Comic Books

[Integrity28]

RJF, I've got a quick question for you... which pricing website is the best for looking this stuff up online? I'm looking at comicspriceguide.com right now, but don't want to log in to get the value info... 

[RutgersJetFan]

RJF, I've got a quick question for you... which pricing website is the best for looking this stuff up online? I'm looking at comicspriceguide.com right now, but don't want to log in to get the value info... 

 

I prefer the Overstreet guide, but it's all what works best for you. CPG is very good, they are more of a live source and use different data sets to track what people are actually buying comics for. I have a gut method of crossreferencing Overstreet with comic book news and eBay auctions, and it works well for me because I need to know if a comic is going to make me money 1-3 years after I buy it, which CPG can't give me. But if you wanted something faster and more real-time and data driven to sell a personal collection in the near future, CPG is probably the way for you to go.

 

Remember though, guides are just guides. And the market fluctuates heavily week to week now more than ever. So no matter which source you use, monitor the eBay auctions for a few days and get a sense of how much your book has been selling for.

[Integrity28]

I prefer the Overstreet guide, but it's all what works best for you. CPG is very good, they are more of a live source and use different data sets to track what people are actually buying comics for. I have a gut method of crossreferencing Overstreet with comic book news and eBay auctions, and it works well for me because I need to know if a comic is going to make me money 1-3 years after I buy it, which CPG can't give me. But if you wanted something faster and more real-time and data driven to sell a personal collection in the near future, CPG is probably the way for you to go.

 

Remember though, guides are just guides. And the market fluctuates heavily week to week now more than ever. So no matter which source you use, monitor the eBay auctions for a few days and get a sense of how much your book has been selling for.

 

Cool. I appreciate the response.

[Bombdirt]

For the most part, no. The 1990s and 2000s have not produced a lot in terms of the high value stuff. I buy and sell a lot, and it's always heartbreaking when I have to tell a guy my age looking to sell his books that his entire collection from the 90s, (which was an amazing era and produced so many great stories), isn't worth anything. And it probably won't be even if you hold onto it for another 10-20 years too. There are a few exceptions:

 

- Very high value stuff (over a g) if near mint.

Walking Dead #1

Bone #1

Chew #1

 

- Under a grand but good investments

Spiderman 298-300 - Venom trilogy

New Mutants 87 - First Cable

New Mutants 98 - First Deadpool. The best book from the 90s you can buy right now in terms of cost to appreciation ratio, IMO. It's a lock to appreciate as time passes, and you can still nab ungraded mint copies for a few hundred bucks.

X-Factor #6

Preacher #1

Evil Ernie #1

Iron Man 281 (first War Machine)

 

I'm probably forgetting a few. Some will tell you that Spawn #1 is worth something, don't listen to them.

 

Cool, thanks for the info. I'd never even heard of a few of those. 

At most of the auctions I go to, the comic book lots usually end up selling for way more than they're worth. I see people go apesh*t over a beat-up stack of mid-90s books just because they see a Batman or two in there. I usually try to stay away since I'm no expert but I know just enough to get myself into trouble. 

It's the same with baseball cards. Just yesterday I saw a table full of 90s nonsense cards that would be of little practical value other than kindling. People still bought them up, though. 

[#27TheDominator]

Cool, thanks for the info. I'd never even heard of a few of those. 

At most of the auctions I go to, the comic book lots usually end up selling for way more than they're worth. I see people go apesh*t over a beat-up stack of mid-90s books just because they see a Batman or two in there. I usually try to stay away since I'm no expert but I know just enough to get myself into trouble. 

It's the same with baseball cards. Just yesterday I saw a table full of 90s nonsense cards that would be of little practical value other than kindling. People still bought them up, though. 

 

 

Ah baseball cards.  An even better collection in even worse condition.  I have them from the early to mid-70's, plus my Dad's collection from the late 50's.  My Dad was a huge Mantle fan, so we have a few, plus Yogi, Elston Howard, Whitey Ford, etc.  Then the general league dudes.  I'm sure they are mostly in bad enough condition to make them virtually worthless.  I do have a mint Yankee "traded" Oscar Gamble with the huge 'fro in perfect condition.  Presumably worth $1.50, but I saved it because I loved it.

[RutgersJetFan]

Cool, thanks for the info. I'd never even heard of a few of those.

At most of the auctions I go to, the comic book lots usually end up selling for way more than they're worth. I see people go apesh*t over a beat-up stack of mid-90s books just because they see a Batman or two in there. I usually try to stay away since I'm no expert but I know just enough to get myself into trouble.

It's the same with baseball cards. Just yesterday I saw a table full of 90s nonsense cards that would be of little practical value other than kindling. People still bought them up, though.

Sometimes those are guys who own shops and are building their back inventory. Buy long boxes at $30-50 a pop and sell the issues for $3-5. I've considered doing it a few times but doing that online would consume all my time just from the shipping alone.

[Integrity28]

Sometimes those are guys who own shops and are building their back inventory. Buy long boxes at $30-50 a pop and sell the issues for $3-5. I've considered doing it a few times but doing that online would consume all my time just from the shipping alone.

 

Would definitely cut into your 18 movies and 3 seasons of every TV show ever per week pace. 

[Integrity28]

Oh hey, I've been poking around the web today basically googling stories of books I know I have, to find cover art, to recall... since I'm not home with the books I have... and this here is one of my favorite comic books that I own... it's a good one

 

[RutgersJetFan]

Would definitely cut into your 18 movies and 3 seasons of every TV show ever per week pace.

And the 5-10 records played per day.

[RutgersJetFan]

Oh hey, I've been poking around the web today basically googling stories of books I know I have, to find cover art, to recall... since I'm not home with the books I have... and this here is one of my favorite comic books that I own... it's a good one

 

 

I miss old Chris Claremont.

[Bombdirt]

Ah baseball cards.  An even better collection in even worse condition.  I have them from the early to mid-70's, plus my Dad's collection from the late 50's.  My Dad was a huge Mantle fan, so we have a few, plus Yogi, Elston Howard, Whitey Ford, etc.  Then the general league dudes.  I'm sure they are mostly in bad enough condition to make them virtually worthless.  I do have a mint Yankee "traded" Oscar Gamble with the huge 'fro in perfect condition.  Presumably worth $1.50, but I saved it because I loved it.

 

Sounds like your stuff is early enough that it might be worth something if it's in decent shape. Mantle, Yogi and those guys will always be in demand. The values seem to really fall off the table right around the early 80s, save for a few examples here and there. 

I built up a bitchin' stash of Ken Griffey, Jr. rookie cards when I was a kid and thought I was awesome. Little did I know, literally every other kid who was into baseball cards at the time had also built up a bitchin' stash of Ken Griffey, Jr. rookie cards, thus making my own virtually worthless. It's pretty crazy how that market tanked--I know a couple of dudes who opened up card shops during the boom in the late 80s/early 90s and ended up losing their asses. 

I do still have my collection somewhere, but 90 percent of it is crap now (I had a ton of Bo Jackson, McGwire, Clemens and that dude from the Mets Kevin Mitchell--he was a badass for a season or two). I do have some 1940s-70s cards in there that are worth a little bit, though. 

 

Sometimes those are guys who own shops and are building their back inventory. Buy long boxes at $30-50 a pop and sell the issues for $3-5. I've considered doing it a few times but doing that online would consume all my time just from the shipping alone.

 

Yeah, that's a scenario where having a brick-and-mortar place is advantageous. I've thought about buying in bulk and trying to flip the comics individually but the few bucks I might make on each book probably wouldn't be worth the effort of listing/shipping/etc. Makes more sense for me to try to pick out those diamonds in the rough on the rare occasions I can find them. 

[RutgersJetFan]

Yeah, that's a scenario where having a brick-and-mortar place is advantageous. I've thought about buying in bulk and trying to flip the comics individually but the few bucks I might make on each book probably wouldn't be worth the effort of listing/shipping/etc. Makes more sense for me to try to pick out those diamonds in the rough on the rare occasions I can find them. 

 

You're looking at 50 cents to a buck per book in profit after everything. No way that's worth packaging up 20-30 books per week and going to the post office at least 3 times per also. Have to have a retail space for that arena.

[Bombdirt]

There's an online estate auction going on right now from a company kind of close to where I live, and there are some mid-60s/early-70s books in there. I won't be able to check out the stuff in person until Thursday at the open house, so I'm not sure how good it'll be. Some of the books look meh (Beetle Bailey, Archie, etc.) but there's one lot with some promising-looking Hulk/Avengers stuff in it. I can't tell what's what, though. 

 

[Jetlife33]

I feel like Jetlife33 has to be an alt account for RJF.

Impossible. I bleed pinstripes, he bleeds whatever it is Mets fans bleed.

[RutgersJetFan]

There's an online estate auction going on right now from a company kind of close to where I live, and there are some mid-60s/early-70s books in there. I won't be able to check out the stuff in person until Thursday at the open house, so I'm not sure how good it'll be. Some of the books look meh (Beetle Bailey, Archie, etc.) but there's one lot with some promising-looking Hulk/Avengers stuff in it. I can't tell what's what, though. 

 

 

That looks like a very run-of-the-mill, low-mid grade lot. If those Hulk issues were mint they might fetch $40-60 per, but obviously they are not if you look at the spines and corners on some. Even if you discounted that aspect, those are not key books, meaning they are not going to be easy to move. The only people who would buy those Trimpe and Cockrum issues of Hulk are completists like myself, and there's no way I'd ever even pay book value for any of them. The Conan books aren't worth anything, and that Av86 looks like sh*t.

[HessStation]

A few snippets, I have a decent Hulk v Thing collection and these are the gems, book on the right is the greatest cover ever IMO and a hellava hard to find book:

And a project my wife helped make. Dr. Doom is my favorite character of anything ever and I threw a few of his best books in with a sketch that she did, along with a frame that came straight out of Latveria. She also did the Batman sketch in the first pic I posted.

I swear my uncle has all this sh*t in boxes in his attic. Dude is prob sitting on 100k of comics.

[RutgersJetFan]

Impossible. I bleed pinstripes, he bleeds whatever it is Mets fans bleed.

 

Sadness. I bleed sadness.

[RutgersJetFan]

I swear my uncle has all this sh*t in boxes in his attic. Dude is prob sitting on 100k of comics.

 

It's certainly possible. If he's willing to open them up and send me some pics, I can give you guys a sense of what he's working with. God that sounded perverted.

[Bombdirt]

That looks like a very run-of-the-mill, low-mid grade lot. If those Hulk issues were mint they might fetch $40-60 per, but obviously they are not if you look at the spines and corners on some. Even if you discounted that aspect, those are not key books, meaning they are not going to be easy to move. The only people who would buy those Trimpe and Cockrum issues of Hulk are completists like myself, and there's no way I'd ever even pay book value for any of them. The Conan books aren't worth anything, and that Av86 looks like sh*t.

 

There are 28 books in that lot; looks like they just threw all the Marvel stuff together. I'll be able to get a better look at what's there this week. Are there any key issues from around that time in the Hulk/Avengers stuff? Maybe there's a good one in there. Probably not, but maybe. 

[HessStation]

It's certainly possible. If he's willing to open them up and send me some pics, I can give you guys a sense of what he's working with. God that sounded perverted.

Ha no in all seriousness I was thinking since I posted that, that I need to call him and find out if he still has all of it. I went through it all so long ago.

He had everything from baseball cards, Lou Brook rookies etc to hundreds of comics. Amazing stuff sort of a cabinet of curiosities. Might take you up on this someday!

[RutgersJetFan]

There are 28 books in that lot; looks like they just threw all the Marvel stuff together. I'll be able to get a better look at what's there this week. Are there any key issues from around that time in the Hulk/Avengers stuff? Maybe there's a good one in there. Probably not, but maybe. 

 

Not really because of the condition of those books. But:

 

Hulk 180-182. Once you get into the 100s, the only valuable books are that trilogy and 102. Everything else might make you a few bucks if it's mint (121 is a decent investment), but it has to be mint.

 

As for Avengers after 50: 54, 55, and 57. Once you get past 60 or so, anything has to be near mint for it to be worth your while. 100 and 115 are also good books to move if mint.

[Bombdirt]

Not really because of the condition of those books. But:

 

Hulk 180-182. Once you get into the 100s, the only valuable books are that trilogy and 102. Everything else might make you a few bucks if it's mint (121 is a decent investment), but it has to be mint.

 

As for Avengers after 50: 54, 55, and 57. Once you get past 60 or so, anything has to be near mint for it to be worth your while. 100 and 115 are also good books to move if mint.

 

Damn I am glad I know you. 

 

[Jetlife33]

For the most part, no. The 1990s and 2000s have not produced a lot in terms of the high value stuff. I buy and sell a lot, and it's always heartbreaking when I have to tell a guy my age looking to sell his books that his entire collection from the 90s, (which was an amazing era and produced so many great stories), isn't worth anything. And it probably won't be even if you hold onto it for another 10-20 years too. There are a few exceptions:

 

- Very high value stuff (over a g) if near mint.

Walking Dead #1

Bone #1

Chew #1

 

- Under a grand but good investments

Spiderman 298-300 - Venom trilogy

New Mutants 87 - First Cable

New Mutants 98 - First Deadpool. The best book from the 90s you can buy right now in terms of cost to appreciation ratio, IMO. It's a lock to appreciate as time passes, and you can still nab ungraded mint copies for a few hundred bucks.

X-Factor #6

Preacher #1

Evil Ernie #1

Iron Man 281 (first War Machine)

 

I'm probably forgetting a few. Some will tell you that Spawn #1 is worth something, don't listen to them.

The Spiderman venom trilogy you mentioned, is that Venom's first appearance?

[RutgersJetFan]

The Spiderman venom trilogy you mentioned, is that Venom's first appearance?

 

Yes. There is some debate on which issue his true first appearance is in. His first full appearance is in 300, but his hand appears in the last panel of 298. 300 is by far the more valuable book though. Great sub-$500 book to invest in.

 

That arc is also famous for being Mcfarlane's first work with Spider-Man.

[Integrity28]

I miss old Chris Claremont.

 

That book, and a lot of the other really old ones I have came from a milk crate at a garage sale. They are, without question, some of the best X-Men books I've ever read... and in large part, why I love the X-Men universe the most, and can barely stand all of the X-Men and Wolverine movies they've made. 

 

I don't know what "new" Claremont is though, or at least I'm not sure I do.

[Integrity28]

Yes. There is some debate on which issue his true first appearance is in. His first full appearance is in 300, but his hand appears in the last panel of 298. 300 is by far the more valuable book though. Great sub-$500 book to invest in.

 

That arc is also famous for being Mcfarlane's first work with Spider-Man.

 

I want to say I've got those books. I really need to dig into whatever is left... and hope that none of it was disposed of or ruined.

[RutgersJetFan]

That book, and a lot of the other really old ones I have came from a milk crate at a garage sale. They are, without question, some of the best X-Men books I've ever read... and in large part, why I love the X-Men universe the most, and can barely stand all of the X-Men and Wolverine movies they've made. 

 

I don't know what "new" Claremont is though, or at least I'm not sure I do.

 

Those are the books that got most people into X-Men. I've always thought it's kind of bullsh*t that Lee gets all the credit for them and all the cameos in the movies. The X-Men were not popular at all under Lee and Marvel was going to pull the plug on them until Claremont and Cockrum took it over and rebooted everything. Jim Lee too with all the volume 2 stuff he did.

 

He's been kind of complacent since the 90s. Doesn't really try to create new characters like he used to. Back in the day he was always introducing new players into the universe.

[Integrity28]

Those are the books that got most people into X-Men. I've always thought it's kind of bullsh*t that Lee gets all the credit for them and all the cameos in the movies. The X-Men were not popular at all under Lee and Marvel was going to pull the plug on them until Claremont and Cockrum took it over and rebooted everything. Jim Lee too with all the volume 2 stuff he did.

 

He's been kind of complacent since the 90s. Doesn't really try to create new characters like he used to. Back in the day he was always introducing new players into the universe.

 

Claremont and Jim Lee were the guys behind the X-Men that I love. You are talking about Stan Lee in bold, I presume?

[RutgersJetFan]

Claremont and Jim Lee were the guys behind the X-Men that I love. You are talking about Stan Lee in bold, I presume?

 

Correct. To be honest, he is the most overrated writer of all time, and the fact that Marvel never gives Kirby an equal share of the credit for their universe is insane.

 

That said, I would still collapse into a ball of fanboy tears if I met him. So I should probably shut up.

[The Crusher]

Correct. To be honest, he is the most overrated writer of all time, and the fact that Marvel never gives Kirby an equal share of the credit for their universe is insane.

 

That said, I would still collapse into a ball of fanboy tears if I met him. So I should probably shut up.

 

It's cool dude.  I feel the same about Colonel Sanders and Ronald McDonald.   

[Integrity28]

It's cool dude.  I feel the same about Colonel Sanders and Ronald McDonald.   

 

Reminds me of the day I met Caesar.

[#27TheDominator]

Those are the books that got most people into X-Men. I've always thought it's kind of bullsh*t that Lee gets all the credit for them and all the cameos in the movies. The X-Men were not popular at all under Lee and Marvel was going to pull the plug on them until Claremont and Cockrum took it over and rebooted everything. Jim Lee too with all the volume 2 stuff he did.

 

He's been kind of complacent since the 90s. Doesn't really try to create new characters like he used to. Back in the day he was always introducing new players into the universe.

 

I remember when some of the younger kids got all Wolverine-y and I was confused.  I didn't remember the X-Men being too popular or Wolverine being anything to get so excited about.  Kind of like how Elmo was on Sesame Street from the 60's and then one day he became Elvis to the sub-10 year old set.

[RutgersJetFan]

I remember when some of the younger kids got all Wolverine-y and I was confused. I didn't remember the X-Men being too popular or Wolverine being anything to get so excited about. Kind of like how Elmo was on Sesame Street from the 60's and then one day he became Elvis to the sub-10 year old set.

Yeah, that was into the 80s when John Byrne came on board and recognized the potential for so much awesomeness with the character. A lot of the more popular X-Men were even later to the game. Deadpool, Gambit, Bishop, Psylocke, Cable...etc. It's a true universe within itself that has offered up more new contributions from writers than any other running title. And I don't think the younger crowd quite realizes how popular X-Men were in the 90s. Even more than today. There was a good 7-8 year span where they truly dominated the comics world.

[#27TheDominator]

Yeah, that was into the 80s when John Byrne came on board and recognized the potential for so much awesomeness with the character. A lot of the more popular X-Men were even later to the game. Deadpool, Gambit, Bishop, Psylocke, Cable...etc. It's a true universe within itself that has offered up more new contributions from writers than any other running title. And I don't think the younger crowd quite realizes how popular X-Men were in the 90s. Even more than today. There was a good 7-8 year span where they truly dominated the comics world.

 

Haha.  I literally have not heard of any of those as X-Men.  I basically remember Cyclops

[Integrity28]

Yeah, that was into the 80s when John Byrne came on board and recognized the potential for so much awesomeness with the character. A lot of the more popular X-Men were even later to the game. Deadpool, Gambit, Bishop, Psylocke, Cable...etc. It's a true universe within itself that has offered up more new contributions from writers than any other running title. And I don't think the younger crowd quite realizes how popular X-Men were in the 90s. Even more than today. There was a good 7-8 year span where they truly dominated the comics world.

 

I read heavily during that 7-8 years. 

 

To me, the work Jim Lee was doing with X-Men was more impressive than what McFarlane was doing with Spiderman... and I LOVED Spidey and McFarlane. That's not a knock on either. I believe I have books that introduce Bishop, Deadpool, Psylocke, and Gambit... might have Cable's introduction too. We'll see when I finally start digging through the boxes.

 

The 90's writing and art for the X-Men was insane though... I'd buy and issue, read it, then go back through it and re-draw every cell that I liked. I'd spend hours basically matching some of the best comic artists of that stretch, one hashmark after another.