Today's guest post is provided by Rob Schroeder, a comic book collector, expert, and long-time eBay seller. Rob has been selling on eBay since 1996 under the name vintagebatman, and his store name is Relive Yesterday.
Comic book collecting is definitely a niche where you have to know what you are doing. Here are a few of Rob's tips regarding selling comic books on eBay.
How many times have you seen a stack of comics at a thrift store or yard sale, but decided to pass on them, as you know nothing about comics? I’ll be honest with you; it was probably a smart move. All too often, people think their comics are valuable, when most of the time, they’re not. Hopefully, I can share a few tips with you so you’ll know when to buy, and when to pass. This is a lot of info to remember, so bookmark this page and refer back to it as a resource. When buying comics, you want to consider three things: age, content, and condition – with condition being the most important. I’ll start with age.
Age
Comics are broken down into various “ages”: Golden, Silver, Bronze, and Modern. There is great debate as to when each age started, but for the sake of this blog, we’ll keep things very simple and say that comics with a cover price of 10¢ are Golden Age (approximately 1939 to mid-1950’s), 12¢ comics are Silver Age (mid-1950’s to late-1960’s), Bronze Age comics have 15¢ - 35¢ covers (1970’s), and comics that originally cost more than 35¢ are Modern Age (1980’s to present). As you probably presumed, the older the better. Golden Age comics have the highest demand, followed by Silver Age, and then Bronze Age. My advice is, unless you have a price guide handy, pass on any comics you see with a cover price of more than 35¢. There are exceptions, and some modern comics are very valuable. However, unless you know exactly which ones to look for, I would pass, as most modern comics sit untouched in comic stores’ 25¢ bins. I’ll discuss price guides later.
Content
Volumes could be written on which types of comics have the greatest demand. I’ll give a few tips here, and you can research more if you like. You want to stick to superhero comics (Superman, Batman, X-Men, Spider-Man, etc.) Horror and mystery comics do well also. Stay away from cartoon comics (Archie, Bugs Bunny, Walt Disney,
Condition
The most important aspect to buying comics is condition, or grade. Nothing has a larger impact on the value of a comic book than its grade. The biggest mistake beginners make is overestimating the condition of their comic. Comics are graded with the following scale: Good, Very Good, Fine, Very Fine, Near Mint, and Mint. There are grades in between those grades as well (Good plus, Good/Very Good, Very Good minus, Very Good plus, Very Good/Fine, etc.). In the last decade, more attention was brought to grading comics, with the emergence of the Certified Guarantee Company (CGC), a third-party grading service who has revolutionized comic grading. For a fee, they will grade your comic, and encapsulate it in a sealed slab, to ensure the comic maintains the grade they have assigned. Whereas sellers’ opinions of the condition of their comic can be subjective and disputed, CGC-graded comics are considered objective and widely accepted in the industry. They remove the risk of over-grading and restoration, so CGC-graded comics fetch a premium.
CGC started a 10-point grading scale, which is now used in conjunction with the grades I listed above. Good is 2.0, Very Good is 4.0, Fine is 6.0, Very Fine is 8.0, and Near Mint is 9.4. There are grades in between those in 0.5 increments, but we’ll focus on 2, 4, 6, 8, and 9.4 for now. (There are also grades 9.6, 9.8, 9.9, and 10.0, but they require great scrutiny and are quite rare and expensive.) I’ll give a brief description of each grade. These are not official descriptions as defined by Overstreet or the CGC, but rather my own words as an experienced comic grader. Let’s start at the top.
9.4 (Near Mint) – This should look like it was purchased yesterday. It will NOT have tiny lines on the spine, and will have sharp corners. No creases allowed. This comic should look perfect to you. Do not allow for any flaws.8.0 (Very Fine) – This comic doesn’t look much different than a 9.4 (NM), but one or more of the corners may not be perfectly square. Still looks like it was purchased recently, but maybe read carefully a few times. It may have a few tiny lines on the spine, but no creases or tears on the cover. It must lie flat, and look near perfect.
6.0 (Fine) – A comic in Fine condition is still a nice looking comic, but with a few more flaws. It may have a few creases, but no tears. Cannot have a crinkled or wavy cover. It has still been well taken care of.
4.0 (Very Good) – This is the average condition of comics found at yard sales or thrift stores. The covers may have creases, it might have a few small tears (not large ones, and not many). It’s not trashed, but looks old. It is an attractive comic, and many novices might call it Fine.
2.0 (Good) – A Good comic is the lowest grade priced in price guides. It gets about 10% of the Near Mint value, sometimes less. It is a pretty beat up comic, but complete. It may have large creases and large tears, but has to be complete. The covers must be there (but can be detached from the inside), and the inside must be complete. It may have writing on it, stamps, etc.
If your comic is really trashed or incomplete, you’re probably looking at a 1.0 (Fair) or 0.5 (Poor) comic, that has little to no value, unless it’s a key issue. A copy of Detective #27 (the first Batman) in 0.5 Poor would still sell for thousands.
One final thing to consider regarding grade is restoration. Collectors HATE restored comics. It’s usually more prevalent on high-end comics, where people have paid to have it restored to a higher grade than it actually was (pieces added to the cover, tears sealed, etc). The types of restoration you’re more likely to encounter are tape and marker. Tape on a comic is OK, if the grade is 2.0. Tape on any higher grade, automatically makes it a 2.0, and may or may not be seen as restoration. Depends on the collector. If the cover has markings on the front cover, it may pass for a 4.0, but probably a 2.0. Now, if the marking was put there to color in a crease line, it’s restoration. Stay away or just be prepared for a lower price (or an irate customer if you don’t disclose it in the auction description).
Online Resources
If you want to know a quick value of a comic you have, I would suggest doing a completed search on eBay. That’s the most accurate measure of what a comic is selling for. If your particular comic isn’t listed, you can try Comics Price Guide. I cannot vouch for the accuracy of their values, but it’s free and might give you a ballpark figure.
If you would like information about a particular title or specific issue (except for price), check out Comics.org. It’s a great resource for just about every issue of every comic, as well as scans of the covers.
I hope this has helped you get a better understanding of what to look for when determining if a stack of comics is worth buying. As I said, this is a drop in the bucket for all there is to know about comics. If you would like to learn more, I would buy a used copy of the Overstreet Comic Book Price Guide. There is a lot of useful information in there, including more on condition, as well as prices for almost every comic book ever printed.
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