High Value Item Sales Tips?

[Frost271 | 22]

This should be a fun topic.
How do some of ya’ll sell your high value sealed games outside of the auction houses in private sales to avoid major fees?  With the prices sky rocketing right now, I’m sure we will be seeing tons of “rare” Mario64s being traded.

Any experienced sellers here in the forums can offer any advice / tips on safe dealings and not getting scammed / cheated?

Edited July 31, 2021 by Frost271

[OptOut | 8,889]

From what I've seen, you won't be achieving record breaking prices in a private sale, I would imagine that for the VAST majority of the highest value stuff you would actually do better taking the auction fees and the taxes on the chin.

For example, @jonebone mentioned that earlier in the year (before the million dollar sale) he was getting offers on his Mario 64 of 75k. If you take the tax and auction fees of the Million dollar Mario, I'd imagine you'd be netting somewhere in the region of 600k? Maybe a bit more? It's a huge gap either way.

Plus, on truly high value sales, even in private you are going to be required to report that as income and get taxed too. So you may be surprised how economical those big auctions turn out to be.

[inasuma | 1,203]

On eBay, I set my listed price a bit over what I’d accept. Then I set my offer minimum exactly where I’d be comfortable.

[GPX | 1,371]

I’m actually curious how are people negotiating prices these days in the current climate of crazy shenanigans. Particularly a sealed Mario 64 US. 

An imaginary conversation:

A: I would like to offer $30,000 for your sealed copy. 

B: Mate, a WATA 9.8 A++ just went for 1.3 million.

A: Yes, but yours is ungraded and looks more like a 9.4 A+. 

B: Yes, but I can’t give you a discount of over 1 million dollars!

A: Why not?

B: Dunno, just this imaginary formula in my head that tells me so.

A: So what would be a fair trade off

[cue @JamesRobot “I’d go as low as..” gif]

[JamesRobot | 5,808]

12 minutes ago, GPX said:

[cue @JamesRobot “I’d go as low as..” gif]

[GPX | 1,371]

5 minutes ago, JamesRobot said:

Yeah that one..

[inasuma | 1,203]

23 minutes ago, GPX said:

I’m actually curious how are people negotiating prices these days in the current climate of crazy shenanigans. Particularly a sealed Mario 64 US. 

An imaginary conversation:

A: I would like to offer $30,000 for your sealed copy. 

B: Mate, a WATA 9.8 A++ just went for 1.3 million.

A: Yes, but yours is ungraded and looks more like a 9.4 A+. 

B: Yes, but I can’t give you a discount of over 1 million dollars!

A: Why not?

B: Dunno, just this imaginary formula in my head that tells me so.

A: So what would be a fair trade off

[cue @JamesRobot “I’d go as low as..” gif]

Lately in my experience it’s more like:

Seller: “eh, no ones been biting for my price so I’m considering grading anyway.”

which inevitably leads to the ever frustrating convo of “okay then… Grade it? No one will pay this price ungraded. If you’re not going to negotiate on price then just take the listing down.” And other obvious points about wasting buyers’ time. 

Also my favorite, right after a record breaking sale for a game, a seller has a slightly lower grade than what sold at auction and their justification for a higher price (despite lower grade) is: “the auction price went low IMO.” This actually happened to me and it was cringe.

the whole market is a meme at this point lol

[CIB_Wholesale | 418]

On 7/30/2021 at 9:11 PM, Frost271 said:

This should be a fun topic.
How do some of ya’ll sell your high value sealed games outside of the auction houses in private sales to avoid major fees?  With the prices sky rocketing right now, I’m sure we will be seeing tons of “rare” Mario64s being traded.

Any experienced sellers here in the forums can offer any advice / tips on safe dealings and not getting scammed / cheated?

i've been selling a vga 90 mario 64 for 3 years and the highest offer so far is 4,500 USD

if you post in "sealed games show them off" all 15 sealed collectors will see it and DM you or not. The resellers only spend their time on certain sites. stick to price charting

Edited August 1, 2021 by SealedWholesale

[Code Monkey | 2,011]

I'm looking for rare games and I'm willing to spend the money for them so if people are confused on where they can sell rare games, you can message me.

I'm not interested in sealed, the things I'm looking for often never even came in boxes at all. That's rare.

[WarMech | 82]

On 8/1/2021 at 1:37 PM, Code Monkey said:

I'm looking for rare games and I'm willing to spend the money for them so if people are confused on where they can sell rare games, you can message me.

Got a good source for sealed older PC games? like 3.5" disk older.

[Code Monkey | 2,011]

4 hours ago, WarMech said:

Got a good source for sealed older PC games? like 3.5" disk older.

I don't, I'm looking for Doom and Wolfenstein myself, as well as Mega Man, Mortal Kombat and Bart Vs. The Space Mutants. I would pay a lot of money for a sealed Doom or Windows 3.1.

[jonebone | 1,307]

Briefcases and cash these days.

[Tanooki | 4,943]

The whole meme of the market being a meme of itself seems right.

Scares me really, not just for the sealed but the trickle down abuse at whatever level the game is from loose and up as the impact is there.

I know we know I have a sealed Pokemon red, perfect it is not, a bit of squeezing on one side, other little nitpicks too, surely would grade in an 8 range I think, it is no 9 I feel by any measure but I'm not them nor get how they'd ding it by a point or tenth of a point.

It's to the point I get nervous seeing it on the wall, but the whole tax burden, and also fear of getting f'd in the a by some manipulative piece of garbage from ebay or elsewhere who do the whole A-B-C (pick your death) scam to steal things.  I'm where I'd love to maybe get rid of it for a really cherry cheery quality CIB copy to stick in that frame like the amazing Castlevania I have.  I imagine by any fair measure seeing like wise non-graded sales it's worth 5K plus.

The thing, is, what do you do?  I really don't want to hypocritically slab it, waiting out 6-12mo from the WATA trolls either.  Do you drive and meet, fly it... how exactly do you deal with the taxes on it?  I wouldn't want to wreck my yearly refund.  How do you handle a one off like this where it's just sold, taxed, and done then and there?  Is that possible?