Garage/Estate Sale Success?
 

I am relatively new back into the hobby and was curious if folks out there regularly find things of value at garage/estate sales?

About two years ago I went to a garage sale and found a stack of 25 different 52T for sale for $.10/each (including a very nice Andy Pafko). I might have been just really lucky because since then all I see out there are a bunch of 1988 Donruss Diamond Kings or the like.

I am sure if you keep on looking there is stuff out there, but do others find success at garage/estate sales or should I assume I had a one-time stroke of luck?

Any words of advice?

Personally...i have never "scored" at a garage/estate sale. Local auction houses regularly have cards from 50's-70's though.

I've found mostly modern cards, but did score some unopened heritage boxes

If I drive by any I stop and poke around.. You never know what people have. I have better luck at the Flea markets I attend. I do OK..

I go to a LOT of garage/estate sales and have been for years. I have never found any pre-1960's era cards, and only a handful of 60's era (and that was at a 'professional' estate sale where they were way overpriced). Granted, this area of the country likely had/has less material stashed away due to several factors (distribution and population back in the day).

I'd say 99.9% of the time I find beat up junk-era stuff at various prices. People have associated 'old baseball cards' with dollar signs for the past 30+ years so most of the good stuff is either sold off to dealers or passed down through the family.

I did have a bit of luck last year when I found an old scrapbook loaded with 1941 Uncle Sam/Home Defense cards. Of course they are taped in and not in the greatest shape, but I was pretty excited to find them. Price was right, too - 25 cents for the book.

I'll probably hit the lottery (which I rarely play) before I find anything like 52 topps for .10/ea around here!

Never even came close to finding anything other than something someone was trying to sell at less than 5 or 10x what it was actually worth.:(

I have never found anything good at a garage sale worth anything. I find it comical that whenever you run across something that looks of value on eBay the clown selling it always says he got it from an estate sale. Total red flag in my opinion, never any authenticity just always says it came from an estate sale like it's their way to make it sound like it's real when I would guess most of the time if not all its fake. Like a lot of Babe Ruth items always seems to be found it at an estate sale or was my grandpa's from an estate sale some excuse which they know they've got it from someplace else. What's the chance of all these high end looking items coming from an estate sale?
I would say slim to none

Last year I bought a 1961 Hartland Rocky Colavito at a yard sale for ten bucks.

I've had much better luck at my local auction house and a couple of flea markets (and even ebay) than garage/estate sales.

Yes, Yes, Yes to the local auction house. Many times they will sell cards mixed in with the dining room set, costume jewelry, paintings etc... I've seen it play both ways. Good stuff selling for pennies on the dollar and I've seen a binder of about 500 vg 1976 topps cards with some stars sell for over $300, which is basically more than a Nrmt set goes for. The thing with the Estate & Garage Sales is this. By all means if you have the time and they aren't too far, never hurts to check things out, but this isn't 1983 when people weren't really aware of what they had, baseball card values etc... Nowadays people are generally prone to think that their 1960 Willie Mays card with two big creases is worth at least half book. It puts you the attendee in a weird situation when you explain that it's basically a $15.00 card and you would be willing to pay maybe $7.00-$8.00 if that.

It's hard to believe in all the estate auctions, farm auctions etc. I have never found anything related to baseball cards. I thought some tobacco cards would show up sometime.

My best luck was running a local ad in the newspaper for pre-1980 only material. Got some 1950's Red Man cards, 1950's Topps and once a bunch of 1933 Goudey's with 3 Ruth's. Never 19th Century or T206's.

Went to a yard sale where a guy was selling pre-war Uncle Jack's Candy cards. The cards were in poor condition but still, they were only $2 to $5 apiece. Scored a Jimmy Foxx.

I never have, but I was reading through the Love of the Game auction guide and read that someone recently found a t206 drum back at an antique shop and it turned out to be real. Not a bad find for what probably cost less than $100, assuming the shop owner didn't know what he had.

Correct - was discussed here.

I used to go to garage and estate sales looking for cards and sports memorabilia. I don't recall finding anything all that great. If you like going to such sales generally, then by all means go and have fun. If not, it's probably not worth your time unless you have some indication that a particular sale will have what you're looking for.

Very true - I go to sales in search of things for my other hobbies (and am quite successful in those). I wouldn't bother wasting any time on them if I were only looking for sports memorabilia.


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Hi-

Personally, I do not do very well with garage and estate sales but I do quite well at flea markets and antique shops/shows. Most of my collection comes from these venues. Most of the dealers I buy from do find these items at estate and garage sales, but they have more time and patience than I do to scour the area.

Regarding flea markets and antique shops and shows, I went to three shops and two shows this weekend. I had no luck at the first two shops Saturday, but at the third I found an 1950s/60s baseball box holding 11 baseballs in their original packaging (plastic wrapping) for less than 50.00. This morning I found three 1968 Atlantic Oil uncut panel cards (including Ruth and Sayers) for 15.00, some 1907 Dartmouth magazines with a football cover and sports articles inside each issue for 1.00 each, 27 1955 Bowman football cards (crease free but with corner dings) for 40.00, two 1915 Brown baseball player snapshots for 12.00, and a scrapbook containing real photo postcards of a 1920s NH prep school for 25.00 (with basketball, track, baseball and other sports). As I was leaving I found an 1840s era chapbook with a child swinging a baseball bat in a woodcut image in the background for 10.00. That is my favorite find of the weekend. I probably overpaid for some items like the Brown player snapshots and possibly the 55 Bowmans but that is the way things go sometimes.

I completely agree you are extremely unlikely to find tobacco cards at any of these places but if you expand your collecting focus you might be surprised at what you can find. People might know general values, but they do not always understand series differences and almost never understand variations. Nonmainstream cards can also be an area to focus on as casual sellers do not always know what they have. I bought a group of about 20 1960 Leaf high numbers for 5.00 several months ago from an antique shop that had 1960 Topps commons at 2.00 each (and some priced higher). They knew Topps but might not have connected sports novelty with Leaf.

Alan

Went to an antique shop today and they had tons of boxed sets from the 90's including Stadium Club, leaf, and studio cuts all were really cheap and then 15% off to boot. Loaded up with the intent of getting ready for next years net54 Secret Santa. If I get somebody into 1990's junk, I am ready to ship.

Now if you are into prewar like me, not much there. A bunch of overpriced 70's cards and some autographed baseballs that were personalized so not worth much on the open market.

A cool story for sure. Glad it went to a net54 member.

My neighbor is in his 90's and is rarely seen out of the house, so when he had a yard sale recently I thought I'd stop by to say hello. Never in my life would I thought I'd find a complete set of 33 Goudey's! The only problem is he and his dad glued them to a poster board and then had it framed back in the 1940's. He knew I liked baseball having seen me play catch out in the yard with my sons from his front window so he decided I should have it.

Being glued to the board is unfortunate, but how nice that your neighbor thought of you, and what a great display piece!

Great story. That's something to keep forever.

I have a feeling that the cards are reprints, as the Lajoie card is included and all the cards look too fresh.

Brian

Doubly sorry
 

I forgot to add I'm sorry if you thought these were original, and if not, sorry I called you out so soon for pulling all of our legs.

Brian

The best thing I ever found at a true flea market (as opposed to a paper fair or other collectibles show) was a photo promoting the second Dempsey versus Tunney fight. It cost probably 33% of a realistic value.

Best thing I ever found in a paper fair was a Pinkerton scorecard of Jennings for $30. Also a nice George Mikan RC for under $100.

Garage Sales are tough and you need to go to MANY of them. In my experience, you find something really good (at a decent price) maybe 1% of the time. The lesser amount of things you know about, the lower that percentage will go.

Others I know who do the garage sale circuit also report good luck in asking about things that are not out for sale. Often a person will not put out something for sale if they feel it has no value or is outdated. Especially when it comes to niche hobbies, it never hurts to ask. Just be careful you don't ask in such a way that makes dollar signs pop up in the person's eyes! :o

This was a practice I found common as well. One of the best deals I found, a mostly-complete 1971 Topps Football Set for $10, was buried under a table in a shoebox that the seller only brought out once I asked if they had any cards. At the time, I didn't collect older football at all but figured they had to be worth at least that.

I agree with the other sentiments that you're not likely to pick up tobacco cards at these things. But there are good deals to be had on 50s, 60s, and 70s stuff. I just found good deals to be too few and far between to be worth the trouble of getting up, driving around, etc. The other issue is that you have to realize you're not the only one doing this. I can't tell you the number of times that I'd stop by a sale and hear 'Oh, you should have been here an hour ago - a guy bought everything I had.' It's a pretty competitive market and you often have to be up at the crack of dawn to beat the local sharks to the punch.

Brian you got me...that was my early April fools joke. This is a reprint set my son and I glued to a board and had framed. Would be great to find a complete Goudey set at a yard sale though...!

Also I want to mention that when you ask someone at a garage sale for something, try to be as generic as possible. Also remember that the people will not know all terms that exist in the hobby or maybe any of them. So I wouldn't specifically ask for football cards, but more like say "football stuff from the 60s" or something.

You need to judge the age of the person selling before using certain words. Asking for "old" things will get you a wide range and likely not what you want. One time I remember asking for "old cards" resulted in a box of beat up 1993 Pinnacle football cards.

I had a feeling, but I thought it might be possible. I guess you got me.

I used to have a connection with a friend who regularly handled estate sales and had him on the alert to watch for baseball cards and/or memorabilia. All he ever came up with in years of looking were '80's cards. I think its just been known for too long that these items can be of significant value for significant items to pop up in these venues, except on very, very rare occasions.

Regards,

Larry

http://www.net54baseball.com/showthread.php?t=209064

Hasn't happened since...but this was just last year...I have had some decent scores since then...same Estate Sale company had a sale a couple months back where every card was $3...some decent stuff, best being a G-VG '69 Bench, but I also did get a '69 Bert Campaneris & '69 Freddie Patek that are at PSA right now that I think may get 9's (Campy may actually get a 10) for $3 each...but most of what was at that one was junky 80s/90s

Several years ago at an estate sale I picked up an album with nearly complete sets of all three T87 Wings Cigarette cards. They were neatly mounted with "photo" corners and were in EXMT condition. I also picked up a Jackie Robinson bat (EX) and a Sal Maglie glove also in (EX) condition. I paid $3.00 for the lot! I also had some luck two years ago at a small antique/thrift store in VA when I picked up a T205 Wilhelm (suffe ed) glued to a piece of scrapbook paper for $20.00. I soaked it off and it graded Authentic due to some paper loss.

I got a Nolan Ryan rookie at a tag sale a few years back...on the SECOND day of the sale. I skipped the first day and attended the second day where everything was half off. They had about 40 small stacks of cards rubber banded together for a couple bucks each, I hit about 5 or 6 of them and found the Ryan rookie. I didn't even look through the rest, I just picked up the shoe box and took all of them. The Ryan rookie was the best card in the lot, but there were a lot of stars too, like Frank Robinson, Roger Maris, Tony Perez, et cetera.

Just last year I hit it big at a garage sale with a ton of 1950s cards including about 200 near mint to mint 1957 Topps cards. I paid about 10 cents each for them. Sold them to a card shop in Omaha for a lot of dough, I'm sure he made a ton on them, but I don't submit to PSA and he does.

If we're talking about local auctions I've made a lot of great scores. Just last year I picked up a photo/scrapbook album of former major leaguer Bill Davidson which included a bunch of photos of himself with other major leaguers, some real photo postcards of Brooklyn players including Zach Wheat which was signed on the back "Buck Wheat". There was also a World Series ticket stub in there from 1913, the game between Mathewson and Plank which went 9 scoreless innings. Matty drove in a run in the 10th and then went out and shut the A's down for the 10 inning shutout.

My best find ever was a Tris Speaker game used bat picked up at a local auction about 6 or 7 years ago. I didn't know it was a gamer until I posted pictures of it to Net54 though.

I've made way too many finds at flea markets to mention all of them, but my best finds include, A Dog's Head cigarette pack, 2 Cameo Pepsin pins that were dead mint, and an early Portland PCL team cabinet photo that was HUGE..the largest cabinet photo I've ever seen.

I don't think it's pure luck to find this stuff though, it's perseverance. I hit garage sales, tag sales, auctions, antique shows and flea markets weekly.

I love sales and have found a lot of things. Mainly antiques and my vintage toys you never know😎👍

Garages
 

My only experience is recounted in part in Love of Game's current and future auctions involving "the Texas Find". I am originally from St Louis but have lived in San Antonio since 1995. St Louis is a baseball town, San Antonio is not. I am a fairly serious post war collector with full Topps, Bowman and Fleer runs.

As Al C has related in his auction preview, my wife was in a church bible class and was telling a friend about a trip we were about to make to Phoenix this past March to see some spring training games with a group of fellow baseball card collectors who gather there each year. Another woman she did not know heard the conversation and related that her husband had died unexpectedly back in 2007 and left behind a "bunch" of baseball cards. She wondered if I would look at it and make some suggestions on how she could sell it.

Because she said he was a lifelong San Antonio resident I went not expecting much, but it took me. 3 days to wonder through it all. Some was well organized but because of his sudden death before retirement, much was spread out all over in boxes and suitcases. Most in a study, full to the brim with every wallfull of shelves full of cards in binders, and packed closet as well. Some was in the garage. Cards , autographed balls and photos, and publications.

A lot of stuff was post 80 and there were hundreds of older and newer minor league sets. But there was a full Bowman and Topps run and a large number of extra autographed 52 cards, including an autographed Campos black star card, some older basketball sets and a few oddball older baseball sets or partial sets.

In the end I put her in touch with a couple of folks, including Al at Love of Game, who the family ultimately chose to sell the collection. The whole event was a lot of fun. Because of the connection my wife and I developed to the family and the fact I recommended him, I can say how pleased I was with how Al Crisafulli handled the entire matter

What a great story all around!!! Thanks for sharing, Al.

Picked up this card for $5 at a yard sale. Also a 59 Topps Fence Busters w/ Hammerin' Hank for $2.

http://i1199.photobucket.com/albums/...e27/33Foxx.jpg

These are among a TON of stuff that is in one starting tomorrow...I'll be there in line 2+ hours before it opens...anything specific I need to check on the Ruth to make sure it is authentic? (I am not very hopeful it is, but hey, judging form the contents of the sale the guy was a former dealer or something and it isn't full of junk like Coaches Corner crap, so I have a glimmer of hope at least)

https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/Ei...Q=w696-h467-no

https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/1r...w=w378-h532-no

The Ruth is a reprint. It's cropped incorrectly & too much space between photo & black line.

Rob-

I would be very leery of that Ruth card. There are many old threads on how to tell the difference between real and fake versions of this card, so definitely study those before you go. My gut feel is that it is a fake without looking at it too closely.

Also, getting to the estate sale 2 hours in advance probably will not be good enough for you to be one of the first sports people in line. It all depends where you live. In MA, you normally have to get there between midnight and three am as that is when the sign up sheet goes up at the good estate sales. Then, you need to make sure no one changes the sheet until numbers are given out around 7am. I am not sure this sale is worth the effort, especially if those are the only cards pictured. I hope I am wrong though, and you get some great items!

Alan

There are 8-10 3200-5k boxes that have cards @ $.75 each...alot of what can be seen in the pics is junk, but there are some decent things showing (Steve Spurrier RC, 1968 Topps Game card) that I'll dig through for <$1 ea...dozens of 50s/60s stars priced entirely too high (clearly tape damaged 63 Mantle for $150 for example)...I may grab the Spahn & see if there is any damage that isn't in the pic or on the back, and head right to the bulk boxes to see if there is anything missed in there.

I usually show up 30-45 minutes early for a promising sale and am in the first 4-5 in line, so I'm getting there well in advance of that tomorrow :o

Thank you for pointing out the space between the line & the photo...when I compare that to a PSA graded version you are spot on correct.

#2 in line.

picked this up from an antique store a couple of years ago.

$3

I stop at estate and garage sales whenever I can, but have had very limited success. Oddly, my two "scores" were both graded cards. I went to an estate sale at the home of Al Ronning (a former catcher in the Dodgers organization and later a scout) and purchased a 1952 Parkhurst card of Mr. Running himself. The other card was a very nice 1962 Topps Roger Maris in a PSA 5 holder that I acquired for 20 bucks at a neighborhood garage sale.

Last year I bought a scarce Hartland Plastics statue of Rocky Colavito at a flea market for ten bucks. Flipped it for around $350.

What Dan said above about sums it up best. Almost too many to count for me. I can find something of real value at least twice a month, though not always card related.

So what if you don't find pre-war stuff. You don't think you can turn a pack fresh '76 Payton RC, ALL the '72 FB high number IA cards (Namath, etc) in NM condition, very nice late '60s and early '70s Bobby Orr Topps and OPC cards, '30s Mickey Mouse cards (with one of the booklets), TWO ticket stubs from Bunning's Father's Day perfect game, et al into cash for pre-war baseball cards? All these and more that I've come across in separate instances for pennies on the dollar. Not to mention toys, comics, etc. You just have to expand your searching a little.

Welp, this sale today was total garbage.

It was a dealer that moved his stuff into an estate sale to try to dump it to suckers...problem was, there were no suckers there, just pissed off people. I'm in Kansas City, one dude drove from Fort Worth, TX (about 8 hours) to come to this sale to do nothing but waste his time. All the vintage cards were garbage at NM prices. There were Repo's of 62 Mantle, Montana Rookies, Ryan Rookies, in the card bins (@ $5 each) that were an absolute joke. All of the "Non-Common" $.75 each cards were total over produced junk (to be expected) and anything that was mid-grade that you'd normally find at an estate sale for $.50-$1 a card were marked at $3+ per.

Easy way to illustrate how shady this sale was (as if the counterfeit/repo cards weren't enough)...there were huge (like cases of office paper size) boxes with 9 card sheets in them...probably 500-700 Sheets in the box marked for $40...pretty good deal right? The top 50 or so sheets were solid Ultra Pro or equivalent sheets, but when you dig down in there, you find those shitty crackily ones that stick together and ruin cards the rest of the way down...

Total shit show. There was one other N54 user there (at least) that I was talking with that was as disappointed as I...

http://brownbutton.com/olathe-estate...nebridge-park/

I am sorry to hear that Rob! I hope you have better luck in the future. I am still amazed you were number 2 in line though given what time you got there. It is much more competitive in Massachusetts.

Alan