Most cards that Ive bought for way cheaper, I would have just ended up buying for more later if needed to to complete my goals. The only card that comes to mind that I probably wouldnt spend on now is the lillies clefairy promo. I bought it around cosmic eclipse just to complete all the character rare style cards for less than 20 bucks. It’s like 200 bucks now.
Another one that just came to mind is a cp6 booster box. I got it in 2019 for 90 bucks. I love it in my collection and am glad I got it because I simply could not afford its current price.
Maybe against the rules but the Mario Pikachu Hanafuda deck I bought at retail price which I think was about 2000 yen. Looks like it goes to close 100,000 maybe these days lol
Not an individual card, but something I enjoyed doing just before lockdown and into 2020 was completing the elite trainer box collection. I’ve sold almost all of them now, but it was a lot of fun to complete a sealed set that was attainable but challenging. Defintely wouldn’t want to/be able to spend what it would take to complete a set today. I completed the set at the time for right around $5000, with half of that being plasma storm
I’m small time. Wasn’t even around during the covid boom to know what prices may or may not have reached.
I’m not sure how much they would realistically go for at the height/now, but back around 2012 maybe I bought a bunch of WOTC era holos for the equivalent of $1.13 each. I’m not even too sure why I did it since I didn’t end up buying anymore cards until 2021 lol.
One example is Sabrina’s Gengar which is $88 on TCGPlayer which I would never buy today lol.
edit: Even more insane would be a family friend I knew whose dad was rich and used to buy him multiple booster boxes back when we’d only be buying packs. So he had binders full of Base-e-Series holos. I had sort of lost interest and it seemed weird to ask for any so I never did, but I found out later that all of it was given away to another kid when he left for college. Imagine the windfall if that other kid kept it. Binders of mint holos for $0.
Dope stories and a fun read. Had to bring out my all time favs.
All 3 cards marked the day where iirc was one of my first submissions. I gave these cards to a client who came to my shop back in 2017-2018 who would clean me of singles. Little did I know, sparking the conversation would lead me here to have one of the best friendships I’ve ever made in over 15 years. Thanks guys, they know who they are
Purchased these for $4 CAD raw. There were way too cheap for their time.
Consecutive grades as well
Traded half a booster box of Guardians Rising. Yes, Guardians Rising. Call of Legends didn’t sell at my shop at asking price, so people traded most of the SL’s. Queue in Tapu Lele GX and the rest is history
PS, this is first time ever, in over 5 years since I’ve had this card, that I’ve publicly showcased this POP 21 PSA 10 SL10 Rayquaza. I was the 18th back in 2017-2018.
I know the feeling, especially the Japanese Pikachu promos and FA Supporters. To name some key examples:
Bought the Mario & Luigi Pikachu promo boxes; Charizard cosplay Pikachu promos boxes; Raquaza cosplay Pikachu promo boxes; etc. all for pre-order prices. Not sure what those pre-order prices were anymore, but probably like 75 bucks per pair including shipping/import fees I’d say. All of them are 1.5k+ USD per card by now.
The 20th anniversary ‘Mitsuhiro Arita autographed’ XY-P Pikachu promo that came together with the Mew. Bought the Pikachu for 30 bucks or so, but it’s also north of 2k by now.
Basically all 7 of my Art Academy Pikachu. In order, I bought them for 300 USD; 320 USD; 512.60 euros; 500 GBP; 1k USD; 1k USD; 3k USD. But all of them are north of 7k by now, and the rarer ones like the Queen of Hearts or Orange Raincoat ones even 15k+.
The Masked Royal PSA-10. Overpaid for it at the time for 3.4k USD. It’s worth 50k+ now.
Then again, these are all cards I bought for my personal collection, and I don’t intend to ever sell. One card I did buy on impulse and did sell later on for a huge profit: PSA-10 Red Cheeks 1st edition Base Set Pikachu. I already had a raw copy, but this PSA-10 had a very minor chance of being a thin 1st edition version (couldn’t tell for sure on the pictures), so I bought it thinking it was worth the shot. I paid 400 USD for it near the start of 2019. Little more than a year later mid-2020 I sold it for 7.5k USD, and it even peaked at 12k USD near the end of 2020…
Tbch, apart from low value foreign cards, I can only think of a single card that’s worth less than what I paid for it (for cards pre-2022), which is the XY-P Pokémon with YOU Wagon promo Pikachu. I had been collecting Pikachu for 5 years before one finally popped up for sale. I missed that one, and it sold for ~135k Japanese Yen (which would have been 1.5k USD with middleman/shipping/import fees for me at the time). Then three more popped up simultaneously in response to that first one, and I was able to win one of them for 77k Japanese Yen (900 USD including fees for me). As you may have guessed, more and more popped up, and within halve a year they were available for as low as 125-150 USD. During Covid they had raised in value quite a bit and even peaked at around 1.25k USD on average, but it seems they’ve since dropped back down to ~400 USD right now.
(Either way, I don’t regret buying it for 900 USD. I would have waited a bit longer nowadays, learning from that mistake. But I would have regret it A LOT more of those 4-5 first sales were the only ones and I had missed out. I’m still very happy to have this beautiful card in my collection.)
The single most mind-boggling moment for me has to be when 1st ed Jungle Pika was stonking in October 20. To see one of those in a 10 go for the same amount I paid for three 1st ed Jungle booster boxes back in the day was just absurd. Even now it’s almost $100.
I think on my third day of being on E4 back in October 2020, @Quuador shared his FA supporter collection in a thread and the art of the EBD Lillie happened to catch my eye. Something about it just evoked some bittersweet nostalgic memories. I did end up buying a Japanese one off Ebay about a week later, and oh boy am I glad I did at the time…
