VintageCardPrices.com vs SMR

Mantlefan

After all the talk about the accuracy of the SMR, I have found a better way to track prices.

For a small monthly fee, VintageCardPrices.com gives an extensive price history of almost 250,000 graded cards. They track EBAY and major auctions and cover all the major sports. I generally key my auction bids based on the most recent auction prices and I have gotten quite a few bargains, while not over-paying for vintage cards. Great site!

markj111

I like the site as well. I do wish they would assign the value of a card based on the average of all sales rather than using just the most recent one.

JasP24

That's the major flaw in my opinion...A particular card could sell for $400 five times in the last 6 months, and then $600 this month..You check their prices and it shows $600...That's not an accurate representation of market value..Then definitely need to use average over the last year, otherwise, it's as worthless as the SMR...

Jason

Boopotts

<< <i>That's the major flaw in my opinion...A particular card could sell for $400 five times in the last 6 months, and then $600 this month..You check their prices and it shows $600...That's not an accurate representation of market value..Then definitely need to use average over the last year, otherwise, it's as worthless as the SMR...

Jason >>



I wouldn't say the average over the past year, but definitely something like the average over the past 10 transactions.

Griffins

I’m not sure about the averaging. It's giving you information on past sales so that you can draw your own conclusions. Averages aren't real, and can be affected by a variety of factors, including an abnormally high or low sale.
What if a zero feedback seller sells a card on ebay? What if it's a low end or overgraded example of the card? What if it was listed in the wrong section? All of these prices would be too low.
On the other hand, there are a few auction houses that I have a bit of skepticism about- their sales are sometimes astronomically higher, and I don't count that in- especially if the item is owned by the house. And what if 2 guys with deep pockets are really going at it? Now one of them has the card and it will settle back down to a normal price. In all of these scenarios the price would be way above normal, and possibly represent a sale that may or may not have actually taken place. I would hate to see this factored into the average.

Last nite I received a series of emails from the owner of a rival pricing service, accusing me of being a paid agent of vcp. I am not, and pay the same $9.95 per month that every else does. I do think VCP is an excellent service, and very enthusiastically recommend it to others. There are a few other products I've found reliable, well designed, and functional and recommend those when asked. This one is no different.
SMR takes a lot of heat for being off, and IMO it is on many issues. But I don't see how a printed magazine can ever be up to date on an ever-changing market. VCP can be, because the information is posted as soon as the auction ends. For someone like me who is working on several sets and often start new ones I think it's indispensable.

Bosox1976

VCP strikes me as a brilliant business idea. Selling information has a great markup/margin. Hopefully they will figure a way to include input (like in this thread) to further penetrate the market. Seems like there could be a few columns - most recent price realized, avg. of last 10, annual avg., trend, etc. Sure wouldn't cost them anything other than a pittance in further script writing. Could market is as "premium" service, or good value added.

Do they use the same technology for coins, comics, or other stuff - seems like a no-brainer?

theBobs

<< <i>series of emails from the owner of a rival pricing service, accusing me of being a paid agent >>



shaken not stirred

Griffins

<< <i>shaken not stirred >>



Shaken chips ice into the drink. You're diluting the alcohol that way. Don't you bourbon drinkers know anything

Mantlefan

Average price might be a good idea, but as Anthony says VCP is better since it lists ALL auctions from the last year or so. This gives you a trend on prices. For instance, T206 Christy Mathewson portraits in PSA 5 have gone from $1025 in Feb. 2006, to $2000 in May of 2006 to $2230 in August of 2006.

hofcollectoronly

When I first joined asked them the same thing about doing a price average and the response was one that made sense. They feel that cards are like the stock market and the prices fluctuate from day to day. When you buy a stock it is at the current market value and not the average for the past 6 months. They provide the sales history with links to the EBAY auctions that you can view the cards if the image is still posted to compare and see for yourself. So if you are bidding on a card that has been selling in the $400-$500 range and win it closer to the $400 then you know you have gotten a good deal. Look at the sales data they have and you can determine if the card has been rising or falling in value.

According to the website and other posts they list the last 25 sales for every card by grade and grading company so that would mean that the data can go for many years on cards before droping from the system.

Since joining I have been very happy with the product and the customer service provided has been outstanding, they have responded to every email or problem I have found with in minutes, they are on top of everything and I hope it stays that way.

ejguru

Do they track set sales or just individual cards? How about signed memorabilia? Sounds like a tremendous product--I'll be checking it out for sure!

BugOnTheRug

<< <i>Last nite I received a series of emails from the owner of a rival pricing service, accusing me of being a paid agent of vcp. >>



Anybody with a head half full of marbles can start a business. And it looks like that 'anybody' did.

ArtRossLives

<< Last nite I received a series of emails from the owner of a rival pricing service, accusing me of being a paid agent of vcp. >>


Man Anthony, and I thought you were just another collector - paid agent? I presume the rival pricing service is in Russia, perhaps the Middle East.....what a &^%$$%#.

pandrews

<< <i><< Last nite I received a series of emails from the owner of a rival pricing service, accusing me of being a paid agent of vcp. >>


Man Anthony, and I thought you were just another collector - paid agent? I presume the rival pricing service is in Russia, perhaps the Middle East.....what a &^%$$%#. >>



are yall talking about the dude in this thread?.. cardpricer or whatever its called?

magellan

Signed up with VCP because of this thread.........looks like a very good service.

cmoking

I resisted signing up with any of these services because I didn't think it would be worth $10 per month. I thought I could keep track of prices myself and get the job done for what I wanted to see. However, I started to realize when I got into sets that I was not familiar in, I was lost as to fair pricing. For example, lately I bought a few T207s, but was not comfortable about pricing. I didn't want to track prices for a month or two to get comfortable, so I signed up with VintageCardPrices.com. After about a month of using it, I admit I was a moron for not signing up earlier. It is a complete no-brainer for collectors who are actively buying and trading. I didn't sign up with CardPricer a month ago because they weren't ready yet. Even though I know Ted, business is business, and VCP has my business.

aro13

I also signed up with VCP because of this thread and am glad they have added basketball and hockey.

jaxxr

"shaken not stirred "

Us real bourbon drinkers prefer it "neat" that is straight no ice whatsover, the chaser, if one is desired, may be iced.

braves72078

I love VCP and the free 2 weeks have made me a subscriber from now on. I did have a couple of issues and the response was fast and fixed the problem. Way to go guys.

Bill

AlanAllen

It's a great concept, but it's not quite enough for me to drop $99 a year. There isn't a lot of data yet for football, and I'd like to be able to add cards without entering what I paid. I'll check it again in a few months to see how its evolved, and how much football data is in there.

Joe

RipublicaninMass

<< <i>I resisted signing up with any of these services because I didn't think it would be worth $10 per month. I thought I could keep track of prices myself and get the job done for what I wanted to see. However, I started to realize when I got into sets that I was not familiar in, I was lost as to fair pricing. For example, lately I bought a few T207s, but was not comfortable about pricing. I didn't want to track prices for a month or two to get comfortable, so I signed up with VintageCardPrices.com. After about a month of using it, I admit I was a moron for not signing up earlier. It is a complete no-brainer for collectors who are actively buying and trading. I didn't sign up with CardPricer a month ago because they weren't ready yet. Even though I know Ted, business is business, and VCP has my business. >>



Ditto!!

Griffins

<< <i>It's a great concept, but it's not quite enough for me to drop $99 a year. There isn't a lot of data yet for football, and I'd like to be able to add cards without entering what I paid. I'll check it again in a few months to see how its evolved, and how much football data is in there.

Joe >>



Joe-
I just enter $1. on a lot of cards that I don't know my cost basis for.

Mantlefan

Good idea Anthony. I find the "portfolios" that VCP generates for you are a great way to keep track of our sets' present value and can be invaluable if ever [God forbid] some of your cards are stolen.

Griffins

<< <i>Good idea Anthony. I find the "portfolios" that VCP generates for you are a great way to keep track of our sets' present value and can be invaluable if ever [God forbid] some of your cards are stolen. >>



Or, if [god forbid] anything should happen to me, my wife can easily see the current value. Not recommended if divorce is in your future though.

AlanAllen

<< <i>

<< <i>It's a great concept, but it's not quite enough for me to drop $99 a year. There isn't a lot of data yet for football, and I'd like to be able to add cards without entering what I paid. I'll check it again in a few months to see how its evolved, and how much football data is in there.

Joe >>



Joe-
I just enter $1. on a lot of cards that I don't know my cost basis for. >>



That's what I did . Still kind of annoying though.

I played around with the site a little more after my post, and found I kept referring to it through the night. It's great for frequently traded cards, but for example it only has 2 recorded sales on 1962 Fleer FB PSA 8's. It needs a few more months of data collection. And I'd REALLY like to be able to leave the price paid field blank and not get an error when I try to add a card.

Joe

sando69

the site will allow you to add cards for 0.00 if you don't want to include prices!

Griffins

There is an advantage to puttting down 1.00
For example- I have a set that has 176 cards in it. I put down $1. each for cost basis.
It totals up the card sales in the grade I have and gives me a total- lets call it $7870.
But that total is based on only those cards that have sales, and my set is thinly traded. It shows my cost basis next to the total, and by having it at 1. each, I can see that the cost basis is $58, letting me know that the value of 7870. is based on 58 cards, and the 787. is only a partial value.
As more and more data comes in this may not work as well, because over time every card will have a sales history, but some of those sales may be years old and no longer accurate. But overall I think this has a benefit over putting down 0.00

hofcollectoronly

I put in the current SMR for the all the cards in my coolection mostly to see if there was a difference. And I was very surprised at the difference in price of the Net Value. SMR was not even close, sometimes I think PSA puts it out for the advantage of the dealers and not the collectors.

Griffins

I think Joe is very open to verified input on SMR- but that often input only comes in from dealers.

RobMM77

Is Vintage Card Prices.com still about 9.99/month? I think I may get on that......

PSARich

I have been using the Vintage Card Prices free service and find it very interesting, although I believe that they have missed completed auctions in their data base. I know I have sold several PSA 9 HOF bb cards on ebay in the last few months that don't appear. Anyway, I like the listing of the individual auctions because you must remember that many things go into the final auction price besides the grade, timing, demand, etc. All PSA 9 mint cards for instance, do not present the same desireability when you view them. A perfectly centered card with great gloss is more desireable than a 60-40 card with less gloss, even though they both might carry the "9" grade. For vintage cards the difference in price might being hundreds of dollars or more just on card appearance. It is very interesting to see the variance in prices realized for similarly graded cards and also the variance between grading companies.

RipublicaninMass

<< <i>I think Joe is very open to verified input on SMR- but that often input only comes in from dealers. >>



I know more than a few board members have sent him closed auctions which have resulted in drastic changes in the SMR

Buccaneer

<< <i>

<< <i>I think Joe is very open to verified input on SMR- but that often input only comes in from dealers. >>



I know more than a few board members have sent him closed auctions which have resulted in drastic changes in the SMR >>



Except they do not acknowledge that most vintage commons go for 50-60% of SMR.

Griffins

Other than '52 Bowman football a couple of years ago, how often do they adjust SMR downward? I don't recall it happening, but I don't follow SMR very closely.

TheVon

I hate to beat a dead horse, but it kinda bugs me that we all have to pay $99 a year to another service just to get a somewhat reasonable and accurate idea of a card's value when we've already paid $99 to PSA for (among other things) the SMR. I know this is a naive thing to say, but I wish that PSA would either buy out a company providing these services or contract with them to allow PSA members to access their information. I know Collectors Universe is a publicly owned company and the bottom line is extremely important as it is in any business, but after reading this thread, it really sounds to me like an accurate pricing service could be a profitable asset. Maybe having access to this information would be what pushes some of those on the PSA membership sideline into the game?

mariner

After reading this thread, I decided to join.....so I just did and I have been checking it out for the last hour. I like it!

Cincykid8123

How long are sales tracked? I spot checked a 1978 Topps Eddie Murray and didn't see any sales for a PSA 10. I'm quite certain that one sold this past summer for around $5,300. Was VCP just recently created?

Griffins

60's and later were just added. about 6 weeks ago, so there isn't as long a sales history. I think the entire site is about 8 months old, and '50's and before have almost a years worth of data.

hofcollectoronly

Reading on the site it says they have sales records for baseball pre-war starting in 2005 and added 1945-1959 last May. This last expansiion added baseball 1960-89 along with all the other sprots started begiinning of October. Don't know if they are going to fill in past data records but the new stull sales so often I would imagine it not be needed. The sales are filling in fast from ebay alone.

marz

Doesn't Bobby and Co. privide an e-mail for cards you are looking for when they are available in auctions or e-bay?
That is super helpful and saves hours of research!

aro13

I just signed up last week and am very happy with the service. I got an email yesterday telling me about a card I needed just being listed on ebay.

hofcollectoronly

Just curious but I have not seen a single person admit to being a member of the other service is there any on this board? I was for about an hour until I could not find anything of value. Now I hear they are doing a Want List feature but including dealers. Sounds like it is going to be like .10 cent listing day everyday there like ebay which I can't stand. He is bringing in all the dealers with the inflated prices to try and sell to the members. All I can say is NO THANK YOU and www.vintagecardprices.com had there Want List in place since the beginning bringing only auctions and it has been great for me.

koby

Hofcollectoronly, Is cardpricer.com really as bad as you say it is? I tried using it once but at the time it may not have been fully operational. You are saying it is not worth checking out at this point?

hofcollectoronly

It just made me appreciate vintagecardprices more comparing the 2 against eachother. And this new idea for the want list sounds real bad to me. And it is still not secure and I think the management is not very good so I stay away. Just read a press release on sportscollectorsdaily.

blacksoxfan

HofCollector et. al,
This is an unfortunate and troubling thread for us. I see no reason why my company should be brought into this conversation whatsoever. If you truly are such a fan of vintagecardprices.com, then by all means, use and support their site.

I want to communicate further on points raised by HOFCollector. I believe having someone involved with the product to explain the situation is important.

We are not a marketplace and never will be under my watch. People do not list items on our site. Our site, via our Universal Want List, will inform users of items available in the marketplace, regardless of the venue. We then give people the opportunity to go straight to that vendor's page. If the vendor's site generates a dynamic and unique structure for the listings, we will put people straight into the bidding or item purchasing pages. We are holding off on eBay integration until people are comfortable with our process. Per the announcements on our site, we are loading inventory from the participating companies and will release the updated software to compliment this. In the meantime, people can continue to use the favorite search feature on eBay to request email notification. Your statements about the rest of our business are equally as inaccurate.

Many of our sites features are 100% free of charge. All of our checklists 21,000 and our 52,000 image browser can be accessed without handing over so much as a username. Our my collection software, and the supplemental Universal Want List, are free to use. One must sign up to use those features, but that is simply so that they can have a personal account. We have had a free, multi-week trial available to anyone and everyone who visits our site. That will continue.

To date, auctioneers Robert Edward Auctions and Mile High Card Co. have committed to this product. Dealers such as McAvoy Sport Cards, Shoebox Cards, and Tom Witek enterprises have committed to us. This clearly establishes us as a viable and respectable company. Why would these companies associate themselves with our product if we are as unprofessional, rude, and incompetent as you seem to say we are?

For those of us that are unfamiliar with our product, I apologize. It is unfortunate that you do not have the opportunity to make an unbiased assessment of our tools. To reiterate some points from another post: We use RackSpace for our hosting. They are one of the premier hosting companies in the country. We use Bank of America/CyberSource for our credit card processing. They are a major financial institution. We use AES security to handle credit card transactions. All data is secured through https related techniques. Our team is made up of collectors who have designed major pieces of software for some very large and impressive companies.

We have over 4,200 users already and 870,000 transactions available for review from 85 of the hobbies most important sets. We have elected to release only 85 price guide sets right now during the beta process. That means our information is as comprehensive and deep as it can be.

I'm really not sure where to go with this. I will say if anyone wants to engage in an honest discussion of our product, I will be happy to do so. I can be reached professionally at ted@cardpricer.com. We are fully aware of the fact that some of our features are not fully functional, and this is certainly acceptable with industry standards given that we are in the Beta process.

We will continue to announce and update people on the status of our site through standard internet news sources. This is a topic I can discuss for hours. However, I believe the information here is sufficient for now. I do not believe i will be making another post in this thread, unless there is a legitimate and honest reason for me to speak up. Take care everyone and happy collecting.

Sincerely,
Ted Golden

President
CardPricer.com

hofcollectoronly

Ted,

It is very nice of you to chime in on the matter and yes I have a few questions for you if you don't mind answering. You are an ebay market data license correct so that means you get the results sent to you in a spreadsheet or xml format. This being said how can you accuratley parse the data? I read on wintagecardprices that there software pulls all the auction listing and approve or dissaprove the auctions as they are live. Meaning a PSA card with a qualifier would be rejected or any card that the seller lists wrong and according to them there is a 12.7% regection rate. You also cover raw cards in your pricing how do you know if it is real or not and how can you put a grade on a card for an auction that you have never seen? Are you trusting the sellers description? So with this all being said that would mean that the data you have is off in price by at least 15% on graded cards and can't even make a guess to the raw. Just a few thoughts on your product and the information that you provide that I would like to know as I am sure everyone else here as well.

koby

On the recommendation of so many people of this board, I have joined vintagecardprice.com. I have only been browsing the website for a few hours, but can see how the many applications will be greatly useful for my collecting.

It will be interesting to hear cardpricer.com's response to those questions. It seems they are falling way behind.

marz

"This is an unfortunate and troubling thread for us. I see no reason why my company should be brought into this conversation whatsoever."


1) some of us have spent well over over 25k submitting cards to PSA and feel we have every right to compare/contrast and comment as we see fit about web sites having to do with cards ted and guess what!! THIS is a place to do just that!

On another note, if praises were glimmering throughout this thread about your company you would be thanking God and CU for the first amendment! Simply put, some of expressed "opinions" on comparison between you and your competition,nothing slanderous or malicious here.Some have merely decided that Vintagecardpricer.com is easier to navigate and more helpful to use! They are not allowed to conclude this Ted?