1954 Bowman FB at Mile Hig

SOM

That set (54 Bowman, with 122 PSA 8, one PSA 9 and five PSA 7) caught my eye as I perused their new catalog. But, I haven't much of a clue on vintage FB. So...

is SMR ($7,000) the realistic market value for this set, considering there are 8 sets completed on the Registry, almost all 8+?

are there any notorious tough cards to look out for v/v centering, print defects, etc?

How does this one do sales-wise compared to other 50's sets?

Thanks!

Nick

duner

I think i've only seen one other '54 set for sale in the past couple of years. If you can get that set for 7k you're getting a great deal. In comparison to other sets, there aren't that many cards that have been graded. When you factor in roughly 1/6 of the entire graded population is locked up in the top 10 sets on the registry....and another 1/6-1/4 are locked up in the rest of the sets people are trying to build, there's very little supply.

The downside to that set is that it doesn't have any firepower. there's only 2 hof rc's. Which is likely the reason the graded population of the entire set is so low. My assumption is that a set like that would sell at a premium merely as a result of ease of assembly. A '60 fleer fb set sold in the mile high auction for about 7k last year....and the only explanation i could think of at the time was the guy who bought it didn't feel like spending the time to build one....b/c there was just no justification to pay that much.

Consequently, if you're buying it to break it up....it could go either way. You're going to have to rely on set collectors to recoup your expenses because of the lack of high demand cards in the set....On a good day you could make a killing on the commons. But if you list it at a bad time.....you don't have any high value cards that appeal to the rest of the football collecting population to subsidize the losses.

If you were patient and had 2-3 years to put the set together you could easily build one for far less than smr....pretty much how it is for the vast majority of the '50s football sets. Outside of 52 bowman and 55 topps aa, there's not much universal demand for many of the sets.

ironranger

Nick, if you review the population report, the tough cards are easy to spot. A '54 set is not too tough to complete card by card. In my opinion, $7k is a fair price.