Question for experienced card collectors
 

Let me preface this question by stating that I am new to the card game

I just recently purchased a one month subscription to Beckett online because I am just now starting to get into football card collecting.

A seller had a card listed for a certain value that was 4 times greater than that of the Beckett online price guide. I emailed him and asked him if he could come down on it, referencing the price guide value.

He stated that he doesn't go by the Beckett price guide because "they have not been changed in years" and he goes by market value.

Is this accurate? If so....is buying the price guide subscription a waste of money?

my opinion is he subscription is a waste of money.. a much better way to check pricing is to go to ebay and search "ended listings" for each card your interested in.. that way you can see market value of what the cards are selling for...

also you can go to card target for pricing on vintage cards.. their database pulls from ebay I think and that is free.

hope that helps

Since you are referencing Football in particular this may be better in the Football forum (http://www.net54baseball.com/forumdisplay.php?f=8)


As far as Beckett I personally don't think it is a problem to use it as a guideline, but sometimes the market moves before Beckett does also you have to use the guide for all the info. For instance you can't look at VGEX prices for a Mint card and vice versa.

There are other places you can subscribe to that just bases it off of internet sales. A lot of people use VCP (Vintage Card Prices), but they are not the only one.

My experience...
 

Try and sell something to a dealer. They can't grab the Beckett fast enough to see what your cards list at.:p Beckett is dead on on some items and way off on others. Check ebay completed listings as an example to see what people are really paying for any said card. I personally don't think the guide is a waste if it is used properly and all information taken with a grain of salt. That all said, anyone can ask whatever they want and you can pay whatever you want, even if it's 4x book and you really want it.
Hope that helps a little!

Here is MHO: A card is only worth what someone else is willing to pay for it. With that being said, prices fluctuate from month to month based upon the "interest" in the player (for modern day cards). For vintage cards, you will see that prices are usually consistent between the various degree of condition. I.e., a Green Cobb in T206 in a PSA 7 or so is going to cost about the same as a car, but a PSA 2 or 3 can be had for less than $1000.00 +/-.

For modern cards, the cards are going to be all over the place depending on how the player is doing. So I have to disagree with the person who says the prices are the same. For vintage, yes, but not for new shiny stuff.

Prices
 

Buy a subscription to vintagecardprices.com (real time actual selling prices)..Also don't compare prices to 707sportscards.

It's always possible the seller was asking for way too much for his card. Sellers with ridiculously inflated asking prices is no rarity on eBay.

I think price guides are useful in their way, if just for checklists. But following auctions and sales is important too. There's no one source for information, and your observing the market is an important part.

When I used Beckett and SGC price guides years back, the prices were retail-- higher than the collector could possibly sell for. But when you learned to see them as 'high prices' or 'retail prices,' they were useful. It was information that, if correctly understood, was useful.