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We received in inquiry via our website appraisal form from a retired gentleman in the Midwest that had collected baseball cards for a few years in his youth. The gentleman mentioned that he was considering selling his collection and that he had received an evaluation of the cards in the mid 1990's from a local sports card dealer, so he had some idea of their value and figuring that they should have appreciated.

We asked if he could provide us with a few images of the key cards to help us get an idea with respect to the condition of the cards. He said that he wasn't able to do that. We asked if he might be able to provide a spreadsheet of the cards that he had available, but he said that he wasn't able to do that, either and asked if he could send a Xerox of the cards so that we could get a better idea of the condition. Not exactly an ideal way to go about it, but when the options are limited, you make do with what is available, so we provided our mailing address and he assured us that he'd send the copies of the images.

Lo and behold, a few days later, a manila envelope arrived with photocopies of the entire collection (front images only). The collection included a partial 1951 Bowman Set and a nearly complete 1952 Bowman Set with both Mickey Mantle and Willie Mays' second year cards.

After reviewing the images, we contacted the gentleman and discussed the collection and the potential value based upon the images provided and that any final offer would be dependent upon being able to review the collection in person. After some discussion about the potential value, and the price that we would be able to pay, there was obvious disappointment on the gentleman's part as he thought the condition and the value might have been significantly higher. Given that the cards had previously been over graded and the values had been overstated, it was obviously a concern.  While third party grading was still on the horizon in the mid-1990's, the dealer that evaluated the collection was rather liberal with respect to condition. Granted, the nuances of grading were still years away from permeating the hobby, but even with the standard for the time grades of POOR, VERY GOOD, EXCELLENT, NEAR MINT and MINT, the collection was over graded with many cards being noted as NEAR MINT.

We talked about the change in the hobby over the past few decades and that the value of cards are based primarily upon condition.   We agreed that in fact,  there had been some appreciation in the collection, but that it was not from the starting point that he had from the earlier appraisal. We were able to forward the gentleman some additional information and provide some specific examples of grading similar condition cards and their values.  He was more understanding of the market and his collection and agreed to forward the collection to us for an in-person assessment and evaluation after we explained our free, fully insured FedEx shipping option.

He packed the cards, let us know that they were on the way and two days later, the collection arrived securely packed in a binder at our office.  We let the gentleman know that the collection arrived and we reviewed the cards.  After diligent evaluation, we contacted the gentleman with our results and our purchase offer.  Base upon our earlier discussions and preliminary evaluation of the Xerox images, we were able to quickly reach agreement and close the transaction and forward the gentleman payment for the entire collection.

Just Collect is always looking for vintage sets and collections at market leading buy prices, so if you have a collection that you are interested in selling, contact us today to and we'll provide you with a free appraisal and can make you a cash offer on the entire collection. We also travel to buy more extensive collections.