It does seem lower. The Green Mile S/L went for $658.97 a couple of days ago. well below the issue price of $900.Originally Posted by Patrick
Tippy4 only got $85 for LSOE at the second try. Below issue price. (It also had a Brodart cover on it)
I expect it to get worse as the recession start to dig in later in the year.
Great news if you are a buyer.
Last edited by Mr. Rabbit Trick; 03-10-2009 at 06:51 AM. Reason: Corrected sale price of GM S/L
I concur. Prices have taken another step down to a lower level. Some rarities are retaining decent value, but (listen to me now) run of the mill S/L, like Green Mile, Black House etc., have also taken a big hit. This is not a hard and fast rule, but I still think King's early work is holding value much better than anything done after 1990.
Dragline : Nothin'. A handful of nothin'. You stupid mullet head. He beat you with nothin'. Just like today when he kept comin' back at me - with nothin'.
Luke : Yeah, well, sometimes nothin' can be a real cool hand.
I have a Buick 8 up at $525 - high, but I would accept offers, and not even a lowball offer of $250-$300!
It's not coincendence that the market is worst for books like Buick 8, which coincide with when people started buying less for collecting and more for 'investment.' Exact same thing that hurt comic and baseball card collecting. The good news is these books are truly limited, so that finite number will keep the market from totally bottoming out.
I mentioned this is another thread. I have a book called The Fantasy-Science Publishers Index, and it has 12 supplements, I think up to 2004? And that’s when Jack L. Chalker died. But it was a lifelong project and it details every small press book in the fantasy/sf/horror field from 1900 or whatever up to 2004. The first edition of this book was 1966, the 3rd printing was 1992 and the supplements went up to 2004.
Anyway he obviously followed the market for 40 years or so and he was complaining about how high the price of books got in the 90’s and 2000’s, and basically said the value of books at this time was way overpriced, and he expected it to come back down to reasonable levels. The recession is doing this, but imo I don’t expect to see the mid to late 90’s prices again for a long time. For me this is great as I always have felt that Stephen King collecting has been way overpriced, but if you bought at that time then this stinks.
Btw, it’s the most valuable book I have in my collection.
Geoff
This LSOE just went for $66. Well below issue price.
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.d...m=200316129698
I should have bought it as I STILL do not have my single copy direct from Grant.
Dang! I would have bought that one too.
The kindness of close friends is like a warm blanket
That's an interesting study...and it jibes with baseball cards except on a more expensive scale...once the card manufacturers realized people were buying for investment, they came up with all sorts of excuses to make more and different brands of cards, at progressively higher prices - granted, they had cache' like autographs, patches of uniforms, etc. but after awhile it was impossible to keep up with them.
Of course, the average kid who just wanted to buy a pack of baseball cards was priced out of the market...and there was no scarcity because at the price people paid, everyone kept them in all mint condition, etc.
Eventually no new collectors were coming in, and so the secondary market for the would-be investors dried up pretty quickly.
SK s/l editions seem like they're following pretty much that same pattern...
There was some point where it was exactly like the housing market - you'd buy a limited, and the price didn't matter because you were just going to flip it anyway...wow, those days are gone...
I know this has been discussed before, but when did the market hit it's absolute peak? Was it 2004? Or a little earlier?
PS - Like Matt says below, it also affected comics...although it didn't see like price was the problem. I think it was just lack of scarcity. Everybody bought every issue, bagged it, and saved it...so of course value never went up, because there was never a shortage. The only comics that really maintained value were ones where a character was introduced as a throaway villain or something, but then years later was reintroduced as a significant plot point of the narrative (Wolverine's arch-nemesis Sabretooth showed up in some random Iron Fist and was promptly forgotten for 10 years. Even Wolverine was a toss-off rival for the Hulk, not meant to be a recurring hero)
Same thing happened with comic books during the same time frame.
The kindness of close friends is like a warm blanket
There is a coin collecting newsletter that keeps getting in my inbox of my email. I'm not sure why as I do not collect coins. However, in their recent newsletter there is an article on how more people are shifting this investment into physical collectibles. With 12 months CD only yielding 2% and FDIC insurance only covering up to $250K, it makes sense to me. Maybe it's related to mostly coins or super high end collectibles?. It's interesting anyway.
I'm so glad that I only bought comics for their intrinsic art value to me. Mostly graphic novels, such as Black Orchid by McKean and the like or older comics by Moebius or Richard Corben. Same goes for artwork. I only bought pieces that I would want to hang irregardless of their 'value'. I never buy art to 'flip'. This way I always win.
Unfortunately, I did get caught-up in the art-card market, which basically has no value any longer.
With comics, what happened was essentially what Matt said. The comic book companies started manufacturing multiple copies of the same books so collectors would buy them. This artificially drove the price of the current issues up until the bubble finally burst. Many of the titles produced in the early 90's experienced this, but few garnered such attention as Superman #75. I saw prices hit as high as $125 per issue and less than 6 months later individual issues, still in the polybag and in NM condition, were selling for as low as $5.00. Many of those who bought for investment lost their ass.
Margaret Emmie Mackey Catoe, you are, have been, and always will be my soulmate, and I love you.
Con todo mi corazon, por todo de mis dias. And I always will, in this life and into the next.
August 2, 1947 - September 24, 2010
If you like Moebius' art, he have illustrated couple of books of Bernard Werber, and those are only available from Korea... pretty nice!
Previews : http://www.bernardwerber.com/livres/...us/page14.html
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I suppose lucky for me, I've never looked at my King collection as an "investment" but just something fun to do. The soft market actually makes me really happy, as once I start working full time again, I'll be able to put hands on things that if I started collecting a few years ago would have been way beyond my reach.
YOU MUST CHILL. I HAVE HIDDEN YOUR KEYS.
^ Same for me.
I'm with Ves on this one.
I collect for me, for the fun, because the books hold a meaning to me. They touched my heart somehow, or spoke to me, and that makes them special.
Thanks to the collectors here, who helped me with the few books I have. I can't imagine selling them. ( you all know who you are)
Sam - this turtle did not fall for the huge price jumps on Supe... though I did buy several at original price.
I will say though, that I seem to miss out on all these great Sai King bargains some people are grabbing up ... I must be searching for the wrong thing on eBay.
The Man In Black Fled Across The Desert...
...And The Gunslinger Followed.
“I’m always on the Batman rule, sir.” - Kate Kane / Detective Comics 857
"It is the story, not he who tells it." Except to us collectors who have to put limits somewhere. - jhanic
Remember, Remember, The Fifth of November, The Gunpowder, Treason, and Plot.
I agree completely, I can't imagine selling anything in my precious little collection.
That's why each of them need to have a special meaning to go in it.
But I suppose if I had been doing this for the last 10 years or so and ended up with extra things because I found a better deal or copy...well then I'd have to recoup as best I could.
Hopefully, if I can stick to my criteria, that won't happen.
The kindness of close friends is like a warm blanket
Pam--I didn't fall for the prices on Supes either. What I did was see the writing on the wall and sold out what I had two months before the fall.
Margaret Emmie Mackey Catoe, you are, have been, and always will be my soulmate, and I love you.
Con todo mi corazon, por todo de mis dias. And I always will, in this life and into the next.
August 2, 1947 - September 24, 2010
Theres one book that I think is an oddity in all this - the S/L of the Waste Lands.
Right now they're going for $300- $400, and I think even in this market thats WAY below value. Six months ago I sold one for $700, five months ago I bought one for $650. I'm not sure if anyone else has noticed, but theres a guy on eBay that seems to have a never ending supply of them - probably a dozen in the last three months hes auctioned off. I'm pretty sure that seller is the cause of such low prices for that particular book.
Thoughts?
Owner of a defunct bookstore maybe? I think that it's very likely that he HAS flooded the market. I was beginning to think that the seller was a thief (you know, selling the book, getting the money, then not sending the book) since the book kept showing up so much.
Margaret Emmie Mackey Catoe, you are, have been, and always will be my soulmate, and I love you.
Con todo mi corazon, por todo de mis dias. And I always will, in this life and into the next.
August 2, 1947 - September 24, 2010
I thought that too, but each listing is a different number, and they all have pictures as back-up. I hadn't given it a ton of thought, but bankrupt bookseller makes sense.
Link to my xcell pricing from 2005
Shocking.
If you are talking about the seller using the eBay username "redmelvin27" I can attest to his honesty. I have bought several comic books (Carl Barks artwork from the 1940's) over the past year and have been impressed with his conservative grading, professional attitude and overall "coolness" of his listings. I have no idea where he gets his stock for sale (including the multiple copies of the King book) but I suspect all his listings are legitimate.I thought that too, but each listing is a different number, and they all have pictures as back-up. I hadn't given it a ton of thought, but bankrupt bookseller makes sense.
Yep thats the one. I was just commenting on how he seems to have flooded the market for DTIII. But its all good, supply will eventually run dry and demand will drive the price back up to what one would expect for that book. Good old capitalism!If you are talking about the seller using the eBay username "redmelvin27" I can attest to his honesty. I have bought several comic books (Carl Barks artwork from the 1940's) over the past year and have been impressed with his conservative grading, professional attitude and overall "coolness" of his listings. I have no idea where he gets his stock for sale (including the multiple copies of the King book) but I suspect all his listings are legitimate.I thought that too, but each listing is a different number, and they all have pictures as back-up. I hadn't given it a ton of thought, but bankrupt bookseller makes sense.
Well, given the five-year gap in time between DT III and IV, it's not that surprising that a bookstore/collector had a bunch of IIIs, but never ordered IV afterwards. I think that a defunct bookstore is a good theroy.
I've noticed this and I'm trying to pick one up as a filler until my number emerges someday!
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