we are back stacking slabs flagship here on the stacking slabs network i'm brett i am in the process of building creating a network for sports card collectors and those who work in the sports card industry having a lot of fun there's a lot to talk about there's a lot of news there's a lot of highlights there is a lot of posts going on to get your attention that is happening on the digital front we like to slow things down a little bit here on the pod dig into a topic that is deep in the hearts and minds of the sports card collector here in twenty twenty six we're looking ahead twenty twenty seven we're building i've had a lot of amazing conversations recently excited about the direction of the network going into the new year there's going to be a lot of good stuff coming a lot of content that i believe will fit in your routine your regular schedule when you're on the road chasing kids going for a run cutting grass doing the things you do when you listen to stacking slabs slabs and i do appreciate it if you're enjoying what i'm doing here or any of the amazing guest hosts hit the follow button tell a damn friend and run on over to the patreon we have new and exclusive content there we host our videos there so come join the party we're going to be talking about a topic that is an extension of a lot of what we talked about last week and the topic is or it's more of a question what is it worth when there is no comp a lot of thoughts ideas questions coming out of last week's episodes so we're gonna explore that get into it provide some value give you something to chew on before we do that gotta shout out inferno red technology who is the official partner and sponsor of the flagship and they're the engineering team behind some of the biggest names in sports and collectibles like dc sports eighty seven comc collectors upper deck and ebay from ai powered solutions for startups to full stack platforms for industry leaders their team can tackle your toughest technology challenge they build awesome software for the hobby for leagues and fans and everyone in between see what they can build for you at inferno red dot com the question that is deep in the hearts and minds of collectors navigating this space making decisions digging into their collections trying to enhance their collections is always at some point what is a card worth when it has never sold i wanna start there today because i can show you the card i can tell you what i paid i can explain why i love the subject and there is still a question sitting across the table from me how did i land on that number last week i dedicated an entire episode talking about the biggest purchase i've made to date with the twenty twenty two immaculate roman reigns premium memorabilia autograph platinum one of one for thirty thousand dollars i walked through what the deal required for my collection the cards i sold the conversations i had the decisions that came after i said yes then i followed up that episode where i talked about building a thesis before you buy if you listen to those episodes you know why this card belongs in my collection today i want to stay with a question those episodes didn't settle there was no public sale of the exact card i could pull up only one copy exists it changed hands privately i could look at other roman cards and other cards from that set i could ask people who know wrestling cards i could see what sellers wanted and what buyers had paid for nearby cards none of that would tell me the price of this card at some point i had to decide what is it worth to me in dollars with the chance that someone else would come to a very different answer that sounds like freedom it can also get you into some big trouble if every number can be defended by saying well it's a one of one you have stopped valuing the card you have given yourself permission to pay whatever it takes to own it so i want to talk through how i made the decision what i borrow from the market what i learned from the card itself what i believe about the future and where i put a limit on my own conviction i've heard people say a collector was crazy for paying a price that had no comp it happens all the time we're judgers here a lot of judgers in the hobby people worrying about other people's business what they're buying and why they did it sometimes they're right sometimes that collector understood something the rest of us had not spent time studying how do you tell the difference before you know how the story ends i appreciate you all being here excited to get into it so let's give comps their proper job a completed sale tells you that two people reached a price under specific circumstances and conditions on a specific day and that's useful information i use it all the time and i think you should too card ladder great place to do it i cannot tell you how many people would have paid more if they had seen the card i cannot tell you whether the seller needed cash that week i can't tell you what the next buyer will think in three years a single sale is just an observation it is not instruction one unusually high or low auction often does not establish the price of the card two bidders can push a sale up a card can be overlooked and sell low there's a lot going on with each transaction when the exact card has no public sale collectors usually move outward same player different parallel same set different subject similar card from another release for another year maybe a private sale somebody tells you about you need that work but every time you move away from the card you add assumptions does the other subject have the same kind of following does the other product carry the same weight is the autograph on the card is the memorabilia tied to an event or does it label worn or used was the sale public verifiable was it made during a run of attention that has since passed i can find a comp that supports almost any number if i allow enough distance between the comp and the card i want that is why i write down what each comparison proves and what it does not prove a roman sale from another product might tell me something about demand for roman it cannot establish the premium for this immaculate card a sale of a different wrestler in the same set might tell me how collectors treat that product it cannot tell me what a roman collector will pay that is a small shift in language but it matters the question is not what is the comp it is what did i learn from this sale if the answer is only that it makes my offer feel better then i keep looking when someone asks what is a card worth and this is probably the most popular question i get regularly and i find that this question usually comes from people who are newer in this space i want to know what they plan to do with it are we talking about a sale this weekend the number you would put on it to keep it in your collection the highest amount you would pay to acquire it because those three things can be all different numbers if i needed to sell a car quickly i would care less about offers i can get now after fees in the time it takes to find a buyer i would not get to choose the strongest possible version of the future and call that my exit play price if i'm planning to own the card for years i can place value on living with it the card can be worth more to me than it would bring in a quick sale i still have to know the difference enjoyment does not pay a bill if life forces a sale then there is my buy number this is the most important number in this conversation how much can i commit today given the other things that money can do and the loss i can live with for the roman card thirty k was my buy number at the moment roscoe and i made the deal it was not a public declaration that every collector should pay thirty k for that card it was also not a guarantee i could put it up for sale tomorrow and receive the thirty k back it was the decision i made with my own collection my own knowledge and my own limits i think some of the anger around rare card prices comes from mixing those numbers together a collector says i would pay this someone else hears this is what the market will pay those are different statements i need to be able to say which statement i am making and the seller has a number too their ask is a position it is not a sale they own the only available copy and may have no reason to sell it at my price that matters in any negotiation it does not require me to accept their value as my own here's the part that gets left out of most pricing conversations many of us buy a card because of what we believe it will mean later we might see a subject building a body of work that the card market has not sorted out we might see a set gaining collectors we might see an error that people will look at back on with more interest once they can place it in part of the larger story or we might understand a category well enough to notice that collectors keep returning to certain cards while the wider hobby is looking elsewhere there is a real advantage to being early there is also a convenient way to fool yourself declare that the market will catch up and leave out when or why i try to make the future part specific what would have to change who would have to care how would the person find the card why would this card be the one they wanted when they had other choices if i say wrestling cards will grow that is too broad to help me price one roman card if i say collectors may place more weight on first year immaculate wwe cards from the heart of roman's title run especially a top parallel with an on card autograph and a worn or used material now i have something i can examine i also have to examine what competes with it roman has important cards outside of immaculate more roman cards will be made some future cards will connect to name events some collectors will prefer an earlier issue or a different product i cannot pretend my card will own the whole conversation because i own it that is where staying active helps me i watch what collectors seek when no card is being sold to them i noticed the cards that people ask owners about year after year i listen when someone tells me why a product matters to them i notice when a a set has scarcity but almost no conversation around it i can learn more from ten honest conversations with collectors in a category than from ten posts telling me the category is about to explode i've talked a lot about being a curious person curiosity becomes useful when it improves the question is it easy to gather facts that support a purchase it takes more work to ask what might collectors want instead one more thing the future i am buying might be personal i've watched roman's career for years the period in wwe meant something in my life before i owned this card if its market value stays flat i still have that part of the purchase but i cannot take what it means to me and present it as proof that another buyer will pay more the personal future and the market future can overlap they are never the same promise i believe that some of the best collecting decisions look strange when you make them you can see value before a broad market gives it a price you can prefer a subject other people dismiss you can pay for the best example in a category when the available sales only show ordinary examples i also wanna challenge something i said at the top people thinking you are crazy is not evidence that you are right it might mean you have done the work they have not done it might mean they see a risk you are refusing to face we like to remember the first kind of story we rarely hear from the people who went against the crowd and bought the wrong cart when i was putting together this episode i stumbled across a press release from heritage auctions july twenty fifth twenty twenty two and the title of this press release was finest known nineteen fifty two topps mickey mantle rookie card expected to sell for ten million dollars at heritage auction i read the release and i think it provides a card and example to think about in nineteen ninety one anthony giordano paid fifty thousand dollars for a nineteen fifty two topps mickey mantle from the famous rosenfein the seller had wanted fifty seven thousand five hundred heritage says the fifty thousand deal was five hundred dollars above the previous record for a nineteen fifty two mantle giordano held the card for thirty one years once graded an sgc nine five it sold through heritage in twenty twenty two for twelve point six million dollars it is tempting to tell that story as spend whatever you have to on the best cards and wait i think that would be the wrong lesson he paid an extraordinary price for an extraordinary example of a card people already cared about the documented history and the condition mattered the size and wealth of the future buyer pool changed and we know this story because this card became one of the most valuable cards in the world many other expensive bets from nineteen ninety one never became the story what interests me is the decision at the time giordano had to see enough in that particular copy to pay above the price the market had already recorded he also had to own it through decades when he had other uses for the money the outcome does not give us a formula it shows what it looks like when when a buyer has a view of a card that extends beyond the last sale there's another part of the mantle story i wanna bring back to my own collection giordano bought a card many people already knew was important his disagreement was about the price of that particular copy i faced something narrower with the roman i was deciding what a particular roman card meant within wrestling cards a market that still gives collectors room to disagree on the hierarchy somebody can look at my immaculate one of one and prefer roman's twenty fourteen topps chrome superfractor somebody else might put the twenty twenty two prism black one of one above it i think i probably would too a collector who cares most about memorabilia tied to a named event might wait for a different card entirely and i understand those choices if i paid thirty thousand dollars i cannot rely on every roman collector making the same choice that i made i need to believe there are enough people who understand that the cards place even if they rank it differently and that is where being active in a category does something a sales database cannot do i hear how collectors talk when they are trying to sell i learn which releases have held their place with the people who own them i find out what an autograph means to a collector who has followed roman since the shield and what a card from his title run means to someone who came back to wrestling during that period those conversations do not prove a thirty thousand dollar exit they help me decide whether i'm seeing an enduring reason to own a card or building a case around my own excitement i also need to ask what would make my view weaker if future roman cards give collectors a stronger connection to the same era some of the demand i see from mine might go there one copy of my card will always exist there is no limit of one important roman card that is a distinction and i have to live with it being early can be an advantage when you understand why a card matters before other collectors spend time on it paying more than the room expects does not create the advantage by itself here's a method i use when i have to turn that belief into a number this is the work i wish i had made more explicit before buying the roman first i describe the card without the asking price the subject the issue the card's place in the product the features i can verify what an autograph and memorabilia label states condition the closest alternatives a collector can buy the last part matters a one of one has no second copy of itself it still competes with every other way a collector can own an important card of that person if another roman card gives me more of what i want for less money i need to hear that argument before i talk to the seller second gotta build a range from evidence and write down where it is weak i look at sales near the card i talk to the people who buy in that category i separate a completed transaction from an asking price and from a private offer someone says they received if a private deal cannot be verified i label it as a story and give it less weight the range tells me where the market has shown some willingness to spend it does not get to decide my final number for a card that it has never seen third i think about the future in plain sentences why might the card matter more five years from now why might it matter less which of those possibilities am i paying for today if my case only works if every favorable thing happens i am paying for the best possible outcome before it arrives fourth i write down the other purchase sale this one would cause what would i pass on what cards would i need to move what happens if those cards bring less than i expect can my family and my business carry the same decision if the market does nothing for years i said in the roman episode that my collection needed to pay for the card i meant it the card funding gave me the time to sell card equity it did not turn the price into less than thirty thousand dollars the future i believed in did not earn me permission to place the obligation somewhere else fifth i ask a question i don't enjoy asking if i had to sell sooner than planned what might i receive i do not use the most flattering sale i can find i think about the buyers i can reach the time i would have and what fees would leave with me that number can be far below my offer can i own the gap between those new two numbers if the answer is no i need a lower buy number or a different card and six i set my ceiling before the negotiation runs away with me i think this is really important i want to know the number at which i am comfortable if the future takes longer than i expect i want to know the number that makes me uncomfortable even if i love the card an offer is a conversation with the seller my ceiling is a conversation with myself the seller does not need to know the number i do that is what conviction does for me it gives me it gets me to an offer i can stand behind and it also gives me the ability to stop offering you do not need a thirty page appraisal to do this you need a few honest sentences and a number you can still recognize after the rush of seeing the card has passed let's get creative let's make up a deal these numbers are an example not an estimate for any card on the market say there is one of one autograph of a subject you have followed for years you like the product the autograph is on card you have studied where it sits in the release there is no sale of the exact card the seller asks for four thousand dollars you look at the subject's other cards and other subjects in the release you hear from collectors who care about this era the evidence tells you there are real buyers but it does not tell you that a sale tomorrow would reach four thousand dollars you decide that if life forced you to move it quickly you might receive around eighteen hundred after selling cards or selling costs that is an assumption you write it down so you cannot hide behind your enthusiasm you also know what you would give up to own that card maybe you would sell cards you don't you do not mind releasing and delay another purchase you can do that without touching money your family or business needs after all of that you decide that you are willing to pay up to three thousand why three thousand because at that number you can live with the ownership the opportunity cost and the risk that your eighteen hundred dollar exit is right you believe the card's placed in the subject's story and you think it will matter more to other collectors over time you also know that belief might be wrong you offer less than three thousand dollars you leave room for the other person to respond if you settle on two thousand eight hundred dollars you understand your decision if the seller holds firm at four thousand dollars you thank them and walk away the card can still be great the seller can be right and keep it and your answer can still be no that is far more useful form of independence than buying at at four thousand dollars so nobody else gets it and if the card sells to somebody else for four thousand dollars tomorrow your work has not automatically failed another person has a different budget different collection different view what matters is whether the evidence you used was sound and whether you honored your own limit bring that back to my roman my number was not built by multiplying another wrestler's one of one by some premium i found online i had years of interest in roman i knew the twenty twenty two release and what this card combined i understood that other roman cards would compete for its attention i saw enough demand in wrestling cards to believe that the card had a market beyond me and i knew what leaving thirty thousand dollars of card equity would ask me that did not make the price certain but it gave me a decision and it made it mine now let's take the other side seriously what if the category stays small what if collectors decide that the set matters less than i think what if a future card does a better job of representing the same person in moment what if i paid the highest price this card will bring for a long time i don't like those possibilities i still need to be able to hold the card if they happen there is a version of anti herd collecting that sounds brave but is mostly just ego you make a purchase people question it and their questions become your reason to buy more every objection starts to feel like proof that you're ahead i do not want to collect that way if somebody who knows the category disagrees with my number i wanna understand why maybe they are missing the card's history maybe i am missing a supply issue a better alternative or a buyer group that has a that is a lot thinner than i thought i can hold my view and listen at the same time after the purchase i can still learn new public sales matter new product releases matter collector behavior matters a lower sales we're studying i ask whether the car the buyers or the conditions were different sometimes one sale gives me a reason to revise my view sometimes it tells me only what two people did on one day and i need to leave room for one more possibility my personal priorities can change i sold cards i once loved to buy the roman that did not mean i have been wrong to own them if one day the roman no longer belongs in my collection i want the freedom to see that honesty too no one who buys a rare card knows the final chapter the best i can do is make a decision with evidence curiosity and a price that i as a collector can carry if you have a card in mind right now and there is no sale to point to here is what i would ask you to do before you send the offer write down what another collector can buy instead write down what you know from actual sales and where comparisons stop helping write down the future you see the particular card might have and what would have to happen for other people to see it too then put the number on the cost of being wrong what would a rush sale look like what would you need to sell or give up to own the card decide the highest amount you can pay while keeping faith with the rest of your life that is your number you can offer less you can negotiate you can change it when new evidence comes up you do not need a roomful of collectors to agree some of the cards that have meant the most to me were purchases other people would not have made and i can live with that i need to know why i made them what i put at risk and how i will feel about owning them if the market never applies what is a card worth when it has never sold the market cannot hand you that answer it can give you evidence you have to decide how much belief you are willing to fund i'm brett thank you for spending time with me and stacking slabs if you enjoyed this episode tell a damn friend would love to see you share it on social appreciate your support appreciate all the passion and being here each and every week i do value your attention happy collecting take care talk to you soon