Buy/Sell/Trade Forum

I look for lots on Facebook Marketplace and recently found a local card store that sells bulk boxes for around $50.  I was full of decent traders.  I don't collect anything but Saints, Archie Manning, and Shaq.  My tradelist includes all 4 major sports (sorry racing fans) and a few gaming cards.  I try to add to my inventory every few months so I can trade for my collection.  The more you have to trade, the more likely you are to make a trade.

my philosophy was to stick to what i liked, what i thought was cool, what i thought was a quality product and what i thought was fun. If your in it for the money you're in it for the wrong reasons. I BOUGHT FOR THE ENTERTAINMENT.  Have a PLAN for STORAGE containers and space. and the MEMORIES!!!! 

#THEY ALWAYS HAVE MOORE IN THE COLLECTABLE'S INDUSTRY. 

I CAN'T TELL YOU HOW MANY TIME'S I GOT "ROBBED" BUYING CARDS!

BUT ONCE IN A WHILE, THE GOD'S WILL SMILE UPON YOU. 

OOOOH MOORE SPARKLE'S.

Yep, this is my main mode of trading. Builds the collection, see some new and/or unique cards, and then send some off who really want them. I enjoy the randomness, and even though none of the cards are really 'hits' they might be a 'hit' to someone else.

Buy a roll of painters tape (any color will do). Start off with small trades that you can fit in an envelope (15-18 cards). Hmm, buy envelopes and some stamps too. 

In terms of knowing if a bulk lot is a good buy. It's the same as going to a card show (if you have been, otherwise this applies there too if you do go). Don't buy the first thing you see. Spend some effort and time to see what is available before buying. A little research saves a lot of grief. There are great buys in collections, and there are delusional prices being asked too 

Understand the price value mix. A $25 5 row box of 1990 Donruss is a worse buy than a $50 5 row box of flagship Topps which is likely a worse buy than an $80 5 row box of Chrome, Heritage etc.

Do not underestimate the time it will take to go through, catalog here and file collections. Most bulk lots are not well organized.

Remember you don't have to trade baseball for baseball. If your purchase includes other sports, people still want that too 

Figure out your filing system and do it as you catalog the purchase. It doesn't matter what it is, by set, by team, by player by card number or anything else. Just choose and be rigid about doing it as you go Nothing is worse than getting an offer and then not being able to find the cards

Like others have said, don't be afraid to start small. There are a lot of 20 or less trades done here (at least that is my experience)

When I put my collection on here nearly 3 years ago I used the 'move dupes to FST' option on the collection and witihin minutes I had my first trade offer. I had about 40K cards. Some were packs I'd bought, others were auction lots from online sites, boxes of misc cards from Facebook marketplace. My initial collection gave me a good FST core, but I do like to still get lots here and there to add new cards that I can trade for things I want. Once I hit 100K cards I decided to go through my collection and move non-PC, mostly complete or complete set cards to FST to 1) free up some space and 2) have more to trade for the cards I really need/want.

I see I do have a few things you need if you are buying.

Nothing to add on the trading side, just wanted to say welcome to the database and well done on engaging the community to do things well! Lots of good advice on here, so keep involved, it has been a great boost to all of our collections.

I sent you a proposal last night

When I started off I had a small number of cards on my FT list.  I built up my inventory by scanning Craigslist, Facebook Marketplace and OfferUp for people selling big lots.  It's getting hard to find reasonable deals out there but once in a while you will still find some.  Most of the stuff you find will be junk wax, but there are folks here who collect that so at that point it becomes a matter of sorting, organizing and listing.  If you pay the right price, even if you don't get a lot of keepers from your purchase, you can build up a good stock of traders.  I bought a few large bulk collections for about $0.002 per card, in some cases even cheaper, and built up a decent inventory.  I later found a breaker who sells me the base stuff that they don't ship, so I've built up my modern inventory that way.