Does anyone here have any information on the comic Amazing Spider Man?!
Question: This sounds cliche but I was going through my Dad's boxes that were left at my Grandma's House. He gave me the comics that were inside. I was a novice collector back in the day (loved Deathlok by the way) and found an Amazing Spider Man #3 (first appearance of Dr. Octopus) and X-Man #13 just to name a few. The Amazing Spider Man still has it's cover and in pretty good condition and there are about 5 X-Men, all with the cover. These comics are from the early 60's and there are about 40 of them. Where would I price these things? I know, from when I was a kid, that comic book and baseball card dealers are scum bags so I would never take them there. At this point I want to preserve them, what would you do?
Answers: This sounds cliche but I was going through my Dad's boxes that were left at my Grandma's House. He gave me the comics that were inside. I was a novice collector back in the day (loved Deathlok by the way) and found an Amazing Spider Man #3 (first appearance of Dr. Octopus) and X-Man #13 just to name a few. The Amazing Spider Man still has it's cover and in pretty good condition and there are about 5 X-Men, all with the cover. These comics are from the early 60's and there are about 40 of them. Where would I price these things? I know, from when I was a kid, that comic book and baseball card dealers are scum bags so I would never take them there. At this point I want to preserve them, what would you do?
I would hang on to the books, because they are valuable and their value should only go up. Your best bet would be to go to your local library and see if they have copies of 'The Overstreet Guide to Comic Books' which is published annually and contains supposedly solid information about the value of specific comic books. You want the most recent addition of the book you can find, so you can check the prices listed for the books you have. Your biggest difficulty you are going to run into is figuring out the grade of the books but you seem to have some understanding of condition or at least you understand that grade is important; for estimation purposes, go with the "good" grade. The rule of thumb I would apply to the values listed in the Overpriced Guide (as some collectors call it) is that if you're buying expect to pay the prices listed, but if you are selling you will be luck to get between 25% and 50%.
A way to double check the figures you come up with is to compare those figures with the prices that have been paid for the books on eBay (don't be disappointed if the same books have sold for a little less on eBay, you're just using both sources for a ballpark figure).
You also need to go to a comic shop and buy some bags and some boards so the grade of the books doesn't go any lower. Keep them out of direct sunlight, and you might also consider buying a "longbox' to store them in.
Depending on exactly what issues of which titles you have, and exactly what grade they are in, you probably have at least two to three thousand dollars worth of prime silver age books, perhaps more.
There is also an online price guide to also give you a rough idea. http://www.ComicsPriceGuide.com
Deciding on the grade is the hardest part since these are so old and depending on where and how they were stored at your Grandmother's house.
If you decide to sell them as is you won't get full guide price since it's extremely hard these days to get guide price for anything UNLESS it has been graded professionally by the CGC. You can send the books away to have them graded professionally but I'm not sure how much that costs.
You could sell them without doing that but if you sell them either online or to a local collector be sure to check varying price guides to get a handle on a firm price because as sad as it is, not everyone is honest and will try to cheat you if they believe you don't know what you're doing.
Get the books in protective sleeves, the bags with backing boards or depending on how many issues you have you could put each in a hard cover clear plastic holder.
Not all dealers are bad. There are some good ones out there. The trick is finding them.
If you sell these comics don't take them to a local comic shop.As whats already been said about the over street I agree just find someone to help you grade them and if you want to sell them put them on EBay