Having perhaps collected comic books as a kid or just always loved reading them, maybe you have had a waxing and waning interest in comic books and collecting. Regardless of why you’re interested in building a comic book collection, there are a few pointers to take into account when building a serious collection.
If you are either buying or selling your comic book collection, keep in mind quality comics trumps all other components. Collectible comics are just that because they are worth more than the average issue from the same collection. Whether this means a new character was introduced or it’s the first (or last) in a subseries- such as “Venom” to “Spiderman-” there must be a quality component for a comic to be considered remotely collectible. The condition of the issue must also be impeccable.
Rarity, obviously, is also a valuable component to consider for the value of a comic book. A quality edition could have the most compelling storyline and developments in comic book history. But if there were half a million copies printed, it is way too common to be worth any money- until many start dropping out of circulation or are destroyed over time.
Take the 1986 Jose Conseco Donruss rookie card; a great player in his rookie year nearly 30 years ago. However, there were literally millions of these cards issued, and subsequently can be found for $100 on the high end. This compares to the T206 Honus Wagner, of which there were only 200 original issues in 1909 and subsequently goes for $20,000 on the low end. The same applies to comic books; take the 1938 Action Comics 1, of which there was only 200,000 original copies issued- one of these copies is valued at over $3million!
Finally, and perhaps most important- is always contact the experts- such as a professional estate sales agency- for an accurate value assessment. Expert s are your best bet for a fair indication of what value you may- or may not be sitting on. There are a lot of collectible comic books out there. An expert can determine if they’re worthless, valuable or even fraudulent.
