General Forum

If you don't mind my asking, roughly where do you live? We might have a trusted member in your area that might be willing to look through the collection and help identify what may be of value. If space isn't an issue you may want to hold them at this time but as a spouse of a collector you may be tired of looking at those cards sitting around! 

"Sentimental" might be optimistic.  You might be just passing on a burden.  As stated earlier, the years mentioned are commonly known as "junk".  I'd recommend trying to sell them all at once.  Selling individually, or in small lots could literally take years.

Selling the whole thing locally would be the easiest option. There may be a member on here willing to buy it otherwise facebook market place or craigslist are options. I can tell you if someone on here buys them there’s a very good chance they’ll be going to a good home. There are if a lot of passionate card collectors on here!

I found that I always came back to this site for answers questions. That’s why I registered here. Thank you, guys, for your suggestions. I most definitely won’t trash all these cards. He invested too much money and time in them. If I give up on them, I would love for them to go to a bunch of little boys/girls who like baseball and would love looking through them. I do admit, some of them are just too pretty to let go of. I look at the “value” of the ones I like and they’re usually not worth anything but I like them. 

And you should keep those, regardless of "book value". About where in the US are you (state is good enough)? There are some people on here who don't mind taking on collections like this (if local).

But, by all means, pull the stuff you like, and let the rest go. If it goes to someone on here, most likely, they'll be distributed to those who are wanting those cards the most, so I'm sure your late husband would be happy with that. That's how we operate here (for the most part - if you have seen the "Pay It Forward" thread, you'll see how many members here are more concerned with getting their extras into the hands of those who want and appreciate the cards than worry about monetary value of the cards). 

If you are looking to unload the cards, I would not recommend COMC. COMC is great for collectors and hobbyists to earn store credit and essentially exchange cards.  Cashing out requires a pretty large sum of credit and then the site takes a cut.  If your goal is to end up with fewer cards and some money in return, ebay or Craigslist or some other similar site would probably be a better option for you.

Each area is a little different in terms of the best way to sell large quantities of cards. As others have mentioned, knowing your state would be helpful. Facebook Marketplace is a pretty good option where I am. 

As others have mentioned it kind of depends on what the primary goal is.

Goal to Maximize value you get back: You need an honest assessment of what you have and what things may be worth. Finding a local collector or card shop owner to take a look may help. I know local shops around me don't really buy collections but they may take a look to see if there is anything that interests them. I personally have hundreds of thousands of cards from that era and most are not worth much.

Goal to move the collection and have it gone: Post in bulk on a local classifieds add or facebook marketplace.

If nothing else you could take pictures and post them here and someone may be able to give you some indication of what is there.

Feel free to message me or post in a general thread if you have more questions. I'm happy to help in any way that I can.

There is a lot of good information and people here.  The more information about the collection the better we can refine the advise to you.   

The other thing I have seen in my area (that is not a baseball city)  do well is Estate Sales.

I look on estatesales.org for cards every week

I am not sure what % the estate sale company takes, but..

It surprises me to go to a sale on friday and see a nice collection, priced by the box/album, etc..and to even see the 'overproduced era' sets are gone on sunday when everything is discounted more heavily..

that may be one way to get many folks dropping 5 bucks or 20 bucks intead of one single larger transaction to a dealer, or mutliple meets with people on local resale groups..

mark

I’m in central Kentucky.