's not autographed.

The seller originally wanted $1,000. I showed him our records of shield prices and suggested the Ladd/Sharp would end up in the $400 range. We agreed on $500. Hope that helps!
Click to expand...

I did exactly this for the Sutter Shield card being discussed. First exchange, didnt mince words..
I gave the seller the price I paid for Rookie Year:
1/1 Cup
1/1 Dual Shield Sutter-boychuck (non-auto)
1/1 dual shield Sutter-gillies non-auto)
1/1 black diamond onyx
1/1 OPC Premier 4 patch auto

I offered a 10% premium over the highest I paid for any card in this lot, and he countered with a price hundreds more..

Fun stuff!
 
canesice said:
I did exactly this for the Sutter Shield card being discussed. First exchange, didnt mince words..
I gave the seller the price I paid for Rookie Year:
1/1 Cup
1/1 Dual Shield Sutter-boychuck (non-auto)
1/1 dual shield Sutter-gillies non-auto)
1/1 black diamond onyx
1/1 OPC Premier 4 patch auto

I offered a 10% premium over the highest I paid for any card in this lot, and he countered with a price hundreds more..

Fun stuff!
Click to expand...


In all fairness to the seller, the Ultimate AU Shield 1/1 is probably worth at least double what you paid for any one of those cards. Maybe not to you it isn't, but if you look at market data, it's pretty consistent across the board. It's pretty much a consensus that the Ultimate Rookie Shield AU 1/1 is the Holy Grail for rookie year collectors and the single rookie year card that retains most of its value year over year.
 
TanguayFan said:
In all fairness to the seller, the Ultimate AU Shield 1/1 is probably worth at least double what you paid for any one of those cards. Maybe not to you it isn't, but if you look at market data, it's pretty consistent across the board. It's pretty much a consensus that the Ultimate Rookie Shield AU 1/1 is the Holy Grail for rookie year collectors and the single rookie year card that retains most of its value year over year.
Click to expand...

I understand, and we will see (maybe). So far only 2 known people chasing it..

It is the sellers card, their choice on what they sell it for.. I'm not going to lose any sleep if I don't get this one.. As a matter of fact, I didn't expect this one to ever surface, I thought it was likely a redemption as the /25 ultimate rookie cards were, and only 2 to my knowledge have surfaced.

I agree it is a great card! And of all the 08-09 rookies, it is #1. Obviously the value is the big question...

Let the debate continue!
 
When I want to sell cards, I will price them to move. I'm not concerned about getting back what I put into the card, because this is strictly a hobby for me and I expect to "lose" money when it comes to hobbies.

For those running this as a business, I can understand a greater reluctance to take a loss.
 
To give you an idea, for my Mikkel Boedker Ultimate Shield 1/1 from 08-09, I paid 3 times the highest selling price of his Cup Black 1/1 (which surfaced three times). Boedker seems to be a similar player to Sutter, as both were top prospects with high expectations that didn't quite live up to the hype......yet.

I'm sure that if I opted to list the Boedker right now (which is extremely tempting) it would garner close to twice what I would have gotten for it even a month ago. His performance thus far in the playoffs has been pretty solid. I noticed even the Boedker supercollector over on SCF seems to be trying to move his stuff right now. Perhaps the seller of the Sutter is waiting for the same kind of market to surface on his card. That being said, I agree with you guys on the current market for the Sutter card, and that the seller may have it priced a wee bit too high. The only question is who is willing to budge first: the buyers or the seller. Remember, you may be the two or three biggest Sutter collectors out there, but there may be a whole lot of 'Canes fans, or Shield collectors who have their eyes on that very same card.
 

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