Anybody buy raw off of Ebay?

kalch23

Just curious to know if anybody has ever bought so called "MINT" cards from ebay with the intention of grading them. Has anybody successfully find people that truely sell vintage raw in Mint condition? Anybody have sucess sending these card to PSA and having them come back as 8s and 9s?

ranger63

i bought a raw lot including a montana elway and marino rookies, the elway and the marino came back 9s and the montana as trimmed. To say the least i have very mixed emotions.

paigowmichael

All of my "9s or better" have come from unopened material I've purchased. But I've never bought raw singles (for the purpose of grading) from sets later than the 60s. On those I haven't managed any 9s, but I have purchased plenty of '64s off ebay that earned 8s. I wouldn't think raw on ebay would yield a lot true "Mint" vintage - but you can get some NM/MT if you're diligent and stick to auctions where the seller provides a good-size photo.

pc

last night's 1966 Tommy John psa 10 @ mile high was from
raw cards off ebay.that one set me back alot though,probably
10 dollars.if you find the right sellers and look carefully at large
scans you have a chance at some scores.

mercurynut

I will go to one of my local shops if I want raw cards.

ydsotter

I have had a few successes buying raw off of eBay... A few years ago bought a handful 1971 topps basketball stickers... those difficult condition-sensitive black bordered stickers... paid around 20.00
and got 2 psa 8's... that was a big deal to me at the time. The seller had like 3 feedbacks and the description read something like: "cards are in nice shape etc."

Another time I bought a few large lots of 1971-1973 raw basketball off of GHUNTER or GTHUNTER off of eBay... almost all I sent in graded 8's with a spattering of low pop 9's that sold well for me...
Keep in mind... psa 8's of vintage BK sold for decent prices a few years ago.


This may sound a bit crazy... but... the majority of the success I have had getting nice raw vintage cards at low prices on eBay has been by taking risks... Buying from people who write poor descriptions... have a few negs or low feedback...
Most of the time the cards are bad... but the few times that it works out.... makes up for it... keep in mind I am talking about relatively small investments... like $20 for a larger lot of vintage cards.

Most of the cards I have found that are worth sending in were at local card shops, shows or unopened... you can still find nice ones at shows.

Forget his name... but there was a guy from around Wallingford, CT that seems to always have beautiful raw stuff... he travels the east coast shows...

anyways, I am a very small submitter...

athleticsfan

I bought a raw 67' set off eBay about 8 months ago for about $2200. The seller stated the cards were ex-Mt to Nm-Mt overall with the Rose, Brooks Robinson, McCovey and Clemente being Nrmt-Mt. Anyways I received the cards and sent some to PSA the results......

athleticsfan

.......the Robinson also came back an 8 with the Clemente an 8o/c. So yes I would by raw off eBay. Sometimes its a gamble but it can pay off.

mrc32

Sure.

I buy raw T-205s. As long as you know what to look for you can score.

I bought 3 205s raw for under 50.00. They all graded out PSA 4s (which run about 50.00 each on ebay). So look carefully and you can get some deals.

kalch23

Great Stuff. Thanks. I'm seeing some nice raw stuff on ebay and hoping that they havent already been cracked out of a PSA case because of something like an ST qualifier..... probably worth the risk though.

pc

another way raw can work is with the
modern stuff.ive purchased gimmick cards
that people offered due to 5 color game jerseys
or the like and sometimes ive gotten back psa 10s.
one item cost $300 and got $2700 awhile back.

MiniMaster

I purchased an entire set of 75 Mini's. The set came with 16 graded star cards, of which PSA 9 Yount & Brett were included. Set was hand collated and said to be mostly PSA 8 and PSA 9 probable and created from 20 different raw sets. I submitted 550 and most came back PSA 8 and PSA 9 with two PSA 10's there were 40 or so PSA 7 and a few OC 8's and 9's. I consider myself extremely lucky.
Just be sure your dealing with high end feedback rated sellers and you have a lot better shot at getting what your looking for.
My 75 Mini set in the PSA Set Registry is living proof that buying raw on ebay can work, as a starting point anyway

Love of the Game

I buy raw cards on Ebay all the time. In fact, I rarely buy graded ones. Granted, I'm not as much of a condition-maniac as others might be: the two sets I'm working on that I consider "high grade" (1959 and 1961), I'll take in a 7, sometimes even a 6. The set I'm working hardest on, 1953 Topps, I'll take in a 5.

All the '53s in my set registry right now were purchased raw off Ebay. I was considering completing the whole set that way, for the extra challenge, but then I caved in and bought a bunch of PSA-6 commons yesterday.

I think you have to know the set you're buying. For example, it's pretty easy to find a 1959 or 1961 Topps in 7 or better when buying raw. They're usually pretty easy to judge. But 1953 Topps frequently have surface wrinkles that don't show up in a scan. 1938 Goudeys have big-time toning problems, and the toning can obscure even heavy creases on a scanner.

-Al

Southsider

I've had some success buying raw on eBay.

I bought a '66 Philadelphia Dick Butkus RC that came back a PSA 7.
A '75 Topps Mel Blount RC that came back a PSA 8.
My best so far....
A 1983 Topps Ryne Sandberg RC that came back a PSA 10!

I've also had many, many more "mint!", "Nm-mt!" and "nrmt!" cards that were ex/mt.
And a 1980 Topps Rickey Henderson RC that was "MINT!" because it was trimmed.

When I do buy raw, I always expect the cards to be ex/mt or so and I will only buy from someone with great feedback and clear scans. I feel this limits the chance of getting cards with obvious flaws and creases.

Of course, there are also many online dealers such as Mickey's that offer great raw cards that are accurately graded if you don't want to take a chance on eBay.

TheCARDKid

"Aarons" is the best raw card dealer that I've ever done business with. If anything, they are conservative in their grading.

If they say "Near Mint +", others would call the card "NM-MT".

Their feedback says it all.

Unfortunately, the cats out of the bag with them. When I last checked, their selling prices were roughly in line with graded prices. There was some spread, but not much.