Grading isn’t for me. I’ve always collected for fun, not money. So grading my cards wouldn’t bring me any value. And I also don’t have the storage space for graded cards.
To me, nothing beats looking through my binders and seeing my cards side by side in all their glory.
I’m a bit stuck now having slabbed my collection but also having a binder. Like now I don’t have all my cards in one place or the other 
or grade them all
The urge to not want to say “urusai”, or something similar everytime I hit your escape key though… nice keyboard. Like the aesthetics of the toploaders too.
Sunk cost fallacy vs saving money
I like your collection of mixed slabs and binder, it makes sense having 1 of each artwork displayed consistently
I will always be a binder collector. Years ago I went and bought a ton of graded cards that I found nostalgic and keep those in a box with the rest of my graded cards.
I have slowly started selling most of my graded cards to help me buy more binder cards. I always prefer my binder cards to be in NM so I will happily buy graded cards to crack them.
Binder Life!
I am a binder collector but I have had some large PSA submissions. My expedition collection is quite extensive and twice I have raided my binders for mint cards to grade.
I don’t regret doing that as I have 2-3 dupes of every expedition card.
But I never look at my graded cards. And they take up so much space.
Recently I decided to liquidate 60% of the graded cards I have via auction consignment. I feel a little sad doing so as I have pulled some of the cards myself.
But the money would help me right now more than I need to continue my 3rd expedition master set lol.
The rest of my graded cards will be sold off slowly over time until all I’m left with are binders.
Now I think I will still occasionally grade cards to sell (free would be great), but my personal collection looks so good in their 9-pocket pages 
Please be careful. The new PSA slabs are not going to completely protect your cards from UV and PSA makes no claims of this. They are “more resistant” than before, but they are not likely to be 100% UV resistant.
Some sets that I collect make no sense to grade. Grading would be costly (e.g., 350+ card sets at $10-$15/card is $3,500-$5,250) and would add little value to the cards.
Other sets that I collect don’t grade easily either (e.g. think vintage reverse holos, MTG foils), so I would end up being disappointed with the grades after spending thousands of dollars to break up a complete binder. Lose-lose scenario.
I answered very cheap grading but I would only take advantage of that in order to increase the value of cards I am selling, I wouldn’t grade my collection even if it was free or there was added incentive. I prefer the way my collection looks like in binders.
I am aware slab binders are a thing but they hold significantly few cards per page and are even more of a hassle to carry around if you are going to an in person event.
I love looking through binders although, I also love having my cards graded too. I actually tend to look at my graded scans more than binders as I can store them on my phone and can easily access them anywhere while on the go. Plus without having to pull everything out in the house and risk handling them is a benefit.
If grading was cheaper I’d happily grade the majority of everything to be able to archive my sets better. However, I’ve been thinking this for a long time now and it’s more the hassle that’s putting me off, rather than the cost.
I’m in it for the long game, so there’s no rush.
I buy graded cards that i want as graded cards. My binders are my babies, a lot of which have been freed from slabs.
I periodically flip through my binders, but the majority of my graded cards are in the safe, which is upsetting as i love looking at them
What do you mean by blood tax?
I honestly think some really rare cards look better in a slab, preferably if it says ´10´. It gives some extra weight. So yeah, I´m willing to pay for that. Doesn´t hurt the investment side either.
I think what they mean by the blood tax is if your card exceeds the value you submitted it at once graded, PSA applies a value charge or upcharge as most people know it as. Therefore it can cost a lot more than just the bulk price you might be expecting to pay.
Thanks. Yeah, that is kind of stupid indeed. At the same time, the card has also become worth a lot more, so I do not have a big problem with that. Like I said, it can be worth it. Just don´t grade everything.
An example; in 2015 I pulled a Erika´s Venusaur (back when opening WotC was still a thing). It was just in really sharp condition, so I decided to send it in. It got a 10. I definitely would have enjoyed it in a binder, but putting it on display in a perfect 10 is awesome too.
What I´m trying to say is, there is a situation for both.
I like graded cards i just dont do it lol. It takes alot of time and searching for how i collect so im scared to ship them out incase of loss or damage. Also its more about encapsulation and pop for me instead of value. Since i collect predominantly foreign language cards i hardly expect 10s anyway since im after true rarity over conditional. But its also very nice when you get both
