General Forum

It's completely up to you, but me personally I collect, not invest. 

"Do you not anticipate selling your cards in the future for profit?  Do you not perceive them as an investment?"

short answer no if that is why you collect then you are frankly doing it wrong.

The above quoted from other messages.

You're not doing it wrong - do it however you like to do it. If you're in trading cards for the "investment" side of it, please be forewarned that very few people really make money off it. Not saying you can't, but it's not the norm.

You will find most of the membership here is in this for the fun of it, not the investment of it. Many of thought we were potentially "investing" in cards when we bought those boxes upon boxes of Topps, Fleer, Donruss, and Score cards. Yeah, we see how that panned out.

If you're really looking to invest your money and turn a profit, I suggest stocks and bonds, not sports/trading cards. If you want a fun hobby, sports/trading cards is the way to go.

Depends on what direction you want to take with your collecting...if you're doing it as an investment, then yes, buying a complete set is the way to go. If you're wanting to build the set, and have fun doing so, then I would look at the additional cost as entertainment value.

If your intention is to invest in cards you shouldn’t even be thinking of making sets. 
 

I’m not going to say there is a right and wrong way to collect. Making sets from wax and trading was the way it was when I was young, and it’s the way I find it enjoyable. I have also seen people get an entire set graded by a TPG, while it’s impressive I find that even more daunting. 

i do this totally for the fun of it, the thrill of the hunt!  in 1976 i bought a set of 1972 topps football that was missing 8 cards in the final series.  in the world before the internet (yes, there really was a world before the internet), i took me almost 12 years the find those final eight cards.  when i finally found the last card (alan page) i was so excited, then disappointed, because i had finally reached the end of the hunt. 

If any of y'all are in this for the investment, my sister and I have also got some Beanie Babies for you.

i have a friend full of beanie babies and hot wheels

This was a great thread, I rarely make it all the way through but seriously top notch. Me personally, I collect, sell, invest, Player collect and the only sets i have that are complete just happened through volume. That said everyone has their thing and then a different way to do that thing, I must stand firm on the following statement There is no way to incorrectly collect cards and different from you is not incorrect. You cant make money on trading cards is an insanely incorrect myth. If you consider that you collect and if you dont want particular cards so you sell them you make money then you can go buy singles or whatever you desire But you made money on cards you didnt want instead of looking through god knows how many lists to find someone to trade with then work out the details then pack and ship and wait a week.......I was going to post my ebay sales for trading cards but I figured it wouldnt be a classy move but making money on trading cards got my family through a pandemic, with money not other cards! Final Note : HAVE YOU SEEN THE STOCK MARKET Trading cards are a much safer investment, If you grade the cards you sell you are doing it in a very risky way because you now have a hell of a lot more money in and you will not make the grading cost back but sell RAW and accept fair offers and you will be fine. Perrsonally my fun in the hobby is collecting my favorite players past and present, Putting them in books so i can show them to people and I enjoy making lots of the ones i dont want and photographing them, I despise EBay but I like the amount of users it has.     

If you really want to get rid of those stuffed animals I will take them and give them to kiddos who would love em, thats what stuffed animals r for

BLadd,

What's your basic strategy on selling?  Do you sell the whole set once you've completed it?  Or, do you sell by random lots, by teams, by individual players?

Problem i see with these junk wax complete sets is that they are so terribly cheap, that their value might not even be worth the price of shipping them.  Now, if you put them in 9 pocket pages and binders, and sell them that way, the overall loss is even greater.

So, how do you then make money off these junk sets?

I have had some pretty good luck picking up sheets and binders locally for next to nothing so putting cheap sets in binders hasn’t been an issue for me.