hi guys I have been looking into harry potter books and was wondering if anyone knew more about them as i was thinking in collecting a few for investment purposes. I may be wrong but it reminds me of how pokemon had a deep impact of a generation and that carries the same powerful emotional nostalgia and i remember harry potter being such a pivotal point for kids and adults growing up. to summerise I was wondering if harry potter books are a good investment and some guidance on what to look out for? cheers in advance for any guidance
The last time I looked into the Harry Potter books, the “1st edition” of the Philosopher’s Stone was over $50,000. It had a small print run and was distributed in a way that would have certainly damaged or put the books to use. The copy that sold was in mint condition. Anytime you collect something, going after the first edition is usually the place to start. Over $50,000 was way too much for me to start. I’m not sure what else would be desirable or have better investment potential. I don’t mind sitting back and watching this from a distance. Good luck!
www.abebooks.com/docs/harry-potter/hp-collecting-guide.shtml
$40k for first UK print, not bad
This guy is the top collector from what I have found. Good resource for learning. ULTRA RARE HARRY POTTER BOOKS IN MY COLLECTION - YouTube
something that I didn’t know before looking into books, is that most of the copies are “first edition” since the content doesn’t change. So what you are looking for are the “first print runs”
Ie. they have “ first edition first print run, first edition second print run, etc”
They also have first edition, first print runs in different languages for the different countries.
The UK books are the most valuable, then the US books.
The super high end stuff is already very expensive.
I’ve loved reading these comments - I hadn’t considered how valuable Harry Potter books could be! Time to try and dig out my copy of the first book from the late 90’s!
I think they were a great investible but the secrets been out for years so you May have missed the boat:(
Here in the UK, I distinctly remember a time at the height of Potter mania where everyone was going crazy looking for rare editions of The Philosopher’s Stone. I still have all of the early editions, nothing particularly valuable, I do have various coin and stamp sets that’re quite in demand though, they really went hard with the merchandising here.
If you’re just genuinely interested in the series, try looking up some of the Non-English versions, many countries have their own cover arts that are very thematically different to the one’s you’ll be familiar with and it provides great insight into how the franchise is perceived by other nations.
Kinda off topic but as someone mentioned the international Harry Potter books: The original Finnish Harry Potter books had the worst covers ever. I’m glad they have released the books again with better covers these days.
I mean look at this…
OT but I’ve always hoped a series of books called The Edge Chronicles would take off like Potter. I have the early books in first edition and a few signed ones. The illustrator recently worked with J.K Rowling which stoked the fires a little.