Anybody here collect Comic Books?

[Vatican_Assassin]

I dont know what sparked it, I guess another hobby to take interest in. I use to collect Baseball Memorabilia when I was younger, but have now become intrigued with comics. Mainly early Batman, Spiderman, X-Men and Fantastic 4. its kind of fun going to the flea market finding collectible comics in the 1$ stack, later finding them to be be 50$ comics. Some people just dont want to take the time to find out what they have. For instance I met someone on Craigslist selling 55-100 issues of The New Mutants for 20$, which is an offshoot of X-Men. In the stack was New Mutants 98 which is the first appearance of Deadpool in Near Mint condition. In essence I ended up paying .35 for it. That same comic in just a good a shape I saw at a comic book store the day before for 75$. Im just hoping I find an Action Comics #1 at a yard sale, same one that sold recently at auctiom for $1.5 million. I feel like a nerd, I may go to Tampa Bay Comic Con next month

[tatmanfish]

I used to collect X-Men when I was a kid into my early teens. I believe I still have the entire set of X-Men(early 90s series). I dont collect them at all anymore and just hold onto that series hoping it may worth something one day, or at the least give it to my son here shortly when he gets a little older.

Sadly, having read the series when I was younger has almost ruined the movies for me. The first couple made the series so far from accurate it was hard to enjoy them. They have so many characters time lines overlapping in the wrong spots or characters that were generations apart are now in the same time frame. It was a lot like reading a book tht later became a movie. The movies rarely do it justice. In the case of the X-Men movies, it was like having Obama as president before Abraham Lincoln.

[Nicodemus]

Back issues are not much of a market these days. Most of the time if you are going to try and sell anything you won't get market price for it, at best if you sell to a shop you'll get a 3rd of the value. That said you may get the price you want on Ebay, but with both Marvel and DC rebooting their franchises you may find that the price slumps even further.

[Skull and Bones]

when my grandfather died I found several boxes of my dad's 1940s comics in the basement.  they weren't wrapped in plastic so they were no exactly in mint condition but still some pretty good Disney collector items and a few superhero ones.  Still about half of them were "classic Illustrasted" or something like that.  not worth a whole lot of money.

[Skull and Bones]

my father still has them as far as I know and would probably like to sell the whole lot if anyone interested.  he lives in the Tampa Bay area.

[JavaRay]

Back issues are not much of a market these days. Most of the time if you are going to try and sell anything you won't get market price for it, at best if you sell to a shop you'll get a 3rd of the value. That said you may get the price you want on Ebay, but with both Marvel and DC rebooting their franchises you may find that the price slumps even further.

I collected them in the 60's and 70's but stopped when I was 15.     I had amazing spider man 7 through 100, xmen 1 through 100, fantastic four 12 through 100, and many more.    They were in pretty darn good condition, but when I sold them, I didn't get nearly as much as I thought I would out of them.   I agree with you that you will end up getting about an average of 1/3 market price for the books.   I personally would not recommend the hobby at all.

[Vatican_Assassin]

Damn Java, that was quite a collection. You can easily get market price for them at comic auctions like Heritage Auctions. They tend to go for more than the book price. For instance, that Action Comics #1 sold for 1.5 mil just recently. The book price was 1.4  mil in near mint condition. X-Men #1 book price NM is $30,000, I bet you still wish you had that, along with your other ones.

[JavaRay]

Near Mint condition books do go for more than market price.   You know how rare it is to find a near mint copy of a book?   That's why they go for big money.    Mine were just normal condition.   No tears, or damage, but not near mint.   Only the near mint copies garner anywhere near market price.

[ufojoe]

Yes. Working Pawn Stars and seeing the baseball cards and comics that come through the door, I've learned how much of a price difference it is when an item is MInt vs., every other grade.

Vatican, we had an interesting item, related to your post, come in recently. I'll try to let you know when it's supposed to air. Nothing outrageous but interesting to a collector like yourself.

[Kodiak]

I still collect them. I got into them when I was in middle school. I had a bunch of friends that were playing a table top game and I joined in. It was a Marvel game and the super hero they gave me to play was Wolverine. I then saw one of his comic books and picked it up in the store. I was hooked. I now own ever issue ever of Wolverine and most of the X-Books. You have to grow up at some point, but that doesn't mean you have to stop being a kid.

[Vatican_Assassin]

Yes. Working Pawn Stars and seeing the baseball cards and comics that come through the door, I've learned how much of a price difference it is when an item is MInt vs., every other grade.

Vatican, we had an interesting item, related to your post, come in recently. I'll try to let you know when it's supposed to air. Nothing outrageous but interesting to a collector like yourself.

Yeah, thanks Joe, ill be looking out for that. Im sure i'll be catching that episode, thats one show I dont miss is Pawn Stars. Yes, condition plays a huge part in determining price, espescially with comic books from what i've learned. For instance, Action Comics #1 in NM/9.2 condition has a book price of $1,400,000 while in Fine/6.0 grade is worth $270,000. Thats over a $1,000,000 in price difference between those grades.

[Boid Fink]

Had a ton of Xmen comics, all in these plastic sleeves.  Had them stored away.  Went to the Air Force, never saw them again.

My favorite one was Green Hulk V. Gray Hulk, tied with Wolverine V. Spiderman.  And yes, Wolverine beat Spiderman.

Ahhh...the days of me being able to enjoy such trivial things...

[JavaRay]

In my collection, this book was always my favorite for some reason.   It wasn't the the most valuable one, but I liked it.

[Bucpride5]

I'm a huge comic collector, mainly Spider-Man and other Marvel characters. I've been collecting and reading comic since I was 10, I'm now almost 30. Have a good friend who runs a comic book store in Brandon check it out sometime if your in the area Readmorecomics.com sorry for the shameless plug.

My collection mostly consist of Amazing Spider-Man back issues I have every issues from #17-670 (the current issue), missing 10 of the earlier issues to complete my collection.

Nicodemus-Back issues are not much of a market these days. Most of the time if you are going to try and sell anything you won't get market price for it, at best if you sell to a shop you'll get a 3rd of the value. That said you may get the price you want on Ebay, but with both Marvel and DC rebooting their franchises you may find that the price slumps even further.


Wrong, back issues are very much in demand do a quick Ebay search, and see how much even low grade copies of Amazing Fantasy #15 (1st Spider-Man), Hulk #181 (1st Wolverine) and other Marvel classics from the 60's and 70's. Of course if you sell a comic to a store you aren't going to get megabucks for it as they need to sell it for a profit and know telling how long it will take up space in their shop. Yes, DC has recently rebooted and renumbered all their titles but Marvel is not doing this gimmick. They every so often renumber their titles to attract new readers or to coincide with a movie release for example both Captain America and Thor relaunched with new #1 series to coincide with the releases of their movies. Renumbered titles don't effect the cost of back issues.

Typically comics from the 60's and earlier are the comics worth the most amount of money. Action Comics #1 first appearance of Superman, Detective Comics #27 1st Batman and Amazing Fantasy #15 1st Spider-Man are the 3 most sought after comics and have all been sold at auction for over a million each in NM condition. If you are looking to get the max for your comics look into a service called CGC. They proffessional grade and seal comics, the previous mentioned comics all sold for over a million by being proffessionally graded. Very few comics from the 70's onward are deemed vaulable to collectors. Incredible Hulk #181 1st appearance of Wolverine and Amazing Spider-Man #300 1st appearance of Venom are pretty valuable depending on their condition.

Modern comics (1980-current) have very little high dollar value. There are a few titles from Independent Publishers like Image or Vertigo that are valued at $100 or over such as Walking Dead #1. If your getting into the hobby for financial reasons your getting into it for the wrong reasons. Unless your luck and find a few Silver Age (comics from the 60's and 70's) gems at a garage sale or in a relative's home.

Welcome to the hobby.

[Skull and Bones]

maybe I was wrong about the value of those Classic Illustrated comics.  there were probably 50 or so of them in the collection.

http://www.amazon.com/Classics-Illustrated-Comic-Book-Frankenstein/dp/B004OT9H16/ref=sr_1_10?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1317414526&sr=1-10

there was also some super hero #1 in the collection as well.  can't remember which one.