Why isn't my MINT collection worth anything?

Hey guys, long time, no see.

I have been collecting Star Wars figures and such since the release of the Special Editions with the old POTF line. I recently was wondering what my 10 year old collection was worth. Back in the day, you would spend more than they retailed for on ebay. Now it seems on eBay, the figures I spent my hard earned money on investing in, are selling less than I bought them for retail. ??????????? Guys, I love Star Wars and I am literally baffeled that my and your collections are not as valuable as we thought.

Any thoughts or comments?

 

Well, the vintage figures that attract the money are 30 years old, and relatively scarce. Your 10 year old figures are relatively plentiful by comparison. Therefore they won't atttract the same returns.

 

Your problem is that you "invested" in Star Wars toys. It is fine to collect items that you find interesting, but as far as investments go, there are far better investment options out there.

 

Yeah, the only way investing in SW toys would work is to go back in time, buy a complete set of carded, unpunched, with all variations of vintage figures, go back to the future and sell that. Sorry man, but like LAJ and Jeff said, investing in SW isn't going to pay off anymore .

 

When people say things like "back in the day" or "old" in reference to POTF2 figures, it makes me feel like a really really old man. I always think of them as the "crummy new figures." I think the most concerning are ebay auctions for VINTAGE 1996 POTF figures.

But like everyone has said, those figures were produced in enormous quantities and collectors/speculators stockpiled them like crazy. There is a far bigger supply than demand, and many collectors prefer the newer more accurate sculpts anyway.

 

I know the feeling, I have some 250 plus action figures and I have 'lost' money. But the real value is the figures themselves. It has been said time and again, but it still holds true, collect Star Wars because you love it, not because you hope to strike it rich.

 

You know, it still baffles me to this day that people buy new Star Wars figures on eBay. I understand if you live in some remote part of the country with no Wal-marts or Targets, but for people who have those stores around it makes no sense. Also, people who do "have to" buy stuff on eBay should wait until the stuff is plentiful in stores so that eBay prices come down.

Let's look at a specific example:

The original Disney Pixar Lizzie Car was selling for $15 - $20 per unit on eBay for about the first 3 months it was out. Then Mattel flooded the market on it and you could get it (even on eBay) for $3 - $5.

For new items, the only thing I use eBay for is looking up what is out there in stores. Usually, I will find something at Wal-mart or Target within 2 weeks of it first appearing on eBay. I can wait the extra couple of weeks.

The only thing people should have to even "eat" when buying on eBay is the shipping and handling price. I would call that the substitute cost for gasoline. If you are paying more than retail price on eBay for anything new, you are WASTING your money and giving scalpers more and more reason to go to the stores and buy everyting up. Stop paying premium prices on eBay and eBay sellers will stop pilferring our stores and taking all the good stuff!

Sorry about the value of your POTF2 collection, but I never thought those figures were worth the plastic used to manufacture them because of the way they looked. Luke Skywalker is not Hercules and should have not been designed to look like him.

 

But the positive side to this is play value. Rip those things out of the package and give them to the kids. The POTF2 figures can take abuse. My daughter has a bunch of mine, and they've never broken or fallen apart. The newer figures with their excessive articulation fall to pieces literally as you take them out of the package. If there's one thing I love about the POTF2 series it's that they are toys--not collector items--and that's not a bad thing.

Seriously...if you can't take an action figure out of the package, chew on it, throw it at your little brother, bury it, dig it back up, carry it in your pocket, lose it in the backyard and find it again a week later, and still have some play value, then what good is it?

 

I even bought almost everything for episode 1, I might be missing maybe 10 figures but I got pretty much everything up to the release of episode 2 which the only thing I got from it was slave I. But I did enjoy collecting. I stopped cuz I ran out of room to put it all, and the market was just flooded with everything. I even snagged Target's displays for Episode I. Now I have the temptation to sell what I don't want, which is probably about 75%. I was pretty upset that I can barely can get retail for the figs. arg.

 

The problem is; these days, everyone's a collector. It wasn't the case in 1977, which is why there's less unopened stuff from then, hence the higher collector's prices. Most people bought toys to play with back then.

You've said yourself that LFL basically flooded the market for EpI. Are you really surprised that a collection from only 8 years ago that was pushed into almost every area of the consumer market isn't classed as rare?

 

I think once people realized that an occasional unopened mint toy could someday be worth insane amounts of money, the days of any new toy being worth insane amounts of money ended. Hasbro, Mattel, et all are in the business of making money, so they're going to make sure that they make enough figures, cars, et all to meet demand. Would Hasbro rather have you pay $20 for a figure to somebody on ebay or $7 to the toy store. In the ebay scenario they've sold 1 figure, but if they increse the supply to meet the demand, they sell more.

 

Other than the Darth Sidious holgram, Queen Amidala (battle), Sio Bibble, TC-14, and R2B1 figures, the Episode one toys are worth next to nothing.

 

You can't make money from buying SW toys unless your a dealer that buys them from people at a fraction of the cost but even they don't make much. It's that dumb off line products like the figures from Droids that are truly worth money. That's because they were so ugly no one wanted them. Also they were so cheap the stickers came off while still in the package.

The only value in SW toy is that you had fun with them.

 

Very, very few new Star Wars items are worth anything significant, and even then whether they hold or gain value later on is doubtful. Even vintage doesn't have the value or demand it once had, and this whole AFA business is a terrible concept that hasn't helped at all.
There were some great items at the CE auction that went for mere pockey money. The market in general is pretty gloomy and the main thing fans at shows are concerned about these days is autograph collecting.
Ebay hasn't helped either because finding and buying items is much easier, so the supply can outstrip demand which brings price down.

In the end, you just have to collect for the love of it rather then planning your retirement fund

 

I agree. That's one of the biggest contributors. I think they produced something like 22 million figures in the vintage era (1977-1985) but most were opened and played with. Today collectors buy [I don't know what %... half maybe?] of all figures and most keep them either MOC or at least complete and un-played with.

The other factor, IMO, is that there's no nostalgia for POTF 2 era forward. Today what's hot is the next wave. That figure that everyone was dying for in June is yesterday's news. Maybe in 20 years when this generation of kids grow up, the prices for prequel era Star Wars merchandise will start to rise a little. But expectations should be lowered when you realize just how much mint product is out there.

 

Also a lot of people got a lot of figures on clearance over the years. Ep 1 toys were cleared at Walmarts by the 1000's for like a $1 each. Thats the time to buy stuff to invest, the $1 or $2 clearance sale.

Now on the pricing front I might be able to help a bit. Most of what you have will only have kids looking for it, not collecters. MIBC POTF and EP 1 would largely be worth around $5 a piece. I've been selling at ToyShows for 12 years and find that parents jump at the $5 price. I find I can sometimes do a bit better on Yoda and Vader figures in general($8 to $10) but for the most part $5 is it. Do your homework, like a previous poster said some of them have some value but most wont, atleast not the value you want for them.

 

Another thing to think about is this. When I first started collecting back in 2005, that Lava Darth Vader figure was selling for over $100 on eBay. Now you can get him for as low as $11.50 plus shipping. Quite a substantial drop in value for a 2 year period of time don't you think?

I once got caught up in the eBay hype and paid $35 for that Red variant ARC Trooper from the non-animated Clone Wars series. Never again, not when you can get anything new for $7 or less at Target or Walmart. It is all a matter of simply knowing where to look and when. It also helps if you have about 3 or 4 friends who collect as well, especially if they don't collect Star Wars stuff. Then they call me up and it's like "hey dude, Walmart got in a bunch of new Star Wars figures, get down here now if you want them!"

Patience is key, not plan B!

The only thing I buy off eBay now is vintage Star Wars stuff. Just because I don't have any other choice.

 

Well, pretty much what everyone else said already.

If you're collecting for fun, then just have fun with the toys you collect, whether you open them to display or just keep them in packages. Don't ever expect to make money on them, chances are you'll be very disappointed.

If you're just looking for stuff to buy make an easy buck, then there's no sure thing, but anything that people don't seem to care for originally at least has a remote chance to be worth something someday. With vintage figures, few people thought at that time that someday they might sell for 1,000s of dollars -- and that's precisely why many of them, at least mint in mint packaging, can be worth thousands.

 

This discussion reminds me of the "old days" of collecting comic books. I remember being in the store when X-Men #1 came out (the Jim Lee version with like 5 different covers) and there were guys there buying entire cases thinking they were going to get rich. I was laughing thinking "if you're buying an entire case... how many other guys are doing the same and thus proving that there will never be enough scarcity to drive up the value".

Same thing happened to tons of other books and shortly thereafter the market went south and I don't think it's recovered.

There obviously has to be a SCARCITY issue to drive up values. And in today's 'collector' or 'ebay' society... there simply isn't in many cases.

 

SoonerSean brings up a good point, with eBay nothing is too scarce anymore.

Now if a figure isn't plentiful in your area you don't have to go to a collectibles show to find the only one in town, you just go online and get hooked up with anyone who has one in the country or even the world who has one.

Plus nothing produced after 1990 is really that collectible now. Maybe in 2024 when Episode one is having its 25th anniversary you can market some of the promotional stuff for Phantom Menace but the figures were so plentiful and will be probably reissued again and again, I'm not sure they will be worth much.

Better to have invested in Google.

 

The exclusives appear to be your best bet for any short term gain. I have no idea what your long term prospects are for things like the Clone Commander busts that were limited to 2,500 units - or whatever the number was. Those are all over ebay right now... some for $150 or less and some where sellers seem to think they are either made of gold or that they're vessels for smuggling crack. Again... I have no idea if the value will hold 10-20 years down the road.

But I think the days of someone going out and buying regular figures off the toy aisle and making any money in the long run is over.... unless you've got a time machine and can go back and snag some OT figures.

 

hello all,heres a little story for ya all.i was working in this old house tearing out walls and stuff like that,just demo work.well the boss told me and my son to go down into the basement,and clean everything out.there had to be years of stuff in there.most of it was just trash and junk like,old tables,and old chairs,boxes of christmas junk,boxes of old tax reports,stuff like that.but there where three boxes we where going to throw to the dumpster but thank god we checked them.when i opened the boxes they were loaded with a bunch of vintage star wars.toys,figures,hundreds of trading cards.i have lots of them little kenner catalogs of diffrent kinds,movie cards that came with a stick of gum.then in one box we opened we found a 13"1/2 inch boba fett with the peep hole,cape,back pack,and right under that was a 12" inch cp30 and about 20 figures.and a issue one of poster monthly.and lots more stuff.just thought i would share this story with you all.but the sad thing is i don't know a darn thing about this stuff.i dont know what to do with it.it just sits in my closet.

You were fine til you gave the email address. Advertising isn't allowed here.

 

i wonder why?that dont make a bit of sence.oh well i will respect the rules and move on. there are tons of other forums out there.so thats what i will do.what sucks the most is theres a lot of nice people on this forum too.thanks everyone and have merry christmas.bye

 

The site owners made those rules - we didn't. We have a private forum where selling/advertising is allowed but you have to be a Fan Force member to gain access.

Check out rebelscum. They have classified forums there. You have to register but it's free.

 

Sadly, no toys or comics are worth anything these days. I think some of the original unleashed stuff is getting decent money, or it was a few months back, but I dunno if it still is. Comics are a joke, espically in the 90s when we had 5 different varient covers and people bought all of them.

If you are going to collect do it out of love, not for the $$ cause that will jsut bite you in the butt. Remember the beanie baby craze? People were shelling out thousands for like one. I just shook my head. If you want to invest in something buy antique furniture or something. Its vaule will no doubt go up. Its made or real wood and is very fuctional.

But I'm not saying anything different than the earlier posts.