This is exactly right! We have long been spoiled in our hobby and have gotten used to being able to buy the best of the best of almost anything in high psa 10 grades with a middle class income. (I find myself being guilty of falling into this psychological trap myself at times) If you compare our hobby to many other older hobbies, getting PSA 10 or equivalent copies of iconic top items tend to be reserved for very wealthy individuals or take a long time to save for.
If people start adapting to the idea that 5-8ās are beautiful, collectible cards and feeling lucky that they were here towards the beginning of this hobby when they were able to easily afford some psa 10ās they will be much happier. This idea that you need to collect all the psa 10ās and that if you donāt you have failed as a collector is hugely ambitious and sets you up for disappointment.
@jacobm9 This is pretty much what Iām banking on and thinking myself. I started off with all 5-7 quality cards with some occasional 9-10 candidates and rarely a graded card. I know everyone always points directly to pop reports to show how many of a particular grade there is. Does anyone ever reply with the amount of collectors in America alone? Let alone the whole world. Eventually every wotc 9 and 10 will be gone or very high priced. Or it should be at least we will see. Which will lead more and more people to ungraded or PSa 5ās-7:s
Yep itās DOA. President already promised veto. Itās not getting 2/3 vote after the veto even if it miraculously passed Senate (although it wonāt). There could be a second round coming (maybe late summer)ā¦but half of America hasnāt even received the first one
I am a little stressed tbh. I am a small time collector I donāt have any cards worth 1k+(maybe if I wait a few days my PSA 9 Lugia from Aquapolis will be). Iāve never paid more then 550$ for a card. A lot of the cards I got for 30$ a year to month ago are like x10 the price but I donāt want to sell. I merely collect but at this point I feel stupid not to and if the bubblebathbath pops(which it always does) I will feel even dumber. I guess this is my first seller market since getting in the hobby seriously and itās kinda making me bananas. I am buying a lot tho still cards I like that I think are steals right now.
Sell the stuff you donāt feel attached to. Thatās what I have been doing. Yes, some kind of retrace is inevitable and the market wonāt stay as a sellers market forever (they never do). This is a good opportunity to really focus your collection and profit from the buying euphoria on card you didnāt intend to keep forever.
This is an interesting thread. My personal opinion - people who buy high end cards are still working but now suddenly have unexpected disposable income as they are no longer going on vacations, or to restaurants, or to any other outings (NBA, NFL you name it) that cost a lot of dough. After watching all the episodes of Tiger King or whatever on weekend nights, these folks are now bored out of their minds, and taking a drive down memory lane and remembering Pokemon from their childhood, except that now they have money to spend. The other theory is that perhaps they believe Pokemon cards will hold value over the long run over the incredibly volatile stock market and other investment options. The other theory is that a number of them are speculators/gamblers - those who normally go to casinos and spend money speculating, or those who buy houses just to flip, or stocks just to flip - a lot of them are now doing it on TCG as all those avenues are kind of shut. Who knows? As a seller, I have really been rather shocked, but I am not complaining ā¦ there seems to be just endless appetite these days and virtually no price sensitivity. A good time to sell, in my opinion, except perhaps your truly coolest cards ā¦
Iām sure this has already been said abunch but collecting cards is addicting and yet thrilling at the same time. I often find myself watching TV while not really watching it while searching cards online. What do I want to buy in the future (window shopping) what purchase do I want to buy this week or today? I take notes on prices of cards I want. And check almost every selling platform for best price. Thereās always something else to look for while window shopping. Or once money is in hand or you have extra you can spend itās even more fun pulling the trigger buying :-). Also all the time we spend looking back at cards we already have keeping track of new prices. Always something but I love it
No, there are a lot of other quality threads on the forum. But the increase in prices lately has naturally lead to more threads on prices etc. It was similar in 2017 when prices shot up.
The problem with the original line of thinking is we donāt know what pent up demand there is. Weāre not adding hundreds of tens on chase cards from 20 years ago. I wouldnāt count on retrace in the next few months without an extreme economic event beyond what we are seeing now, just my opinion. You might see it in modern sets where thereās literally hundreds of 10s. A rainbow zard just sold for 1500, thereās over 650 tens and you can still buy cases of booster boxes for close to original retail. Now nothing goes up forever, but it matters how high things go before they retrace. Some of these tens have a couple dozen examples, and some are notoriously difficult to grade. Thereās nothing wrong with lower graded, or unlimited versions as a way to collect.
