Author
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Topic: The best place for the fairest and most universal pricing.
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danoflamancha Member
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posted April 17, 2012 02:04 AM
Hey guys, I was wondering which website the majority of you use to price your cards. I noticed that it can vary pretty wildly between some websites, and I'd like to be as in the loop as I possibly can.Thanks. __________________ don't need no mojo pin to keep me satisfied.
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PortlisX Member
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posted April 17, 2012 02:07 AM
Ebay completed auctions.
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Zeckk Member
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posted April 17, 2012 04:25 AM
What Portlis said, though for hard-to-find or foreign stuff, it's literally whatever people will pay/trade you for it. Even ebay can sometimes be misleading. As a recent example - MPR textless cryptic commands were going for 15-17 on ebay, yet starcity had like 42 in stock at 12 a pop. It's certainly rare, but it happens.
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Bagbokk Member
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posted April 17, 2012 04:52 AM
eBay completed auctions are best, but you actually need to be careful. Averaging completeds works out generally, but some cards will sell low during auctions but high during BINs. This is largely because auctions end after 7 days (well, 1, 3, 5, 7, or 9) so you're at the mercy of the demand for that auction during those days. But if someone wants one of those cards and doesn't want to wait for an auction to end (or come up) they'll buy a BIN, which is often pretty expensive (many times, these are actually higher than retailer prices due to fees being built into eBay BIN prices). The other thing is the same as MOTL # of data points really, if there aren't that many being sold, you need to be careful (what Zeckk mentioned regarding hard-to-find stuff).And yep, eBay can sometimes be misleading, but there are reasons why people don't buy from retailers sometimes, so it's not necessarily always the fact that you can't get semi-close to retailer prices on singles if a few stars happen to align. I ordered stuff from T&T recently and couldn't get any cheaper than $10 shipping from them, have to call in my credit card # instead of using paypal because my new address is apparently "unconfirmed," etc...
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Brekk Member
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posted April 17, 2012 05:52 AM
Personally, I've found Ebay pricing to be the card (No pun intended.) a lot of people pull whenever it turns a trade in their favor. Overall, for large trades, it's best to simply use a marketplace where everything is properly scaled to one another. I really never had much issue with the following three:Star City Games: Only thing I can't stand is how they hyper-inflate a lot of standard cards. For mostly standard/newish trades, it works well though. Troll and Toad: Great for older cards, amazing for trades that require you to cross into different CCGs. Tcgplayer: Check their 'mid' prices. It's still a retail value, but it's a good average using tons of vendors, including the two I mentioned before. When I'm in card stores, I almost always use TCGplayer mid. For online trading, the first two. Another advantage: Nice even numbers. Less nickel-and-diming.
[Edited 1 times, lastly by Brekk on April 17, 2012]
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LemonMeringue Member
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posted April 17, 2012 06:51 AM
Why exactly would you use mid instead of low? Low is the price at which the card could be bought at right away, and is a much better indication of what people are actually paying for the card (especially for standard stuff)
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AlmostGrown Member
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posted April 17, 2012 07:17 AM
quote: Originally posted by LemonMeringue: Why exactly would you use mid instead of low? Low is the price at which the card could be bought at right away, and is a much better indication of what people are actually paying for the card (especially for standard stuff)
Low price is usually not for a NM card.
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Schwingzilla Member
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posted April 17, 2012 07:45 AM
This may be a silly question, but is there a reason not to use the MOTL guide now? For N >= 10 and N >= 5 there are about 500 and 1000 results, so for anything people are trading for it still seems reasonable to me.
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AlmostGrown Member
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posted April 17, 2012 07:55 AM
quote: Originally posted by Schwingzilla: This may be a silly question, but is there a reason not to use the MOTL guide now? For N >= 10 and N >= 5 there are about 500 and 1000 results, so for anything people are trading for it still seems reasonable to me.
Old habits die hard, mainly. I personally use the MOTL guide because it's good for both trading AND Buying & Selling. So if I use lets say...Channel Fireball as a guide for trading, and want to buy something from someone in person, I'm not going to pay them CFB prices. But MOTL is an accurate guide as to what I'd usually pay if I go on eBay.
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Vegas10 Member
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posted April 17, 2012 08:18 AM
Motl guide isn't up to date, unless they finally put DA in there making it hard to use for newer cards.
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Zeckk Member
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posted April 17, 2012 08:32 AM
quote: Originally posted by LemonMeringue: Why exactly would you use mid instead of low? Low is the price at which the card could be bought at right away, and is a much better indication of what people are actually paying for the card (especially for standard stuff)
It has mostly to do with 2 things. 1. Sometimes stores don't update their pricing very often, which can sometimes lead to really outlandish trade values. A recent example would have been the shockland pricing right before modern got into it's season. Anyone with a brain could see that the prices had increased, but if a store has 1 copy of a hallowed fountain at $15, then the low price is $15. Anytime you are using retail sites for trade purposes (and not buying/selling), then using the mid value helps avoid any wonky values. 2. Bulk rare/uncommon pricing. As a trader in real life, everyone attaches minimum values to stuff like lightning bolt, ponder, intangible virtue, etc. But tcgplayer vendors really lowball these kinds of cards in an effort to increase the chances that you purchase additional product from them in order to save on shipping costs. What this means is that no one in their right mind is going to value ponder or intangible virtue at 4 cents, but rather a baseline value of .25 or .50 each for trading purposes.
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Brekk Member
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posted April 17, 2012 08:45 AM
Everyone pretty much hit the nail on the head in regards to low prices on TCGplayer. I feel the same way about them as I do Ebay prices. I just bought 2 Grove of the Burnwillows on Ebay last for 13.00, but would anyone trade them at that value?Noooooooope.
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AlmostGrown Member
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posted April 17, 2012 08:50 AM
quote: Originally posted by Brekk: Everyone pretty much hit the nail on the head in regards to low prices on TCGplayer. I feel the same way about them as I do Ebay prices. I just bought 2 Grove of the Burnwillows on Ebay last for 13.00, but would anyone trade them at that value?Noooooooope.
Anaomalies do occur from time to time, like how on tcgplayer sometimes the data is entered incorrectly and a card is marked at 1,660.00 instead of 16.60.
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Brekk Member
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posted April 17, 2012 09:26 AM
quote: Originally posted by AlmostGrown: Anaomalies do occur from time to time, like how on tcgplayer sometimes the data is entered incorrectly and a card is marked at 1,660.00 instead of 16.60.
Fortunately, when it's a TCG anomaly, you can usually tell. It's pretty obvious most times. I guess one of the other big advantages that I forgot to mention is that TCGplayer shows you a time/price curve. You can look over a detailed history of it's sale prices.
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Mr.C Member
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posted April 17, 2012 10:25 AM
I use tcg low, unless there is something clearly odd.
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Sovarius Member
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posted April 17, 2012 04:08 PM
quote: Originally posted by Mr.C: I use tcg low, unless there is something clearly odd.
This Cause you don't have to look at one low price. Look at the 5 est prices - if they are all $2, then the card is msotly likely a 2 dollar card. Clearly the outliers are the played cards and a store who hasn't updated prices in a month - don't use them. Whoa, right.
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mchainmail Member
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posted April 17, 2012 06:15 PM
quote: Originally posted by LemonMeringue: Why exactly would you use mid instead of low? Low is the price at which the card could be bought at right away, and is a much better indication of what people are actually paying for the card (especially for standard stuff)
Low prices are very strange / biased some times. A lot of TCG Low prices are below what I would want (cash) for on my cards.
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Demilio Member
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posted April 18, 2012 02:36 PM
quote: Originally posted by PortlisX: Ebay completed auctions.
This is usually fine as long as... 1. The completed auction is current (not 1 month ago) 2. Avoid the one price that is far below average (the auction that ended at 3am or a questionable seller (bad or no feedback)) 3. Also keep in mind shipping; just because a card is priced $2, it may not be worth $2 because there is also a $2 shipping charge. (so the card is most likely worth $4)
[Edited 2 times, lastly by Demilio on April 18, 2012]
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Mr.C Member
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posted April 19, 2012 10:00 PM
quote: Originally posted by mchainmail: Low prices are very strange / biased some times. A lot of TCG Low prices are below what I would want (cash) for on my cards.
It makes a difference if you trade for cards to complete sets. I'm sorry, your Xenograft isn't worth $.5 no matter how you cut it, know what I mean?
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Zeckk Member
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posted April 20, 2012 05:45 PM
quote: Originally posted by Mr.C: It makes a difference if you trade for cards to complete sets. I'm sorry, your Xenograft isn't worth $.5 no matter how you cut it, know what I mean?
That falls under other considerations, namely trading bulk for staples, or high-volume trades where bulk pricing is necessary on both sides. That Xenograft sure as hell is .5 if I'm doing a trade at the local shop for small-ball stuff, and it's definitely not unheard of to see stuff like Xenograft or Curse of Echoes get traded for things like intangible virtue or lingering souls. This goes back towards why tcgplayer lowers the value on that kind of bulk - nobody would pay .5 + shipping (emphasis on the shipping) for that, but if they can pick up a bunch of bulk playsets while they are already picking up some staple/higher value stuff, then the retailer gets to move stale product, and the customer is happy. Very different from trading purposes.
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