Baseball Cards Price

If one sells a collection of baseball cards, are they usually purchased at Beckett value?

I have a large baseball card collection easily priced out by Becketts Price Guide at over $5000 dollars. Is that what I can expect to make if I sell them? Where do I sell them and how do I know whats fair price if not what Beckett says theyre worth? Should I grade any worth over $50 to increase the credibility of my collection?

Public Comments

1. yeah I mean it depends on the buyer. Some are under priced in beckett some are over. It's a good starting point though. Keep your collection and monitor each peices value on beckett month to month.
2. The Becketts Price Guide is only a guide. It gives you the value of a card or a set of cards. It gets a little tricky out in the real world. The card is worth what someone is willing to pay for it. Most card dealers can be quite sleazy, and will attempt to pay less than its true value. But, if your only intention is to rid of the cards expeditiously, there are people who may purchase in bulk(large numbers). These dealers or buyers look for cards that have or the older cards or sets. See Sports Collectors Digest or Becketts for buyers. If you have space, sometimes it can pay to hold on to the cards that have value as the economy is down, and less people may be willing to pay top price. Conversely, You only need one buyer. Good luck!
3. Yes, if not.. close to. If you sell to another card dealer expect to get about 40% of Beckett price at best. If you sell on eBay, you won't get beckett value on a majority of your items. Preferably you want to sell them at Beckett listings.
4. you just may get it or not its hard to say the value of the cards is what the buyer is willing to pay for them over the past decade or so they have dramatically dropped in price you might get $3 -4000 for them take it
5. I've benn buying and selling Sports Cards for over 15 years as a dealer and just for fun. Most dealers will pay you between 15% and 40% of Beckett book value. The amound a dealer will pay depends on the demand for the cards and what they think they can resell the cards for as wekk as tge condition. (keep in mind that the high beckett value is for a mint card).. If you sell on eBay the amount you get will depend on the demand for the cards you are selling. If you decide to sell on ebay selling a big lot like that you are probably better off breaking it down to smaller lots by team or player. If you could give some examples of what you have i could give you a better idea of what you could expect to get. Only grade high demand cards or high value cards that will grade a 9 mint or above otherwise you lose value unless your cards are pre 1980.
6. No, you really won't get full book value. I'm finding that out now. People are extremely cheap and don't want to pay full price for anything...I was selling some cards the other day for $200 and the best offer I got was $40. I chose not to sell at the time, and might try again next year. Good luck with yours.
7. No, Beckett value is what a dealer hopes to sell the cards for. Beckett is a very misleading publication. If a collector is selling, maybe 1/2 Beckett is the most you could hope for. And also remember that the value of a complete set is much less than the sum of all the individual values. The best way to judge is to look up the cards on eBay - that will give you a good idea of what the cards are selling for and a reasonable expectation of what you will get for them.