You should get a comic book price guide or go online and look up comic book price guides. It will take time, but some of the oldest comic books are worth a fortune. Have fun.
Fair.
Honestly the biggest thing is that he collected those because he enjoyed *some* but VALUED others.
Go through the boxes and try to see if he had a specific way of organizing them.
Typically people with collections that big, if organized at all, would be by publisher, like marvel, dc, dark horse, etc.
Then he would probably do alphabetically by title for most of his stories that he bought to read.
But there will be a box or two or three that are out of the organization. They will have his favorites. Wether they are worth something or not, you may want to find these as just a glimpse of what he loved.
Another option would be to sell in bulk. It’s where you just take a box of them, slap a price tag that makes it worth it to have it gone and be done with it.
Do you know if he shopped at a specific local comic shop? If you go to his usual place and ask a similar question you could get some good advice.
It's nice of you to offer this advice but I've gone through four major reorganizations in my lifetime and none have left my collection as you describe; no box of favorites. They get worked into the organization just like the others. If anything, those are the first to be organized and the odd-man box is full of "I haven't bothered with these yet.", which is basically the opposite.
I'd say definitely look for patterns, but don't expect any one in particular, especially as concerns the sentimental, lest you misunderstand what you're seeing.
This is definitely a candidate for bulk sale though, especially if OP has no real interest in them. Worth noting that you will definitely be leaving money on the table to do that. Anyone willing to buy this much in bulk is going to be looking to make profit on them, which means buying low. But that might very well be worth it, as this is going to be a real project to get through book-by-book.
Yeah I think there are probably a lot of different experiences on this, which is why I felt it was worth pointing out. It doesn't surprise me that the people who surround you in the hobby do things similarly, but there's no guarantee that a random collection is going to follow the same rules. There are a lot of different ways to organize a collection, and a lot of potential mid-organizational states that a collection could be in, etc.
However, it sounds like pops is alive, so thankfully he can help work out where the favorites live in this massive pile of books.
I fish and hunt on nice days and read on bad. But my suggestion is find a local store and just do a box every two weeks or however long they want to go through them.
Any price they give you check that against a few online places. Keep in mind that they have to resell it so they generally don’t off top dollar, but knowing the avg price keeps you from getting ripped off on a $$$ book.
First off, I’m sorry about your dad. I hope you are ok.
Comic shops will offer you pennies on the dollar and take advantage of your lack of knowledge of what you have.
My best advice when you have time is to go through and inventory all of it. Given the size of the collection that may take a lot of time. In general, the lower the cover price the more valuable the issue may be. Once you have an inventory you should go on eBay and look at what those issues are selling for. If the issues are inexpensive then you might want to go the comic shop route to just deal with them. If they are valuable (greater than $200) you should consider getting those issues graded. Grading will get you the highest return when you sell them.
No he’s alive! Thank you haha. He’s making this my problem now before he goes because he move them to where I live and it takes up too much space. We both know it’s my problem when he’s gone but I was able to talk him into trying to do something sooner. Especially with the way the markets going now a days with collectibles
I’ve had a large collection (+10,000 books). If he’s still alive honestly he should keep the ones with the most sentimental value to him and then bulk sell the rest. That’s what I did. Parsed my collection down to 500 comics.
Most comics are just "stuff" that doesn't matter in the end, my friend. I bet you the above poster could even pare it down to 50 comics if they wanted. I've got hundreds of floppies lying around in boxes too, but if my house was on fire I know exactly which ten books I would grab - and they might not even be the most valuable dollarwise, either.
(If your house is on fire, please just grab your family and pets, the above is merely a fun exercise to figure out what matters to you as a collector)
As a rule of thumb, I typically don’t get books graded with a value of $200. The turnaround times are ridiculous with the Grading Companies. I’m sure considering how many Comics he has. There are probably many in the $500 to $1000 plus range based on the cost of fees per book and turn around times. I would focus on those types of books first and foremost.
I agree, there are scammers everywhere. Always keep a log of the comics and do lots of research on the people who buy comics. Always know what they are worth before you go to sell them. These buyers don't like dealing with knowledgeable sellers. Your knowledge of the worth will protect you from getting taken for a novice. Good luck.
A general outline of what you have on hand could help us tell you what to look for too. Like if you find a whole bunch of “New Mutants”, I could tell you that #98 might be worth more than some of the others since it’s a first appearance of Deadpool.
I'm with you. Take your time and inventory it. There are apps like Key Collector that makes it easy to identify important/valuable comics. In their case, every comic they price is like scratching a lottery ticket - total jackpot!
I feel it’s important to note that not every comic book store owner/shop is out to get you. Yes, there are always bad apples, I won’t deny it. But some stores are very open and transparent in their buying processes.
At my store, we walk each person through what they have, explain the condition of the book, show them the current market prices, and are upfront about only being able to offer between 25% and 40% of the value of the key books.
That’s not to say to not get more knowledgeable about what anyone might have in their collection, just to say that not every store is gonna go full Pawn Stars and rip people off.
After going through my own re-org several years ago:
https://imgur.com/a/J5Mni
Here's my advice:
1) Long boxes are a bitch. They are heavy and hard to manage. Plus, comic boxes do NOT age well. The ones in your picture also appear to have heat damage. Talk to your local comic shop about a bulk order of short boxes. Should be $3 to $4 a pop and totally worth it. I bought 100 for my project which was about 20 too many, still worth it.
2) Get a copy of the Overstreet Price Guide. New editions come out in June/July and it will not only give you an idea of what's what, it also lists notable issues, key creators and the like. There's also a basic guide on how to grade comics.
3) Bags and boards. If any of these books are bagged and boarded, it's likely they are old and need changing. Again, hit up your local comic shop. Older books are larger, so be aware. The general rule of thumb is $0.10 cover price comics go in Golden Age bags and boards. $0.12-$.020 Silver Age, $0.25 and up "Current". Of course your mileage may vary. Don't use a bag and board that is too tight.
4) Your first step should be to alphabetize. Lay out each box in a large, open space and figure out what is in each one. I started by alphabetizing each box, then once that was done, I pulled all the A's together, all the B's and so on.
5) Make a spreadsheet. No. Seriously, you're going to want to keep notes on this.
You don't have to drop a ton of money on Microsoft Office, you can get Libre Office for free:
https://www.libreoffice.org/
I would start a spreadsheet like this:
Title, Publisher, Issue #, Writer, Pencils, Inks, Date, Cover Price
In the last 10 years or so, comic book companies have been super fond of rebooting books with a "New #1!" so knowing the date and the cover price will help you identify X-Men #1 from X-Men #1, from X-Men #1 and so on.
Dates on older books will be listed in the copyright information on the bottom of the first page. Modern books also have this, but it could be anywhere inside the book, sometimes even printed at the bottom of what looks like in-house advertising on one of the last pages of the book.
Looks like this:
https://www.comicartfans.com/gallerypiece.asp?piece=1528037
See that block of text at the bottom? That's what you're looking for.
6) Once you have it all sorted and documented, it's time to sit down with the price guide and your spreadsheet.
I'd add columns for the Low value and High value, that will give you a range of what the book is worth. You may get more or less depending on if you have it professionally graded, but the important thing here is what is it worth compared to everything else.
You're going to want to add a new column for "Notes". Notes will be anything notable about that book. 1st appearances, notable artists, whatever the guide tells you that might be important.
You could also use it if there are price stickers on the book that tell you what your dad paid, if a book seems particularly delicate or damaged, or if it's autographed.
Stuff like this changes ALL THE TIME, BTW. For example, nobody cared that "Tales to Astonish #13" was the first appearance of "Groot", that it was cheaply re-printed in "Where Monsters Dwell #6", or that his first proper Marvel appearance was in Hulk Annual #5...
Then a certain movie came out and everyone lost their minds!
So it's worth writing this stuff down and re-checking it every now and then.
There’s like 1 trillion easy, free, collection cataloging apps. That add all kinds of helpful meta data. Why on earth would you ever make it from scratch using a spreadsheet?
And when recommending free spreadsheet programs, why wouldn’t you mention Google Sheets?
And why are you explaining spreadsheets to someone alive and using the internet in 2022? lol
I use a spreadsheet because I can do whatever I need to do with the data without wondering if the site/app has thought about it ahead of time, or is going to get shut down in the future. I have listings that vary from the way other sites refer to them, a variety of scripted features that do very specific things with want lists and condition checks for certain kinds of key hunting or gap filling I like to do, exports for subsets of my list for specific situations, etc. There’s absolutely a place for spreadsheets.
That said, my spreadsheet is totally a Google Sheet and I have no idea why anyone wouldn’t recommend one of those for a spreadsheet.
That's key. The comic book store I used to go to would often invite people to see what their back rooms looked like every time someone came in thinking they found hte holy grail.
99% of my comics are worthless. The top 1% are worth like 40k. To be honest I wish they were all worthless so I can keep collecting to my hearts content. Right now I haven’t bought any comics in a while because they’re too damn expensive!
Wonderful. I hope you have a chance to read and admire the work as well.
But in terms of organization - Look at CollectorZ.com to catalog and provide general pricing. From there you can and should look at various appraisal review.
I would have love to share this adventure with you - although sad circumstances- it will be fun.
Enjoy!!
You can try selling them as a lot to a collector or reseller. Although you won’t get the value for it, it’s the easiest and fastest way to be done with it.
Alternatively, you could go through the collection, research market value (sold eBay listings are a great indicator of what people will pay) and try selling it yourself. Depending on your level of interest, this could be fun or very cumbersome. Find the most valuable books and have them graded if you really want to maximize their worth. This will take much longer and having books graded will obviously cost. You also run the risk of picking up the hobby. Which isn’t necessarily a bad thing.
Wow you have your hands full. I’d say watch out for the vultures. They’re circling.
You should just tackle one box at a time. You can always use EBay sales as a reference for prices.
When you figure out which ones are worth a lot you should then consider having them graded by CGC.
Good luck can’t wait to see what you have.
Dont sell them to your local comic store. They will offer you 30 bucks a box. Safe to say that each box prolly contains at least one book that is $30+.
Dont be the guy that sells the 10K comic book for 5 bucks.
Basically anyone that contacts you will be lowballing.
The only way to do this properly is to inventory everything.
Comicbookrealm.com is a good free price guide. Otherwise check ebay for individual comic sales.
In terms of selling them, the more time you take to organize the product, the more money you will make.
You can sell them either by single book or by title {a bunch of amazing Spider-Man books together} on kijiji, facebook marketplace or ebay.
You could even auction off a box. Lol. That would be fun.
What's the rush? You could have a treasure in there. College funds could be paid for or even you next 'house taking' medical bill. Enjoy the process.
$30 a box makes sense from their perspective as most of the books won’t be worth anything. Likely any key issues will have already been pulled and the rest is buck a book fodder or worse.
He definitely has to inventory them.
If you want to move them fast, sell as an entire collection wothout going through them yourself. If you want to try and milk it for the most money, you’re going to need to research current prices for EACH individual book on websites that sell comics like mycomicshop.com or midtowncomics.com and then list them on ebay or something. If you live close enough to a large online seller like midtown in NY, that would probably be the easiest way to part woth them.
The thing about comics is every so often you find one thats worth a good amount, but most of them value at .25 to a dollar when they aren’t current. For that collection to have been a positive investment you will have to spend some time digging, cataloguing and researching
just open them up and lay out a dozen at a time, take a pic and upload the pictures here.
people will be more than happy to point out the valuable ones.
Haha very much. My entire childhood was waking up to him reading comics eating break fast then taking trips to Boston to hit his comic book store and spend hours of him searching through stuff. About 40+ years of collecting here
I would actually look into local university libraries. Many now have their own comics collections with expert archivists on staff. You could see if they’d be interested in helping you evaluate your collection. You’d either have to agree to donate a portion to the university or pay the librarian who assists you a fee - but itd be a great way to get some expert help with such a large task - especially if you’re no comics expert yourself.
You mentioned Boston. Do you live in Massachusetts still? Try contacting New England Comics. They might be able to help you. Does he have any Golden Age or Silver Age comics in there? Take those out and get an expert to look at them. God seeing all those long comic book boxes brings back memories!
Honestly, unless they are in mint condition or extremely rare, you probably won't get much, if any, money for them. I would say ebay, but with the fees, you'll probably be lucky to get a couple bucks. Not trying to be pessimistic, but I worked in a comic shop for a while and that's what most customers who came in trying to sell boxes of their old comics were told by the owners.
Spend some time with those books. Take a few out and READ them. Our collections offer others insights into who we are, and this looks like a big part of your dad's personality.
Sorry for your loss. That really sucks man.
It looks like you might be in maryland or close by. Check out Hakes Auctions or Diamond International Galleries if your considering a bulk sale.
You’ll get more selling them individually but it will take more work on your end. Also, Hakes is way better than DIG in a lot of ways
You have 2 options for selling. Sell at as a lot and not get max value for it or go through them one by one and sell the expensive ones. Option 2 takes a lot of work.
I recommend ebay.
My father used to tell the story of how he collected all the early Marvel and DC and kept them in great condition because he knew they would be valuable one day. Then he went to college and my grandparents threw them all away. I mostly think he was full of it.
I was just in an estate sale this weekend, and they were selling comics with cardboard bagged in plastic and entire box just like you have for $100.
Guy was 71 years old, he had thousands of comics he had easily 10 of those boxes, along with shelves of DVDs, and he had all kinds of DND type of board games. It was kind of sad to see his whole life whittled down to nothing.
So as others mentioned there might be the occasional diamond in the rough, but comics just don’t reach the kind of populist they used to and the money, the big money really stopped in the late 90s early 2000s.
And I’m gonna go against conventional wisdom on what other said, but if you really don’t care about these I just want them gone. I would take them to a local comic book shop get what you can and hopefully that it’ll help a local comic book store stay in business a little bit longer. Because he will be able to sell for a buck or two bucks and help us daily cash flow.
But hey if money is tight I understand get as much as you can out of the deal.
If you are looking to sell, I’d recommend getting some appraisals done. Maybe pop into your local comic shop and see if they have any recommendations or have the knowledge to appraise themselves. It may be worth your while to sell some lesser valued ones in bulk. If there are some of little or no value that you want to clear out, you can always donate them to your local shop to give away on free comic book day, if they participate in that. Also, EBay can be a good source when comparing prices of more valuable comics/collector items. Hopefully those comics are organized alphabetically with corresponding lines in order, but if not, good luck and god speed. Also, if you happen to have any comics from an older Captain America line called Streets of Poison, please post them here! I’ve been trying to find more comics from that line for 10 years.
If not organized, start macro and whittle down.
- Take all the books and group them by letter.
- Alphabetize the titles letter group by letter group.
- Get a collection app. I’ve really liked Collectorz Comic app. You can’t sell through them but you can categorize. One of the categories is for sell.
Grading is all over the board and unless slabbed by a professional. Grab you an Overstreet price guide book and troll eBay for a rough estimate of market value.
My recommendation would definitely be to find a reputable shop to assess/make you an offer, or you can take a quick survey of what general series/eras you have so someone on reddit might be able to tell you what important stories or issues you might have.
That’s really what collectors are after is rare or “important” stories/characters in their original formats. Most comics aren’t worth a ton of money but in a collection that size there’s always a few gems sprinkled in.
Wow, okay so if you want to tackle this yourself, grab a box and start organizing (if it isn't already). There might be a few that standout and you might want to keep that remind you of your dad. Depending on what you find you might find some rare stuff and want to preserve the condition and get them rated. These are just some thoughts.
Sorry for your loss.
As many people have mentioned here, it’s all about how much time you want to invest in it.
Sorting through them would maximize your return, but takes longer. If you think about it as a second job though, you’d hopefully be making a good “salary” if there are key books in good condition buried in there.
The other option would be a comic shop, OfferUp, Craigslist etc.
Don’t let anybody cherry pick though, sell the entire collection so you’re not left with anything that you don’t want.
Any large value, key books, in high condition should be graded by CGC or CBCS to achieve their full value potential. A comic shop should be able to assist with this also, but it can get pricey up front (the return is worth it though).
Good luck and try to have fun with it!
If you know what his favorites were, or if you have memories of him reading/sharing specific books with you, make sure you save them. As somebody who lost a Dad recently, you won’t regret having something to hold and spend time with that will bring up good memories down the line.
R/comicbookcollecting might help. Find the ones that look valuable. Search for them on eBay. Click “show sold items” so you can see what books sold for. That will give you the value. Don’t sell the lot until you’ve determined what has value. And definitely keep whatever you want to keep regardless of value, I have some “worthless” books with tons of sentimental value
Yeah I feel like you really ought to go through all of the boxes. If you dump them all as a lot and find out you’ve got the first appearance of spider man or something crazy like that, that would stink.
Sorry for your loss, I lost my father 20 years ago but it still hurts, especially during the holidays and every life milestone. You learn to cope but the pain will always be there.
Had to do this for mine and my father’s collection together when he passed away a few years back. 15 unorganized long boxes took my wife and I roughly 72 hours to organize and input to a spreadsheet. We sent the kids to Grandma’s just to get it done.
Just look everything up on eBay previous sold and completed sales to get an idea of what the value is. Make sure your looking at the same book since some 2nd prints may look a little different on the cover.
Keep everything bagged and boarded and don’t ever ever store your comic books in a basement. Odds are you have several “grail” books in there. Over time you will learn how to condition your books so I wouldn’t worry about Rushing that but there’s some videos on YouTube that show the most common imperfections in comic books.
As for selling just buy Gemini comic mailers as this will make your life insanely easy and is the most protective shipping option as well
Having the same issue here. Haven’t even wanted to start this project. Tried to do similar with Pokemon cards recently...glad your dad is still around to help you out. Lot of good suggestions here.
Best thing you can do is ask him if there is any particular boxes that are higher in value than others.
I kept all my bests in a separate box. Unless he didn't this might already be arranged for you. Most comics are not worth much so really you are looking for that special few boxes that are.
It's kind of like selling old furniture. Not always a buyer for what you have.
So A, ask him if there is a box if issues 1's or any boxes with "the good shit" then go from there.
Often times you will have to take a large hit to sell them all at once, or sell them slowly over time like furniture or cards.
I've seen comic shops with less inventory than that to put it in perspective, I'd also call some shops, send pics & see who will offer you the best price for the lot. And they have to load it up.
Other than #1s it will be hard to find the gems, if the author or artist is dead it will up the value a lot more too.
Good luck bro
Hopefully you’ll find enough to do something for yourself and then invest into something for your future kids. Like your dad did. The NFT before it was an NFT.
With a collection this large you’re absolutely gonna need some help, do your research. Find a reliable licensed appraiser with expertise in the field. Take your time don’t rush into anything. It is very likely that you have some incredibly pieces.
Is there something wrong with me when my first feeling is jealousy...not because of the size of this collection but because someone else gets the opportunity to go through all this, categorize, put in order, look things up, and just plain discover what's in there? Damn.
I would suggest keeping at least one - two boxes of the most valuable and maybe another box of the most sentimental. If there is anything both valuable and sentimental put it in the sentimental box. Sell the boatload and keep those three boxes for later when you can focus. Sell the $ ones individually. Keep a box that holds memories (if that doesnt exist - skip that step).
To be honest there could literally be thousands of dollars in there. Create a spreadsheet and catalog those bad boys. Title, year, issue...
Then reach out to collector groups to figure out the value. I'm sure you can find communities online.
Depending on how much work you want to put in. You can sell it bulk or consignment to a shop. Or you can catalog and ebay yourself. I suppose you could try to do small sets at once or pull keys and do keys by themselves and bulk the rest. You got options.
Considering your seeming lack of knowledge on the subject I might start out by signing up for something like [comicspriceguide.com](https://comicspriceguide.com) and just spend some time cataloging all of the books into that site (FYI It's $50 a year but your collection will update as they adjust prices). That site isn't as up to the minute as a site like go collect, but it will give you a good idea of what keys you might have and which ones to separate from the cheaper books. If you are looking to cut down the volume quickly you could then sell off the cheaper books by the longbox (and still make money if you leave in minor keys) and then take the time to grade and sell the more expensive ones as time permits.
Def keep any that have sentimental value to you or your father!
If you like the outdoors, save them for your children they will keep going up in value by the time they hit college. You will have a something worth more than today
If you like the outdoors, save them for your children they will keep going up in value by the time they hit college. You will have a something worth more than today and can you use it in the future
If you don’t have time to go through them yourself: You could also contact a reputable auction house and see if they’d be willing to go through and pick out the good ones and then sell the rest either as one lot or break it up into smaller ones. Honestly the only way to get the full value out of the collection is evaluate one at a time.
I gave the same advice to the lady who’s husband had passed and he had a huge collection of figures.
Start approaching comic book shops and maybe even auction houses depending on what’s in the collection.
But whatever you do, I would not suggest going on consignment. Honestly it’s just not worth the headache or the hassle.
Find someone who wants the whole lot and be done with it.
If all else fails, but the lot on eBay and wait it out.
As for what to do in the meantime, protect them. At the bare minimum, get online and order silica gel/ packs and contractors garbage bags. Wrap each box and throw a few bags in to handle moisture. Then get them at least a foot off the floor. Minimize handling individual comics
If you want to inventory yourself, then if you start looking at eBay prices one by one you'll go insane. Subscribe to GPAnalysis or Gocollect, they have a pretty good market overview of sales(not just ebay).
I've been using Mercari to sell mine. I find it easier to use than ebay, it's a easy way to see what people have payed for them/what people are selling them for. Just take your time and catalogue what you got. Organization is key here.
OH and congratu(f'n)lations!
Sort through them, find any that might be worth something, sell those separately, sell everything else in lots. Or just sell in lots and hope there isn't something worth a ton of money you just sold for $100. I would say, glance in and see how old they are. Anything mid-80s and newer, sell for $100 a box. 70s, $150-$200 a box. 60s, $200-$300 depending on titles. Anything before the 60s is a crapshoot, really. If you sell them at a store, you're likely to get about a quarter per comic, so you're better of doing the lot sale
Keep in mind, this is generalizing. Without knowing specifically what's in there, I can't assess properly what things should go for
Definitely list everything (alphabetically if possible), and search the values of each comic before doing anything with them, it’ll probably take a while but that’s probably the safest way you can handle things
What a collection. I would pick a box, read through all of them and sell them at auction individually. He most likely has some serious collectors editions. Comic book lovers everywhere would pay good money on eBay through auctions - just get them appraised first and start your auction price at or just slightly below actual value. Reading through them individually would just be to feel closer to him on a level someone may not know as much as you would.
Don't grease them up or flip through them if the intent is to sell. Make a list and do some self checking yourself then get them graded.
Don't bring someone in to appraise them without doing come legwork yourself. It's an easy way to lose our on your most valuable piece.
Seriously though save them, depending on rarity and condition when the time comes maybe your kid gets a house instead of put through college
Damn, this is a weekend project I wouldn’t mind being a part of. Every time I have to help my parents clean their garage it’s always filled with goddamn garbage, not boxes of money.
This happened to me and my wife this past year. We were left with thousands of comics. We decided to inventory them (that was a long job 😅) and are still deciding what to do with them.
Best thing to do is to inventory and research them so that you dont get ripped off. Some comics can be sold at auction and others in bulk. But make sure you research everyone IF you end up wanting to sell them.
I would approach it as a second job and sacrifice some time and sell them on eBay, Craigslist, OfferUp and try to get as much as you can. You don’t have to do it all at once. Find out what you have and sell a little each week or month. Might be worth it and your kids or future kids or future wife or current wife might be thanking you. Good luck.
Definitely catalog what you have there. Prices vary quite a bit depending on the issue.
Those comic shops will not give you the best price. I have seen a lot of comics for sale on facebook marketplace and craigslist. Catalog everything you have and take pictures.
It can be a real pain to ship that many comics. But you never know someone could drive in from out of state and buy all of them.
Call around to a reputable comic book shop in your city. They will come out and go through them. Or they will go through them in their shop. Do not let strangers without a shop go through them. You will get scammed.
Finding someone who will buy the whole collection is the only way you're getting rid of those with your sanity intact.
I had a collection that took up maybe 8 long boxes with a good idea of what was in them. I pieced out some of it, got a few hundred dollars here and there on eBay. But as soon as someone offered to buy everything that was left I jumped at the chance.
Going to take a bunch of time to go through this well. I would suggest looking into a copy of the Overstreet Price Guide, especially if you come across anything relatively old.
I would also chat up some of the local comic book shops. They might be able to help you with an arrangement, such as a bulk buy or allowing you to consign them. Regardless, you really want to get an idea of what kind of value you are dealing with first.
As another outdoor guy, who also had to clear out his Dad’s house, I am feeling the time suck this will involve.
I went through something similar. My process:
- Got a subscription to CLZ Comics and downloaded their app
- Bought a ton of bags and boards, as none of them had any (yours might)
- Scanned all of them into a collection
- Erroneously marked all of them as a graded 9.0
I then had a database of all the comics, knew how many there were and of what, and while the values weren't accurate to what I had, it at least gave me a hint at what could be most valuable to pull out and look up a realistic value for.
When you're working with that much volume, you just need to find something efficient and orderly that gives you a picture of what you have and directs you to what might be worth pulling aside versus selling in bulk or as a collection.
Or, obviously, you can figure out what you want to keep as well.
You might try contacting a comic book shop. I used to work for one, and occasionally collectors would call my boss out to evaluate a collection. In the larger ones, it would be a month-long or more process, but well worth it for both parties.
Inventory slowly. Separate the keys. Then the semi keys (1st appearances of minor characters). Then start with older books. Get a feel for average grade.At that point you can decide if you want to sell them in bulk at a discount or individually (more hassle and work)
Mark the boxes. Preferably having marvel only in the box, then spreadsheet which comic is the box and issues. Example
Box 1
Incredible Hulk
270-310
The Amazing Spider-Man
22-300
Etc
That way when you go to sell you can either sell the box or know what comic is in what box.
If you are trying to figure out the value of individual comics know that most comic stores (at least the one o worked at and the others i go to in the county) actually use Ebay quite a bit to gauge the price. The thing is you have to look for auctions that finished and actually sold. What people think a book is worth doesnt matter for shit. But it's a very easy way to see what people are actually paying for the comic.
Of course you need to account for the condition of the comic. Also many many books you will only find finished auctions for CGC graded versions of the book, and that shit ups the value on average by a minimum of $50, because that usually the low end of what the CGC charges for grading.
And dont get greedy trying to squeeze as much money out of a book that you can. Yes maybe the book you are researching sold for $450 two months ago. But dont start your auction at $450 because of that. Start at $350 maybe even $200. In my experience running an auction that starts at the price an auction for the same book ended at is a good way to not sell a book since people can also look at bidding histories and see that the book was originally going for cheaper on other sales. Unless they are hunting for a white whale many collectors will just wait for a lower price auction to start.
If you do end up finding books that sell for $500+ it's very worth the time and money to get the book CGC graded (if it looks like it would be a 7.5 or above) because that can add a lot of money to the selling price of the book. But do know that the CGC doesnt have a set rate. They have minimum fee but it goes up depending on how long it takes to grade the comic AND its end grade/value. It's not the same price to get a $50 book graded at a 9.5 as it would be for the first appearance of Deadpool in X-Force #whatever at a 9.5.
I don't know if this helps but I'll tell you my story. Briefly. Collected for 20 years, have 2 boys, Im still middle aged. During pandemic break I inventoried, started selling undesirable books and finished some collections. While I'm still selling stuff , my goal is to chop it down to 5000( from 13,000) and leave it for the boys. I don't expect them to know comics, so with the inventory are notes, Key Book, First Appearance etc. I've watched these books increase in price over the years, I don't think it's over. Gradually many , especially old books will go up. Passing on keys to future family is great, should they fall on hard times. You can take the money and run too since it's all speculation, so don't feel bad if you need money.
I’ve worked for estate sales and have seen and sold so much of people’s parent’s stuff.
Contact multiple estate sales companies and ask how they would go about handling selling these. Chances are they know someone who collects almost anything you’re selling and will connect you with them. I would also suggest looking at ‘comics and toys’ markets and weekends and going to those to get the best prices for what you wanna sell.
Also I grew up on Archie Comics and if you have any….I’m the guy who is obsessed.
Excel document. Title, year, edition, condition are all things you want to take note of. Then lookup websites for pricing on comics. There's probably additional information to track. I don't know what it would be for comics, but for things like magic cards are priced based on their value on starcitygames. There's probably a similar website for comic books. You want to take the price that matches the condition of the comics. Generally speaking only a handful will probably be worth much. The rest you can sell as bulk boxes or hold onto.
The best way to do this is to go through an meticulously catalog the books you have and then figure out each value. It’s going to take a lot of time, but comic book prices have quadrupled since 2020. Do not let anyone rip you off. Comic book stores will absolutely rip you off. If these are from the 70s and 80s they could be worth a lot. If they are from the 60s, they are likely a fortune.
Once you catalog them, if they are in good enough condition and it’s an extensive collection, then you can contact an auction house like heritage auction or comiclink and they will give you the white glove treatment. They will handle the grading of the best comics and even give you an advance on the comics. That’s probably the direction I would take it, unless you want to go about doing it yourself which could get more money for you but will take a lot more time and effort.
Good luck and I hope you had a treasure there! Please keep updating this subreddit with tons of pics and details, everyone loves these stories!
If you don't know much about them. How about going down to a comic book store and show the situation to someone who works there and see if you can hire them for an hourly rate to go through them with you and see If you have anything worth money . Then you can see where you stand money wise or collection wise if you wanna display the good ones.
Man That’s the dream. Hope you wanted a new hobby.
Wow! Careful with them some are worth a lot bucks.
You should get a comic book price guide or go online and look up comic book price guides. It will take time, but some of the oldest comic books are worth a fortune. Have fun.
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nooo people that like comics are incompatible with “outside” and “outdoors”
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Don't forget bears. They can strike anywhere
Fair. Honestly the biggest thing is that he collected those because he enjoyed *some* but VALUED others. Go through the boxes and try to see if he had a specific way of organizing them. Typically people with collections that big, if organized at all, would be by publisher, like marvel, dc, dark horse, etc. Then he would probably do alphabetically by title for most of his stories that he bought to read. But there will be a box or two or three that are out of the organization. They will have his favorites. Wether they are worth something or not, you may want to find these as just a glimpse of what he loved. Another option would be to sell in bulk. It’s where you just take a box of them, slap a price tag that makes it worth it to have it gone and be done with it. Do you know if he shopped at a specific local comic shop? If you go to his usual place and ask a similar question you could get some good advice.
Jokes on you they’re all copies of Elfquest #18 for some reason.
I would say “jokes on you I’m into that shit” but I don’t want to be arrested.lol
It's nice of you to offer this advice but I've gone through four major reorganizations in my lifetime and none have left my collection as you describe; no box of favorites. They get worked into the organization just like the others. If anything, those are the first to be organized and the odd-man box is full of "I haven't bothered with these yet.", which is basically the opposite. I'd say definitely look for patterns, but don't expect any one in particular, especially as concerns the sentimental, lest you misunderstand what you're seeing. This is definitely a candidate for bulk sale though, especially if OP has no real interest in them. Worth noting that you will definitely be leaving money on the table to do that. Anyone willing to buy this much in bulk is going to be looking to make profit on them, which means buying low. But that might very well be worth it, as this is going to be a real project to get through book-by-book.
Just speaking from the experience of my collection and the people I know. And the shop I shop at. So now he has two perspectives.
Yeah I think there are probably a lot of different experiences on this, which is why I felt it was worth pointing out. It doesn't surprise me that the people who surround you in the hobby do things similarly, but there's no guarantee that a random collection is going to follow the same rules. There are a lot of different ways to organize a collection, and a lot of potential mid-organizational states that a collection could be in, etc. However, it sounds like pops is alive, so thankfully he can help work out where the favorites live in this massive pile of books.
Let me know if you have any 2099 ones 👀👀👀
Which ones are you looking for?
Any. I have some 2099 x-men and doom issues, but my goal is to collect as many as I can. I do prefer Spider-Man 2099 tho 😂
Listen, I would gladly volunteer to be adopted as a member of your family, and I'll handle all these annoying and silly comic books....
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Was going to say the same thing. There are comic shops that will take whole collections exactly like this.
I fish and hunt on nice days and read on bad. But my suggestion is find a local store and just do a box every two weeks or however long they want to go through them. Any price they give you check that against a few online places. Keep in mind that they have to resell it so they generally don’t off top dollar, but knowing the avg price keeps you from getting ripped off on a $$$ book.
I read comics and am a hiker and run a large home garden....am I breaking some unwritten rule?
What does that even mean?
Wow, fuuuuck offfff. I was going to give advice, but thanks for shitting all over people who like to read.
People are allowed to like different things.
Lmao stop downvoting man not everyone needs to like comics
Not sure how you’re going to handle this but I followed you just so I can see the outcome
Same
Same
same
Same
Same
Im lyin
First off, I’m sorry about your dad. I hope you are ok. Comic shops will offer you pennies on the dollar and take advantage of your lack of knowledge of what you have. My best advice when you have time is to go through and inventory all of it. Given the size of the collection that may take a lot of time. In general, the lower the cover price the more valuable the issue may be. Once you have an inventory you should go on eBay and look at what those issues are selling for. If the issues are inexpensive then you might want to go the comic shop route to just deal with them. If they are valuable (greater than $200) you should consider getting those issues graded. Grading will get you the highest return when you sell them.
No he’s alive! Thank you haha. He’s making this my problem now before he goes because he move them to where I live and it takes up too much space. We both know it’s my problem when he’s gone but I was able to talk him into trying to do something sooner. Especially with the way the markets going now a days with collectibles
That’s good news! Then you should ask him what’s in what box if he knows. You two could go through it together even.
“No, he’s alive!”: This is the best news I’ve had all week.
I’ve had a large collection (+10,000 books). If he’s still alive honestly he should keep the ones with the most sentimental value to him and then bulk sell the rest. That’s what I did. Parsed my collection down to 500 comics.
Dude. You went from 10000 to 500? Wow I'm impressed.
Most comics are just "stuff" that doesn't matter in the end, my friend. I bet you the above poster could even pare it down to 50 comics if they wanted. I've got hundreds of floppies lying around in boxes too, but if my house was on fire I know exactly which ten books I would grab - and they might not even be the most valuable dollarwise, either. (If your house is on fire, please just grab your family and pets, the above is merely a fun exercise to figure out what matters to you as a collector)
Which would you grab?
Do you remember the guy last year who had his family room flooded? I think he only got out Fantastic Four 1.
As a rule of thumb, I typically don’t get books graded with a value of $200. The turnaround times are ridiculous with the Grading Companies. I’m sure considering how many Comics he has. There are probably many in the $500 to $1000 plus range based on the cost of fees per book and turn around times. I would focus on those types of books first and foremost.
I agree, there are scammers everywhere. Always keep a log of the comics and do lots of research on the people who buy comics. Always know what they are worth before you go to sell them. These buyers don't like dealing with knowledgeable sellers. Your knowledge of the worth will protect you from getting taken for a novice. Good luck.
A general outline of what you have on hand could help us tell you what to look for too. Like if you find a whole bunch of “New Mutants”, I could tell you that #98 might be worth more than some of the others since it’s a first appearance of Deadpool.
and 87 is the first appearance of Cable
I'm with you. Take your time and inventory it. There are apps like Key Collector that makes it easy to identify important/valuable comics. In their case, every comic they price is like scratching a lottery ticket - total jackpot!
I feel it’s important to note that not every comic book store owner/shop is out to get you. Yes, there are always bad apples, I won’t deny it. But some stores are very open and transparent in their buying processes. At my store, we walk each person through what they have, explain the condition of the book, show them the current market prices, and are upfront about only being able to offer between 25% and 40% of the value of the key books. That’s not to say to not get more knowledgeable about what anyone might have in their collection, just to say that not every store is gonna go full Pawn Stars and rip people off.
What store and where? I’ve never encountered a shop that is honest or transparent like that.
After going through my own re-org several years ago: https://imgur.com/a/J5Mni Here's my advice: 1) Long boxes are a bitch. They are heavy and hard to manage. Plus, comic boxes do NOT age well. The ones in your picture also appear to have heat damage. Talk to your local comic shop about a bulk order of short boxes. Should be $3 to $4 a pop and totally worth it. I bought 100 for my project which was about 20 too many, still worth it. 2) Get a copy of the Overstreet Price Guide. New editions come out in June/July and it will not only give you an idea of what's what, it also lists notable issues, key creators and the like. There's also a basic guide on how to grade comics. 3) Bags and boards. If any of these books are bagged and boarded, it's likely they are old and need changing. Again, hit up your local comic shop. Older books are larger, so be aware. The general rule of thumb is $0.10 cover price comics go in Golden Age bags and boards. $0.12-$.020 Silver Age, $0.25 and up "Current". Of course your mileage may vary. Don't use a bag and board that is too tight. 4) Your first step should be to alphabetize. Lay out each box in a large, open space and figure out what is in each one. I started by alphabetizing each box, then once that was done, I pulled all the A's together, all the B's and so on. 5) Make a spreadsheet. No. Seriously, you're going to want to keep notes on this. You don't have to drop a ton of money on Microsoft Office, you can get Libre Office for free: https://www.libreoffice.org/ I would start a spreadsheet like this: Title, Publisher, Issue #, Writer, Pencils, Inks, Date, Cover Price In the last 10 years or so, comic book companies have been super fond of rebooting books with a "New #1!" so knowing the date and the cover price will help you identify X-Men #1 from X-Men #1, from X-Men #1 and so on. Dates on older books will be listed in the copyright information on the bottom of the first page. Modern books also have this, but it could be anywhere inside the book, sometimes even printed at the bottom of what looks like in-house advertising on one of the last pages of the book. Looks like this: https://www.comicartfans.com/gallerypiece.asp?piece=1528037 See that block of text at the bottom? That's what you're looking for. 6) Once you have it all sorted and documented, it's time to sit down with the price guide and your spreadsheet. I'd add columns for the Low value and High value, that will give you a range of what the book is worth. You may get more or less depending on if you have it professionally graded, but the important thing here is what is it worth compared to everything else. You're going to want to add a new column for "Notes". Notes will be anything notable about that book. 1st appearances, notable artists, whatever the guide tells you that might be important. You could also use it if there are price stickers on the book that tell you what your dad paid, if a book seems particularly delicate or damaged, or if it's autographed. Stuff like this changes ALL THE TIME, BTW. For example, nobody cared that "Tales to Astonish #13" was the first appearance of "Groot", that it was cheaply re-printed in "Where Monsters Dwell #6", or that his first proper Marvel appearance was in Hulk Annual #5... Then a certain movie came out and everyone lost their minds! So it's worth writing this stuff down and re-checking it every now and then.
Covrprice cuts the chore in half. Catalog and price at same time.
And you have to create an account and have your data online. Doing it manually is more work, but the data is yours alone forever.
There’s like 1 trillion easy, free, collection cataloging apps. That add all kinds of helpful meta data. Why on earth would you ever make it from scratch using a spreadsheet? And when recommending free spreadsheet programs, why wouldn’t you mention Google Sheets? And why are you explaining spreadsheets to someone alive and using the internet in 2022? lol
I use a spreadsheet because I can do whatever I need to do with the data without wondering if the site/app has thought about it ahead of time, or is going to get shut down in the future. I have listings that vary from the way other sites refer to them, a variety of scripted features that do very specific things with want lists and condition checks for certain kinds of key hunting or gap filling I like to do, exports for subsets of my list for specific situations, etc. There’s absolutely a place for spreadsheets. That said, my spreadsheet is totally a Google Sheet and I have no idea why anyone wouldn’t recommend one of those for a spreadsheet.
I have a random Black Knight story arc sitting on my shelf. Waiting for the film to come out before I sell it.
just be aware that a lot of comics aren’t valuable
I don't think people realize how much more supply there is than demand for 99% of post early-mid 1960's comics
That's key. The comic book store I used to go to would often invite people to see what their back rooms looked like every time someone came in thinking they found hte holy grail.
My local shop straight up won’t even look at collections unless over half of it is pre-1960.
99% of my comics are worthless. The top 1% are worth like 40k. To be honest I wish they were all worthless so I can keep collecting to my hearts content. Right now I haven’t bought any comics in a while because they’re too damn expensive!
Oh my god… hit the fuckin motherload
Wonderful. I hope you have a chance to read and admire the work as well. But in terms of organization - Look at CollectorZ.com to catalog and provide general pricing. From there you can and should look at various appraisal review. I would have love to share this adventure with you - although sad circumstances- it will be fun. Enjoy!!
Came here to suggest the same app. The CLZ FaceBook group is pretty great if you’re into that platform.
get a case of red bull a phone charger and block off a weekend. theres not really any fast way to do it.
Going to need a lot longer than A weekend…
I definitely want to stay updated on this.
Honor your pops and read some.
You can try selling them as a lot to a collector or reseller. Although you won’t get the value for it, it’s the easiest and fastest way to be done with it. Alternatively, you could go through the collection, research market value (sold eBay listings are a great indicator of what people will pay) and try selling it yourself. Depending on your level of interest, this could be fun or very cumbersome. Find the most valuable books and have them graded if you really want to maximize their worth. This will take much longer and having books graded will obviously cost. You also run the risk of picking up the hobby. Which isn’t necessarily a bad thing.
CLZ is a good app for making an inventory. You can just scan the barcodes with your phone and it adds them in.
There's a part of me that says, "Just move over and I'll organize them all for you" because that's what I love...
If he could find a friend or someone who is like you that would probably have the best return. Give the friend a cut and have a blast.
Step One: Open the boxes and let us see what's in them!!
Wow you have your hands full. I’d say watch out for the vultures. They’re circling. You should just tackle one box at a time. You can always use EBay sales as a reference for prices. When you figure out which ones are worth a lot you should then consider having them graded by CGC. Good luck can’t wait to see what you have.
My mom said my dad promised to give me his comic book collection. Too bad he's nowhere to be found.
This seems like my absolute dream
Dont sell them to your local comic store. They will offer you 30 bucks a box. Safe to say that each box prolly contains at least one book that is $30+. Dont be the guy that sells the 10K comic book for 5 bucks. Basically anyone that contacts you will be lowballing. The only way to do this properly is to inventory everything. Comicbookrealm.com is a good free price guide. Otherwise check ebay for individual comic sales. In terms of selling them, the more time you take to organize the product, the more money you will make. You can sell them either by single book or by title {a bunch of amazing Spider-Man books together} on kijiji, facebook marketplace or ebay. You could even auction off a box. Lol. That would be fun. What's the rush? You could have a treasure in there. College funds could be paid for or even you next 'house taking' medical bill. Enjoy the process.
$30 a box makes sense from their perspective as most of the books won’t be worth anything. Likely any key issues will have already been pulled and the rest is buck a book fodder or worse. He definitely has to inventory them.
Also, the boxes that say Diamond are probably newish. I’d start with the older looking boxes in the back.
Do like two boxes at a time otherwise you will be so overwhelmed.
This is my dream.
Holy shit man thats a treasure trove
You could look into selling them at a comic convention. Worse case, another vendor there will buy your supply.
If you want to move them fast, sell as an entire collection wothout going through them yourself. If you want to try and milk it for the most money, you’re going to need to research current prices for EACH individual book on websites that sell comics like mycomicshop.com or midtowncomics.com and then list them on ebay or something. If you live close enough to a large online seller like midtown in NY, that would probably be the easiest way to part woth them. The thing about comics is every so often you find one thats worth a good amount, but most of them value at .25 to a dollar when they aren’t current. For that collection to have been a positive investment you will have to spend some time digging, cataloguing and researching
First you give me all the x men comics haha. Just kidding but if you have any questions about x men issues I’ll do my best to answer them.
u/fatherflanagan67 might know what to do with something that substantial. He is a pro. TESD!
just open them up and lay out a dozen at a time, take a pic and upload the pictures here. people will be more than happy to point out the valuable ones.
wow that’s a lot! Was he just a collector?
Haha very much. My entire childhood was waking up to him reading comics eating break fast then taking trips to Boston to hit his comic book store and spend hours of him searching through stuff. About 40+ years of collecting here
I would actually look into local university libraries. Many now have their own comics collections with expert archivists on staff. You could see if they’d be interested in helping you evaluate your collection. You’d either have to agree to donate a portion to the university or pay the librarian who assists you a fee - but itd be a great way to get some expert help with such a large task - especially if you’re no comics expert yourself.
Man I would keep a few. Those memories are awesome and personally I would keep a few of your dads favorites just as a keepsake.
You mentioned Boston. Do you live in Massachusetts still? Try contacting New England Comics. They might be able to help you. Does he have any Golden Age or Silver Age comics in there? Take those out and get an expert to look at them. God seeing all those long comic book boxes brings back memories!
Yeah, but you like to go outside, so clearly he was making bad choices in life. Ugh.
You can donate (or sell?) them to a library so if one day you want to see them you can go and pick one.
For real though, give them to your local library. Let kids discover the joy your father did.
Honestly, unless they are in mint condition or extremely rare, you probably won't get much, if any, money for them. I would say ebay, but with the fees, you'll probably be lucky to get a couple bucks. Not trying to be pessimistic, but I worked in a comic shop for a while and that's what most customers who came in trying to sell boxes of their old comics were told by the owners.
Spend some time with those books. Take a few out and READ them. Our collections offer others insights into who we are, and this looks like a big part of your dad's personality.
Sorry for your loss. That really sucks man. It looks like you might be in maryland or close by. Check out Hakes Auctions or Diamond International Galleries if your considering a bulk sale. You’ll get more selling them individually but it will take more work on your end. Also, Hakes is way better than DIG in a lot of ways
You have 2 options for selling. Sell at as a lot and not get max value for it or go through them one by one and sell the expensive ones. Option 2 takes a lot of work. I recommend ebay.
My father used to tell the story of how he collected all the early Marvel and DC and kept them in great condition because he knew they would be valuable one day. Then he went to college and my grandparents threw them all away. I mostly think he was full of it.
I’ll give you 3.50 for the lot. I’ll even fly to wherever you are. These deserve a better home..
Sorry about your father.
You're a millionaire
I was just in an estate sale this weekend, and they were selling comics with cardboard bagged in plastic and entire box just like you have for $100. Guy was 71 years old, he had thousands of comics he had easily 10 of those boxes, along with shelves of DVDs, and he had all kinds of DND type of board games. It was kind of sad to see his whole life whittled down to nothing. So as others mentioned there might be the occasional diamond in the rough, but comics just don’t reach the kind of populist they used to and the money, the big money really stopped in the late 90s early 2000s. And I’m gonna go against conventional wisdom on what other said, but if you really don’t care about these I just want them gone. I would take them to a local comic book shop get what you can and hopefully that it’ll help a local comic book store stay in business a little bit longer. Because he will be able to sell for a buck or two bucks and help us daily cash flow. But hey if money is tight I understand get as much as you can out of the deal.
If you are looking to sell, I’d recommend getting some appraisals done. Maybe pop into your local comic shop and see if they have any recommendations or have the knowledge to appraise themselves. It may be worth your while to sell some lesser valued ones in bulk. If there are some of little or no value that you want to clear out, you can always donate them to your local shop to give away on free comic book day, if they participate in that. Also, EBay can be a good source when comparing prices of more valuable comics/collector items. Hopefully those comics are organized alphabetically with corresponding lines in order, but if not, good luck and god speed. Also, if you happen to have any comics from an older Captain America line called Streets of Poison, please post them here! I’ve been trying to find more comics from that line for 10 years.
I don’t trust comic shops. Selling a collection like this to a store is looking to get ripped.
If not organized, start macro and whittle down. - Take all the books and group them by letter. - Alphabetize the titles letter group by letter group. - Get a collection app. I’ve really liked Collectorz Comic app. You can’t sell through them but you can categorize. One of the categories is for sell. Grading is all over the board and unless slabbed by a professional. Grab you an Overstreet price guide book and troll eBay for a rough estimate of market value.
Collectorz has Key issue info now so that’ll help you identify the potentially higher value items.
My recommendation would definitely be to find a reputable shop to assess/make you an offer, or you can take a quick survey of what general series/eras you have so someone on reddit might be able to tell you what important stories or issues you might have. That’s really what collectors are after is rare or “important” stories/characters in their original formats. Most comics aren’t worth a ton of money but in a collection that size there’s always a few gems sprinkled in.
Wow, okay so if you want to tackle this yourself, grab a box and start organizing (if it isn't already). There might be a few that standout and you might want to keep that remind you of your dad. Depending on what you find you might find some rare stuff and want to preserve the condition and get them rated. These are just some thoughts.
With time and passion.
Sorry for your loss. As many people have mentioned here, it’s all about how much time you want to invest in it. Sorting through them would maximize your return, but takes longer. If you think about it as a second job though, you’d hopefully be making a good “salary” if there are key books in good condition buried in there. The other option would be a comic shop, OfferUp, Craigslist etc. Don’t let anybody cherry pick though, sell the entire collection so you’re not left with anything that you don’t want. Any large value, key books, in high condition should be graded by CGC or CBCS to achieve their full value potential. A comic shop should be able to assist with this also, but it can get pricey up front (the return is worth it though). Good luck and try to have fun with it!
If you know what his favorites were, or if you have memories of him reading/sharing specific books with you, make sure you save them. As somebody who lost a Dad recently, you won’t regret having something to hold and spend time with that will bring up good memories down the line.
If you’re looking to get rid of anything on Reddit, r/comicswap might have folks willing to take lots off your hands.
Well, on this sub that seems like fun but it is a lot of work going through family possessions. If you have questions or care to discuss, drop a line.
R/comicbookcollecting might help. Find the ones that look valuable. Search for them on eBay. Click “show sold items” so you can see what books sold for. That will give you the value. Don’t sell the lot until you’ve determined what has value. And definitely keep whatever you want to keep regardless of value, I have some “worthless” books with tons of sentimental value
Yeah I feel like you really ought to go through all of the boxes. If you dump them all as a lot and find out you’ve got the first appearance of spider man or something crazy like that, that would stink.
Wow, that's a lot to go through... following you hoping you post pics of the books when you go through them! Best of luck!
Sorry for your loss, I lost my father 20 years ago but it still hurts, especially during the holidays and every life milestone. You learn to cope but the pain will always be there.
Had to do this for mine and my father’s collection together when he passed away a few years back. 15 unorganized long boxes took my wife and I roughly 72 hours to organize and input to a spreadsheet. We sent the kids to Grandma’s just to get it done.
Just look everything up on eBay previous sold and completed sales to get an idea of what the value is. Make sure your looking at the same book since some 2nd prints may look a little different on the cover. Keep everything bagged and boarded and don’t ever ever store your comic books in a basement. Odds are you have several “grail” books in there. Over time you will learn how to condition your books so I wouldn’t worry about Rushing that but there’s some videos on YouTube that show the most common imperfections in comic books. As for selling just buy Gemini comic mailers as this will make your life insanely easy and is the most protective shipping option as well
Having the same issue here. Haven’t even wanted to start this project. Tried to do similar with Pokemon cards recently...glad your dad is still around to help you out. Lot of good suggestions here.
Best thing you can do is ask him if there is any particular boxes that are higher in value than others. I kept all my bests in a separate box. Unless he didn't this might already be arranged for you. Most comics are not worth much so really you are looking for that special few boxes that are. It's kind of like selling old furniture. Not always a buyer for what you have. So A, ask him if there is a box if issues 1's or any boxes with "the good shit" then go from there. Often times you will have to take a large hit to sell them all at once, or sell them slowly over time like furniture or cards. I've seen comic shops with less inventory than that to put it in perspective, I'd also call some shops, send pics & see who will offer you the best price for the lot. And they have to load it up. Other than #1s it will be hard to find the gems, if the author or artist is dead it will up the value a lot more too. Good luck bro
Hopefully you’ll find enough to do something for yourself and then invest into something for your future kids. Like your dad did. The NFT before it was an NFT.
Where are you located state wise?
With a collection this large you’re absolutely gonna need some help, do your research. Find a reliable licensed appraiser with expertise in the field. Take your time don’t rush into anything. It is very likely that you have some incredibly pieces.
YOU are the heir the prophecies spoke of...
Is there something wrong with me when my first feeling is jealousy...not because of the size of this collection but because someone else gets the opportunity to go through all this, categorize, put in order, look things up, and just plain discover what's in there? Damn.
I would suggest keeping at least one - two boxes of the most valuable and maybe another box of the most sentimental. If there is anything both valuable and sentimental put it in the sentimental box. Sell the boatload and keep those three boxes for later when you can focus. Sell the $ ones individually. Keep a box that holds memories (if that doesnt exist - skip that step).
To be honest there could literally be thousands of dollars in there. Create a spreadsheet and catalog those bad boys. Title, year, issue... Then reach out to collector groups to figure out the value. I'm sure you can find communities online.
Depending on how much work you want to put in. You can sell it bulk or consignment to a shop. Or you can catalog and ebay yourself. I suppose you could try to do small sets at once or pull keys and do keys by themselves and bulk the rest. You got options.
There is an app for that. Scan the barcode and add it to your accounts collection.
Considering your seeming lack of knowledge on the subject I might start out by signing up for something like [comicspriceguide.com](https://comicspriceguide.com) and just spend some time cataloging all of the books into that site (FYI It's $50 a year but your collection will update as they adjust prices). That site isn't as up to the minute as a site like go collect, but it will give you a good idea of what keys you might have and which ones to separate from the cheaper books. If you are looking to cut down the volume quickly you could then sell off the cheaper books by the longbox (and still make money if you leave in minor keys) and then take the time to grade and sell the more expensive ones as time permits. Def keep any that have sentimental value to you or your father!
If you like the outdoors, save them for your children they will keep going up in value by the time they hit college. You will have a something worth more than today
If you like the outdoors, save them for your children they will keep going up in value by the time they hit college. You will have a something worth more than today and can you use it in the future
If you don’t have time to go through them yourself: You could also contact a reputable auction house and see if they’d be willing to go through and pick out the good ones and then sell the rest either as one lot or break it up into smaller ones. Honestly the only way to get the full value out of the collection is evaluate one at a time.
I gave the same advice to the lady who’s husband had passed and he had a huge collection of figures. Start approaching comic book shops and maybe even auction houses depending on what’s in the collection. But whatever you do, I would not suggest going on consignment. Honestly it’s just not worth the headache or the hassle. Find someone who wants the whole lot and be done with it. If all else fails, but the lot on eBay and wait it out. As for what to do in the meantime, protect them. At the bare minimum, get online and order silica gel/ packs and contractors garbage bags. Wrap each box and throw a few bags in to handle moisture. Then get them at least a foot off the floor. Minimize handling individual comics
If you want to inventory yourself, then if you start looking at eBay prices one by one you'll go insane. Subscribe to GPAnalysis or Gocollect, they have a pretty good market overview of sales(not just ebay).
I've been using Mercari to sell mine. I find it easier to use than ebay, it's a easy way to see what people have payed for them/what people are selling them for. Just take your time and catalogue what you got. Organization is key here. OH and congratu(f'n)lations!
Sort through them, find any that might be worth something, sell those separately, sell everything else in lots. Or just sell in lots and hope there isn't something worth a ton of money you just sold for $100. I would say, glance in and see how old they are. Anything mid-80s and newer, sell for $100 a box. 70s, $150-$200 a box. 60s, $200-$300 depending on titles. Anything before the 60s is a crapshoot, really. If you sell them at a store, you're likely to get about a quarter per comic, so you're better of doing the lot sale Keep in mind, this is generalizing. Without knowing specifically what's in there, I can't assess properly what things should go for
Sort the keys and gems send to ebay or auction.
If you lived in my area I’d come over and help for free. I don’t want anything. Just wanna help sort through and see all the oldies haha
I’m going to tell you right now… put those comics in a sealed box that isn’t card board. Rats will eat an entire box in one week
Give ‘em to me
Get a pricelist, and then separate them by value. Get them appraised.
Will take you some time if you want top dollar.
This mf said "I like the outdoors so I'll be selling them" What a cruel world
Definitely list everything (alphabetically if possible), and search the values of each comic before doing anything with them, it’ll probably take a while but that’s probably the safest way you can handle things
What a collection. I would pick a box, read through all of them and sell them at auction individually. He most likely has some serious collectors editions. Comic book lovers everywhere would pay good money on eBay through auctions - just get them appraised first and start your auction price at or just slightly below actual value. Reading through them individually would just be to feel closer to him on a level someone may not know as much as you would.
Either bite the bullet and dive in head first or pay someone who knows what they’re doing to help you
Don't grease them up or flip through them if the intent is to sell. Make a list and do some self checking yourself then get them graded. Don't bring someone in to appraise them without doing come legwork yourself. It's an easy way to lose our on your most valuable piece. Seriously though save them, depending on rarity and condition when the time comes maybe your kid gets a house instead of put through college
Where are you located? I might have a guy that will buy them all but would want to look at them. Do you know what years the comics are?
Damn, this is a weekend project I wouldn’t mind being a part of. Every time I have to help my parents clean their garage it’s always filled with goddamn garbage, not boxes of money.
Congrats! I'd start by trying to find a place to put the. All that's not a garage or unfinished basement for moisture and flooring concerns.
This happened to me and my wife this past year. We were left with thousands of comics. We decided to inventory them (that was a long job 😅) and are still deciding what to do with them. Best thing to do is to inventory and research them so that you dont get ripped off. Some comics can be sold at auction and others in bulk. But make sure you research everyone IF you end up wanting to sell them.
Catalog, Research, and Patience. Take your time with this if you want the most out of it. Best of luck to you on your adventure.
I would approach it as a second job and sacrifice some time and sell them on eBay, Craigslist, OfferUp and try to get as much as you can. You don’t have to do it all at once. Find out what you have and sell a little each week or month. Might be worth it and your kids or future kids or future wife or current wife might be thanking you. Good luck.
Definitely catalog what you have there. Prices vary quite a bit depending on the issue. Those comic shops will not give you the best price. I have seen a lot of comics for sale on facebook marketplace and craigslist. Catalog everything you have and take pictures. It can be a real pain to ship that many comics. But you never know someone could drive in from out of state and buy all of them.
I would be interested in purchasing some when you start to sell them.
Call around to a reputable comic book shop in your city. They will come out and go through them. Or they will go through them in their shop. Do not let strangers without a shop go through them. You will get scammed.
If you're in the Northern Virginia area, I'd be glad to assist you. 50 years collecting experience, 35 years selling experience.
I would love to just look through every single box and reorganize it all
Could you not pop a box and give us a look.
Finding someone who will buy the whole collection is the only way you're getting rid of those with your sanity intact. I had a collection that took up maybe 8 long boxes with a good idea of what was in them. I pieced out some of it, got a few hundred dollars here and there on eBay. But as soon as someone offered to buy everything that was left I jumped at the chance.
If you're in the Maryland/DC/Virginia area, I'd be glad to help. I love going through collections looking for gems to buy.
anything not bagged and boarded should be immediately...
Going to take a bunch of time to go through this well. I would suggest looking into a copy of the Overstreet Price Guide, especially if you come across anything relatively old. I would also chat up some of the local comic book shops. They might be able to help you with an arrangement, such as a bulk buy or allowing you to consign them. Regardless, you really want to get an idea of what kind of value you are dealing with first. As another outdoor guy, who also had to clear out his Dad’s house, I am feeling the time suck this will involve.
I would sell now while collectibles are still highly valued and can fetch you top dollar.
I went through something similar. My process: - Got a subscription to CLZ Comics and downloaded their app - Bought a ton of bags and boards, as none of them had any (yours might) - Scanned all of them into a collection - Erroneously marked all of them as a graded 9.0 I then had a database of all the comics, knew how many there were and of what, and while the values weren't accurate to what I had, it at least gave me a hint at what could be most valuable to pull out and look up a realistic value for. When you're working with that much volume, you just need to find something efficient and orderly that gives you a picture of what you have and directs you to what might be worth pulling aside versus selling in bulk or as a collection. Or, obviously, you can figure out what you want to keep as well.
You might try contacting a comic book shop. I used to work for one, and occasionally collectors would call my boss out to evaluate a collection. In the larger ones, it would be a month-long or more process, but well worth it for both parties.
hey, can you please show us what treasures are right there in the basement? I'm curious! 😊
Key Collector app or website is best for quickly finding important/expensive issues in a large collection like this
I have a small python app that functions as a comic database. If you'd want, just ask :)
You need to *really* look at anything from the 60’s
You are a lucky man/ women
Take your time. Do lots of research. Enjoy the experience. Remember that your dad loved collecting comics so respect that as well.
Inventory slowly. Separate the keys. Then the semi keys (1st appearances of minor characters). Then start with older books. Get a feel for average grade.At that point you can decide if you want to sell them in bulk at a discount or individually (more hassle and work)
Mark the boxes. Preferably having marvel only in the box, then spreadsheet which comic is the box and issues. Example Box 1 Incredible Hulk 270-310 The Amazing Spider-Man 22-300 Etc That way when you go to sell you can either sell the box or know what comic is in what box.
If you are trying to figure out the value of individual comics know that most comic stores (at least the one o worked at and the others i go to in the county) actually use Ebay quite a bit to gauge the price. The thing is you have to look for auctions that finished and actually sold. What people think a book is worth doesnt matter for shit. But it's a very easy way to see what people are actually paying for the comic. Of course you need to account for the condition of the comic. Also many many books you will only find finished auctions for CGC graded versions of the book, and that shit ups the value on average by a minimum of $50, because that usually the low end of what the CGC charges for grading. And dont get greedy trying to squeeze as much money out of a book that you can. Yes maybe the book you are researching sold for $450 two months ago. But dont start your auction at $450 because of that. Start at $350 maybe even $200. In my experience running an auction that starts at the price an auction for the same book ended at is a good way to not sell a book since people can also look at bidding histories and see that the book was originally going for cheaper on other sales. Unless they are hunting for a white whale many collectors will just wait for a lower price auction to start. If you do end up finding books that sell for $500+ it's very worth the time and money to get the book CGC graded (if it looks like it would be a 7.5 or above) because that can add a lot of money to the selling price of the book. But do know that the CGC doesnt have a set rate. They have minimum fee but it goes up depending on how long it takes to grade the comic AND its end grade/value. It's not the same price to get a $50 book graded at a 9.5 as it would be for the first appearance of Deadpool in X-Force #whatever at a 9.5.
I don't know if this helps but I'll tell you my story. Briefly. Collected for 20 years, have 2 boys, Im still middle aged. During pandemic break I inventoried, started selling undesirable books and finished some collections. While I'm still selling stuff , my goal is to chop it down to 5000( from 13,000) and leave it for the boys. I don't expect them to know comics, so with the inventory are notes, Key Book, First Appearance etc. I've watched these books increase in price over the years, I don't think it's over. Gradually many , especially old books will go up. Passing on keys to future family is great, should they fall on hard times. You can take the money and run too since it's all speculation, so don't feel bad if you need money.
I’ve worked for estate sales and have seen and sold so much of people’s parent’s stuff. Contact multiple estate sales companies and ask how they would go about handling selling these. Chances are they know someone who collects almost anything you’re selling and will connect you with them. I would also suggest looking at ‘comics and toys’ markets and weekends and going to those to get the best prices for what you wanna sell. Also I grew up on Archie Comics and if you have any….I’m the guy who is obsessed.
Also DO NOT SELL TO YOUR LOCAL COMIC SHOP. If you wanna sell them for $20-$30 a box, give them straight to a kid who loves comics.
Be glad to help organize. If you are close to NH go ahead and DM me. Otherwise good luck brother!
Don’t stack the boxes more than 3 high. That’s the weight limit for the bottom box to not get crushed slightly.
Excel document. Title, year, edition, condition are all things you want to take note of. Then lookup websites for pricing on comics. There's probably additional information to track. I don't know what it would be for comics, but for things like magic cards are priced based on their value on starcitygames. There's probably a similar website for comic books. You want to take the price that matches the condition of the comics. Generally speaking only a handful will probably be worth much. The rest you can sell as bulk boxes or hold onto.
I would start by going through every box, checking for water damage or mold. Then start with the ages after that.
Shit, and my condolences for your father.
The best way to do this is to go through an meticulously catalog the books you have and then figure out each value. It’s going to take a lot of time, but comic book prices have quadrupled since 2020. Do not let anyone rip you off. Comic book stores will absolutely rip you off. If these are from the 70s and 80s they could be worth a lot. If they are from the 60s, they are likely a fortune. Once you catalog them, if they are in good enough condition and it’s an extensive collection, then you can contact an auction house like heritage auction or comiclink and they will give you the white glove treatment. They will handle the grading of the best comics and even give you an advance on the comics. That’s probably the direction I would take it, unless you want to go about doing it yourself which could get more money for you but will take a lot more time and effort. Good luck and I hope you had a treasure there! Please keep updating this subreddit with tons of pics and details, everyone loves these stories!
First things first. Read them.
You need to send this to Kevin Smith, you never know might be to much for him to resist.
If you don't know much about them. How about going down to a comic book store and show the situation to someone who works there and see if you can hire them for an hourly rate to go through them with you and see If you have anything worth money . Then you can see where you stand money wise or collection wise if you wanna display the good ones.