I buy things I like and think are cool, and when/if a time comes I no longer think those things are cool, I sell them and buy even cooler stuff.
I capped my personal collection at a maximum of 12 cards because that’s how many I am able to have on display and only collect PSA 10’s.
Anything below PSA 10 gets sold and if I want to add a new card to my collection, I force myself to sell one of the 12 existing ones.
This may change in the future if I get a bigger office with more room for display, but for me if it’s a card you’re willing to put in a box and not look at for months/years, you probably can sell it without risk of having collector’s regret in the future.
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Before you decide you want to let go of an item, think to yourself, ‘am I able to buy this back, even at a lower grade, if one day I decide to add it back to my collection’. If the answer is yes, sure, go for it, since you’re able to buy it back if you felt that you made a mistake letting it go.
However, if the answer is no, whether it be the item being too high a financial barrier, even in lesser condition, or the item being very unique (error, OC/MC, rare) hence there’s not many out there, then you’d have to take some more time to think it through before letting it go.
Selling a PSA 10 Base Set Charizard but being able to afford a NM copy is very different compared to selling a PSA 1 Illustrator for example.
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I sell only when I am interested in a more expensive and more rare card than what I am selling. I’m sure this has already been said though
Almost everything in my collection is available for sale for the right price (but don’t get me wrong, a lot of it would need to be seriously overpaid for).
I collect a little differently in the sense that many times I don’t necessarily but what I like versus I’ll buy something that I think is cheap so once they go up I sell and so on and so forth.
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At this moment I am keeping 2 of each (card/box/anything I have) and will try to sell 10% of what is left.
Such wisdom in one sentence, this should be heard and digested by so many of us (me included)…
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Personally, I keep whatever I think I won’t find again on the market.
Buy everything, hold forever !
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For my core long-term collection, i typically have a narrative and story i want to tell - cards that fit in that narrative i never touch. Not rational since that narrative includes a psa 10 1st jungle eevee for example which can be easily acquired back at a lower price, but in the end money isn’t everything and I think I’m still a collector first.
If the cards don’t fit in that story then I’m open to selling it. Which to sell specifically I’ll have to observe the market, although a good general rule is the more easily acquirable stuff goes out the window first.
I kind of have separate sections of my collection. My display Collection which I will never sell which is more sentimental and weird and cool stuff I have. Sealed Stuff, and my binder collection. I have a lot of random stuff so if I want some money I’ll just have a look if there’s anything I have which is worth selling that I don’t mind letting go of. A lot of the sealed stuff I will happily let go of for the right price.
You could just advertise everything you aren’t emotionally attached to at optimistic prices and see if they sell. I do this now and again with some of my items (usually duplicates), but basically I can’t help spending all of that money on more cards. The other point from a financial perspective is sometimes it makes sense to sell something that’s just had massive growth (e.g. Evolutions boxes), because it probably won’t go much higher for a while and then use the money on something else which has more room to grow
I haven’t sold any yet. But if I did if have a 1st ed. psa 10 of a card, I’d consider selling my unlimited 9 version of that card to maybe round out another part of my collection.
You just need to be clear on what you want to collect. For myself, it’s raw sets. Otherwise another option I see is always buying two of things…
Recently with all the price increases, I have been selling some of my psa cards and sealed things to fund other collection goals. When deciding which psa card to sell, I just sold the ones that I didn’t feel as strongly about anymore, or some that were my least favorite.
There are a couple questions to ask yourself if you decide to sell.
Are you happy with the profit? Cards will inevitably rise in price forever (unless something crazy happens) but as long as you are happy with the profit you take vs what you spent originally then you should be good. I guess the sale just needs to be worth it in your eyes.
Will you want to own (the thing you are selling) this again in the future? If so, you probably don’t want to sell it, mainly because you will never be able to buy it for the original price you paid and you will most likely lose money.
Are you finding other collection goals? This could be a pretty good reason to sell things. Maybe you don’t want to collect “set X” anymore and what to start collecting “set Y” instead.
Hopefully this helps!
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