General Forum

My original wishy-washy answer is now looking very good...Except for the part where I suggested that others might be able to offer clearer guidance.

v3

Pretty much true     vrooomed

 Price guides are inherently flawed.   I remember going to LCS and the dealer pulled a Beckett when you asked for a price on a card.  Then pull the Tuff Stuff when looking up your trade card.

The internet has it's pro and con   can start a thread on it and it will grow fast

The prices here - it's completely hit or miss  They are hit and miss every where

This site has a lot of nice features / reports.   The price (guide) is a hot button.  So many place to find prices (sold, asking).  When selling a card you look for the highest priced card sold.  When buying you look for the  lowest price sold.

The whole idea of card valuation is completely flawed.    Again the value in in the eyes of the beholder.  To a lot of baseball collectors my PC is worthless to them,  priceless to me.

I have mixed feeling on the pricing feature.  Would like to track/know what I paid for my cards.   Problem that other people think the cards are worth more then I think they are.

Can ADMIN make some changes to the pricing feature?  only if he feels it will help us.  To me it appears he is doing this site to help the card community and a big thank you to him.

I ended up turning off the pricing feature a long time ago. I think I agree with many that the pricing tool doesn't do much for me. I respect that for others it does mean something. I just think it is difficult to regulate something that people can enter whatever they want with no verification process. I don't really see a way to change that.

As with all things on this site, I applaud Admin for the efforts to give everyone the features they want. Thank you for your efforts for all of us.

I'm new here, but I've collected for decades. Sorry to dig this back up, but I feel very strongly that the pricing feature should remain as it is, with an option to turn it off if you don't like it. Beckett is just about dead, and ebay and COMC sales prices are as close as we're gonna get to estimating fair market values for our cards. I think shipping should not be entered by any means. It is variable and often cheap cards will be bought in bulk and combined. eBay already inflates common card values with it's $0.99 minimum Buy It Now. Better to not inflate it anymore. Many sellers offer multiple shipping options, does that mean that a card is worth more because the impatient buyer paid $6 rush shipping when he could have paid $0.50? Honestly, the price feature is one of the things that brought me to tcdb. I can get checklists and track my collection at many sites. But this one offers crowd-sourced pricing and I think it's brilliant. To hell with Beckett and their rediculous prices. They took over Zistle and made my efforts over there meaningless. Now a bit off-topic, but if I were to have a database of card sales, is there any way I can bulk enter them? If not, that would be a great feature.

There's a card price threshold where shipping is irrelevant and factored into your bid.  I'd guess it's somewhere below 2x discount rate bubble mailer shipping rate.  An example, past two sales:

$4.98, free shipping

$0.99, $4 shipping

Is it a $5 card, $3 card, or a $1 card?  I'd argue $5, prove me wrong 😲 

I like everything the way it is. If you think a price is wrong then you my friend can go do the work to find the last five selling prices enter them in with their dates and correct the whole pricing for that card. If you’re too lazy to do that than turn the prices off and leave those that work hard on the pricing alone. Cranky old man says stay off my lawn. 

Brad,

I can agree with you with reservations. In the last while, there are more members who are working to bring the pricing on this database to a more realistic level.  The odd person who thinks they can inflate (or deflate) the prices of cards for their own benefit is having more difficulty as more true prices are being entered for the more sought after cards.  I applaud that group of members and can believe you are making a worthwhile difference to this site. But I think we are still a long way off from being a sole-reliable source for pricing and would not make a trade based solely on the pricing on this site (I tend more to look at eras and player inclusion of trades when I decide if a trade is fair).

As for the cost of shipping being included or not, I think we will always have two groups that won't come together on this.  I will never buy a card that is booked at $1 even for $0.18 (Sportlots) if the shipping of that card is going to cost me $3. Now if I can find 20 cards for $0.18 per card and that are booked at $1 each and I can get them shipped for $3, then I would do that. Total cost, $6.60 or $0.33 each.  The other factor is exchange rate.  I just bought a Steve Carlton RC for about $55 Canadian.  Do I enter that price or do I have to play in the exchange rate?  And that can change day to day.

But do keep up the work on the pricing.  You are making a worthwhile difference on the site. I applaud you and your group.

So back in the day of Price Guides, I liked Tuff Stuff, You look up a card's value, check the + or - trend. My card is at a $3.00 value.  THAT'S IT. I have it, that's what I record.

I'm truly sorry but I can't get wrapped up in including: postage, toploaders, gas to get to a show or shop, admission to a show, eBay, PayPal etc fees, phone calls and so on. I'm sure there is a definitive dividing line of opinion here. Kudos to everybody that voices their opinion.

I just don't think that is the card's value. I guess I feel it's more supply and demand, hot RC, rare ERR/VAR card, auto, gold, SN, SP. I would never enter an extra $30 for the cost of a table at a show that I picked up a card for $20 because the seller was my good buddy and bought me lunch. Absurd pricing theory.

Don't get me wrong, I DON'T have an answer, I'm not turning pricing off because I want to see all features on TCDB even if I wouldn't use them. MY 2 cents.

Some sellers collect up to $5 for shipping US to US. Some sellers list their items with "Free Shipping".

So the card that is $2, with $5 for shipping, is half the price of the same one that's $4 with free shipping? That's absolute lunacy.

And if you would seriously rather buy the $2 card, I have a boatload here I'm willing to sell you for 1 cent each, but the shipping will be $1 for each card.

Personally I would love to see a supply and demand number instead of the price.  If there is a card 10 people want and 1 person has for trade I would generally think it's a fair trade for a card 20 people want and 2 people have for trade.