For example if you see a raw card (from reputable seller) that you’re almost certain would grade at X; what % are you comfortable paying relative to recently sold for that graded card?
Is it 50%? 25%?
Just curious if others have a method to the madness
Depends on much I want the card and how expensive it is in PSA 10. But on a 10 candidate I never pay more than the PSA 9 price, most likely rather the PSA 8 price at max.
Have been burned way too often with buying raw cards, even after additional pictures and confirmations by the seller.
I’m a cheapskate though.
I have a rather simple approach that may not work for everyone. Essentially, if the value of the raw card and grading fees add up to half the value or less of my projected minimum PSA grade. I will normally buy the card. However, if it has a good shot at a 10 I am willing to pay a bit extra. This is usually somewhere in the 65-75 percent price range of a PSA 9 for said card.
Needs to be around a PSA 8 price. Not going to pay PSA 9 price for a raw card online to waste my time, send it out and get a 9 when I could just buy a 9 for my collection without the hassle.
I’m a bit picky. If I’m looking to purchase a card to grade and it looks great, like a 9-10 condition, I always assume it will only grade an 8. I’ll subtract the grading fee from the 8 price, then subtract a bit more (the reason I grade is for the money to buy other cards, so I need to make a profit), and that’s the price I’ll pay. Ironically, if its a card for my binder, I’d happily pay a premium if the card looks at 9-10 condition. In either scenario, if the card isn’t as described or aspects of condition were hidden by the seller, I simply return the card.
If the raw card could reliably be determined as grade xyz, I would pay the same price that a copy with that grade costs. The problem is that more often than not, you cannot determine which grade the raw card will get in the end. Photos and videos can only show you so much, and most of the time that’s all you have available.
In a hypothetical scenario, if the pictures are perfect, I would pay the same that I would pay for the grade I predict. The only exception is a grade 10. No matter how good the pictures look, I would never pay the price for a full 10. In my experience you can’t tell whether a card will be a 10 from pictures.
I really depends on what card are we looking at (difficulty to grade/rarity/pop etc). The most I would pay is a PSA 8 price no matter how good the card looks.
You’re attempting to solve for purchase price of RAW to make X% … you have to know what % is worth your time… but for the hell of it here goes!
Big Variable is Grade Prediction so I always -1 when determining what I will pay to reduce risk and worst case break even & waste time not go in the hole (note I buy collections and use this not so much with single cards, if im buying a single card its most likely because I personally want it or it’s undervalued in current market so id be holding it raw or graded for extended period of time)
At this point you need to have sales data for the card in the GP, GP-1 & GP+1 so if you believe its a 9, id get the data for 8,9,10
example:
raw = $20
8 = $50
9 = $100
10 = $200
your GP is 9 so we will assume it’s an 8 now you’re in it $20 + Grading Fees + Shipping = $35 now you list for $50 take 13% fees + shipping again you may walk away with $5/break even, now if you are correct you make ~$50
To attempt to answer your question though
What % do you want make is really in correlation to the cost of the item and how much you value your time
$5-50 RAW I want to basically at least double my expenses
so for a $5 raw + $15 grading/shipping = $20 IN i’d want $40 OUT after taxes/seller fees/shipping so I’d list it ~$65 on eBay or have it listed for ~$55 or so at a card show
Just to showcase different cost of items
at say $50 expenses id want 100% return
at say $500 expenses id want 50% return
at say $5000 expenses id want 25% return
at say $50000 expenses id want 12% return
(just an example not my actual desired profit margins)
& just remember keep in mind how long you really are going to have this item from purchase to liquidation…
My question for you @mosstastic, is what are your collection goals/investment goals because I answered it from an investment perspective not a collectors perspective as I feel that other reply’s covered from a collectors rationality.
vr
I don’t really care about condition in general, and I’m primarily a binder collector. There are some exceptions, like my FA Supporter or Moltres collections contain high graded cards. But for my Pikachu collection, I prefer raw over graded. If I can’t find the card raw, but a PSA-10 is available, I am willing to go slightly higher than I would for a raw card because I know it’s worth more. But if both raw and graded are available, I’ll (almost) always go with the cheapest of the two.
I don’t typically buy cards to resell currently, just interested in completing my particular set, but I still want to do that at the cheapest possible price point regardless of resale or not.
I keep going back and forth between whether I want to buy already graded cards or raw.
I was able to knock out a larger chunk of the set in raw in one purchase and have some stragglers left. I’ve been 50/50 between graded or ungraded but I switch back and forth when considering time and effort (and cost) to get it graded.
Unless I have purchased from the specific seller before I can´t assume a certain (psa) grade with any kind of accuracy.
The % depends on the final value and the rarity of the card. You don´t want to pay 100$ for a gem candidate eevee 1st ed that -might- fetch 300$ in PSA 10, however I´ll gladly pay 100$ for a gem ex card that fetches 300$ in PSA 10.