Former MTG buyer/seller here, coming out of semi-retirement to ask a couple questions: I've been out of the selling loop for the last few years. Back in my heyday, eBay/MOTL prices were largely the standard for buying and selling cards online. From some research and observation, I see that a lot of people are now referencing TCGPlayer and MOTL is now totally defunct. I've also seen MTGPrice referenced a few times.
What I'm wondering is - are the TCGPlayer/MTGPrice prices a reasonable barometer for what one could actually expect to sell his cards for? Or are they a bit inflated due to the influence of shops in their pricing? In other words, if card X is listed on TCGPlayer or MTGPrice for $10, could I expect to list said card and have it sell for $10 on MTGS or locally? Or is the "true" person-to-person price a bit lower than what these sites list?
On a related note - are the aforementioned sites the best reference to use these days, or is there a "better" site for accurate and competitive eBay-ish pricing?
I, too, would like to know the answer to this question. I've traded quite a bit, but never sold any cards.
I've seen sooo many sales posts on this site with people advertising cards at TCG-Mid or TCG-Market prices, and sometimes adding shipping costs and/or a 3% penalty for paying using the goods and services option. I always just assumed those were inexperienced sellers, and that it would be hard to find buyers here unless total prices were significantly enough below TCG-Low to justify buying here instead of just going to TCGPlayer or ebay and buying there at a lower cost and with all of the financial protections those sites offer.
Is it really reasonable to expect you can sell cards here at Mid or Market prices from TCG? I totally get why those are good sources of pricing data to use for trading, but wouldn't outright selling be a little different?
So, with the caveat that it matters what the card is ...
I'd expect people here to mostly buy at TCGLow, or slightly below it. After all, TCGLow is the lowest price that's available for the card, and TCG is offering a guarantee (and flexibility) that MTGS simply doesn't have. If I want to buy, for example, a Mycosynth Lattuce, I can go to TCGPlayer and get one for $20, shipped. It's HP, though - best price on a NM English copy is $26 shipped. Market is $27.50. So if someone here were offering the card in NM condition for $20 shipped, I'd go for it. Even $23 seems like a decent deal. But if they're coming in at $25, and I didn't *know* the person, then I'd have to ask myself why I'm doing it.
I guess that's a long way of saying no, I don't think that it's reasonable to expect that people here will buy at TCGMid/Market prices. In-person, I think there's a much better chance of getting Market, because you're right there - the customer can look at the card and be satisfied of the condition, plus instant gratification is always nice. And you avoid shipping charges.
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Yea, I guess what you describe is exactly what I'd expect. I'd agree with your example of $20 NM card, or maybe even a few dollars above, if the best price on TCG for that condition was $26. Sometimes you can get NM cards for close to the Low price, and other times you can't. But either way, I definitely agree that you need to take condition in to account when comparing with TCG Low/Mid pricing. I also agree with you about in-person pricing. I'm willing to pay a premium if I can inspect the card and get it immediately, given the extremely low risk in those transactions.
I just wanted to know if I was missing something. The aggregate difference between the low end and Market price is substantial if you are looking to sell a lot, and I would have to consider selling off some cards instead of sticking to trading exclusively.
Responses captured most of the pure pricing points here - but one additional note I'd add is MTGSalvation is a community. Aside from occasional moderator or admin intervention card sales are being handled directly by forum members with no commissions.
Both Ebay and TCGPlayer have a 10-20% commission of all sales after factoring in final value fees and shipping policies. Of course the shopping and selling experience is much better, inventory management is easier and buyers/sellers have much more protection. But for community members you trust (and I found the system here worked pretty well), TCGPlayer has the added benefit that secondary market value stays in the community.
For example if 10 traders bought and sold 50$ worth of cards 10 times over ($500 total being traded around about 10 times amongst various transactions), in these forums the only losses would be shipping fees. With TCGPlayer or Ebay, in that same scenario less than $150 of the original $500 would remain in the community. Over two thirds of the value would have gone to the online store commissions.
So for simple transactions, paying low TCGPlayer or Ebay still has value doing it here - it keeps the money in the community.
So for simple transactions, paying low TCGPlayer or Ebay still has value doing it here - it keeps the money in the community.
That's a pretty good point, Digitek, and it definitely bears consideration. The whole point of this (or any) forum is to build up trust in each other and to create a thriving community. Ywfn, if you start small, you'll probably be able to build up a good rep in short order.
TCGPlayer isn't one number. There's generally a Median Price, a Low Price, and a "Market Price" at the very least. If someone is expecting to get TCGMid prices selling Peer to Peer, they're off their rocker. TCGLow is more reasonable, but if they were to actually sell through TCGPlayer, they'd have to list at low to sell quickly, then get fees taken out of it (and likely shipping as well if the cost of the card is >$25). In general, a good benchmark for P2P sales is 70-75% of TCGMid/StarCityGames Prices (these two numbers tend to be close to identical). This yields a number that is slightly above TCGLow Minus Fees and above Buylist, but below TCGLow, so both sides are getting a better deal than if they were to do their transactions through other outlets.
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Former MTG buyer/seller here, coming out of semi-retirement to ask a couple questions: I've been out of the selling loop for the last few years. Back in my heyday, eBay/MOTL prices were largely the standard for buying and selling cards online. From some research and observation, I see that a lot of people are now referencing TCGPlayer and MOTL is now totally defunct. I've also seen MTGPrice referenced a few times.
What I'm wondering is - are the TCGPlayer/MTGPrice prices a reasonable barometer for what one could actually expect to sell his cards for? Or are they a bit inflated due to the influence of shops in their pricing? In other words, if card X is listed on TCGPlayer or MTGPrice for $10, could I expect to list said card and have it sell for $10 on MTGS or locally? Or is the "true" person-to-person price a bit lower than what these sites list?
On a related note - are the aforementioned sites the best reference to use these days, or is there a "better" site for accurate and competitive eBay-ish pricing?
Cheers,
PoG
I've seen sooo many sales posts on this site with people advertising cards at TCG-Mid or TCG-Market prices, and sometimes adding shipping costs and/or a 3% penalty for paying using the goods and services option. I always just assumed those were inexperienced sellers, and that it would be hard to find buyers here unless total prices were significantly enough below TCG-Low to justify buying here instead of just going to TCGPlayer or ebay and buying there at a lower cost and with all of the financial protections those sites offer.
Is it really reasonable to expect you can sell cards here at Mid or Market prices from TCG? I totally get why those are good sources of pricing data to use for trading, but wouldn't outright selling be a little different?
I'd expect people here to mostly buy at TCGLow, or slightly below it. After all, TCGLow is the lowest price that's available for the card, and TCG is offering a guarantee (and flexibility) that MTGS simply doesn't have. If I want to buy, for example, a Mycosynth Lattuce, I can go to TCGPlayer and get one for $20, shipped. It's HP, though - best price on a NM English copy is $26 shipped. Market is $27.50. So if someone here were offering the card in NM condition for $20 shipped, I'd go for it. Even $23 seems like a decent deal. But if they're coming in at $25, and I didn't *know* the person, then I'd have to ask myself why I'm doing it.
I guess that's a long way of saying no, I don't think that it's reasonable to expect that people here will buy at TCGMid/Market prices. In-person, I think there's a much better chance of getting Market, because you're right there - the customer can look at the card and be satisfied of the condition, plus instant gratification is always nice. And you avoid shipping charges.
I just wanted to know if I was missing something. The aggregate difference between the low end and Market price is substantial if you are looking to sell a lot, and I would have to consider selling off some cards instead of sticking to trading exclusively.
Both Ebay and TCGPlayer have a 10-20% commission of all sales after factoring in final value fees and shipping policies. Of course the shopping and selling experience is much better, inventory management is easier and buyers/sellers have much more protection. But for community members you trust (and I found the system here worked pretty well), TCGPlayer has the added benefit that secondary market value stays in the community.
For example if 10 traders bought and sold 50$ worth of cards 10 times over ($500 total being traded around about 10 times amongst various transactions), in these forums the only losses would be shipping fees. With TCGPlayer or Ebay, in that same scenario less than $150 of the original $500 would remain in the community. Over two thirds of the value would have gone to the online store commissions.
So for simple transactions, paying low TCGPlayer or Ebay still has value doing it here - it keeps the money in the community.
That's a pretty good point, Digitek, and it definitely bears consideration. The whole point of this (or any) forum is to build up trust in each other and to create a thriving community. Ywfn, if you start small, you'll probably be able to build up a good rep in short order.
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