Submit Commons or Buy Online

dalew

As many of you know, I've been going hot and heavy on ebay for 72 Topps Cards and when I hit the grand marker, I backed off to look at the two sets that I have that aren't graded. I was pleasantly surprised to see some really nice cards (great centering - gloss, sharp corners, etc., that I think would grade either a high 8 or low 9). Anyways, a lot of them are commons. The cheapest rate to go, I believe is the $10.00 level. Is it better to purchase off line or submit at the $10.00 level?

I guess the question is, are you using other peoples money to buy commons at the $10.00 range to save on sending them in?

A novice who is trying to learn.

Dale

carkim

Dale,

Submit 100 and it will only cost you $7.00 per card.

Carlos

acowa

Mistakes are very expensive when submitting to PSA. If you get a 7...the graded card's suddenly not worth the grading fee. I like to buy cards that are already graded versus sending them in. Until you get to your last 50-100 cards...I don't see the need to submit...unless you're in a huge rush to complete the set.

Regards,

Alan
EBAYID:ACOWA

mcastaldi

Kind of going along with what Alan said, the idea of submitting them youself is to get back as high a percentage as possible that meet or exceed your desired grade. Or. . .to keep to a minimum the number of cards that don't meet your expected grade. As Alan said, most PSA7 commons won't even get your grading fees back.

So it will come down to how good you can be at maximizing the number of acceptable cards you get back. If you don't get many 9s, it won't take very many 7s or worse to drive up the cost of the 8s you get back. For me, I've found it to be worth submitting myself for my 72s because so far I've done well at getting mostly 8s and 9s.

Keep in mind the thinking will change depending on population. In comparrison to the 72 set, the 1980 set I'm doing just doesn't have very many already-graded cards. There just haven't been that many submitted yet. So. . .my choices will be to either wait on people to submit them and then offer them for sale or to submit them myself. The catch is that with the newer sets, where PSA8 commons are only worth a hair more than the grading fee, there is even less room for error. I realize that 1980 PSA7 commons will be essentially worthless - and that's what has kept me from submitting them so far.

Mike

mikeschmidt

Nonetheless -- with a trained eye, patience, and a lighted magnifier, you can save yourself money by getting your own cards graded.

If you have access to high-grade ungraded commons (which is the critical factor), then you may be in a good position to do well with PSA submissions. You must go into the process thinking that most of the cards you have access to will not be "gradeworthy". Even with a find of high-grade commons, if you are pulling more than 15% for grading, perhaps your standards are too loose. Once you have that group of cards, spend 3-4 minute with each card, and note ever flaw you can find with the card using a lighted magnifier. After you do that, review PSA's guidelines. Submit the strongest cards.

If you do not have the time, patience or willingness to learn the intracacies of the process, then there is no need to bother with ungraded cards. It is a very time-intensive endeavour. However, if you can even get to 75 - 80% accuracy with your grading (say minimum grade of 8), then you may come out ahead. There are quite a few collectors out there who do this very well, sell off their duplicate 9s and 10s and essentially get their PSA 8s and PSA 9s for free. If you can do this well enough, you make the cost of your cards close to zero.

For example, I've purchased nearly 1,000 1982 Topps cards of Mike Schmidt in the past year. Most of these sell for $30 or so in PSA 9 on Ebay. If I submit sixteen of them, get 12 PSA 9's and 4 PSA 8's, I can easily recoup my "bulk common" costs just by selling four of the PSA 9's. The rest of the cards then essentially come to me as net cost of zero. So I can keep them with a price of zero, I can sell them for all profit, or I can trade them for other Schmidt cards I need. If you learn enough about the process (and go through some stupid mistakes in the beginning), eventually you do come out ahead. Just spend some time with your already graded 1972 Topps cards and try and make your own list of what PSA looks for in 7s, 8s and 9s.

MS

theBobs

Do most people make notes specific to each card submitted to leverage those learnings against future submissions?

Grading a raw card gets challenging to me when multiple minor issues exist. A weak corner AND print spots for example. If only one variable is in question, I am fairly sure how to grade. When multiple variables come into play, my head starts to spin.

FB

Its more of an art than a science. Plus, the PSA graders are human (they worked better than the chimpanzees did!!). They're all trained the same, but still will look at each card with a slightly different eye. Some are tougher than others, but they're all pretty close.

I wouldn't recommend writing down lists of imperfections and trying to equate them to a number. Easiest way to go is to compare the eye appeal of the card you're planning to send in with a 7 and then with an 8 and then with a 9 to see where you would categorize it. I've done submissions of over 1000 cards so far and I can predict the grading about 70% of the time. Needless to say, my own grade is usually higher than the one given in that 30%.

Go through your cards and submit the most mint looking ones you've got. If they're beautiful, you'll probably get a bunch of 8's, some 7's and maybe a 9 or two. If you get back a bunch of 6's and 7's, compare them to 8's you've bought in the past, see the differences and try again.
Just don't get discouraged and don't take it personally.