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Return on investment (1 Viewer)

I think this was originally sold for $1100, right?

but note this guy uses the Best Offer option as well. He had a poem for slightly over a grand and ended up selling it for $850 (Best Offer).
 
Hi,
The market is still soft. I think that the best that he could hope for is to get what he paid back at this point. Of course, if he waits another 15 years, $4500 may not be out of the question...

Bill
 
I would agree with the waiting 15 years assessment. In the last few years the market has been flooded with manuscripts, but eventually those large caches will dry up and we'll see what the value really is.

If you take away Scott's (Abandoned Planet) liquidation I think we'd be looking at different prices today. Actually, that's what he did, bought a large collection and sat on it for 10 or 15 years, so I'm sure he made out well. I doubt that large buy was his only source, but it may have been the major part.

Of course in 15 years those of us still around may be communicating with smoke signals and spears, and the manuscripts won't seem quite as important. You never know. ;)
 
If you take away the stnickl and dermaface eBay price war of 2003/04, you are looking at a different market for manuscripts AND books! I believe the animosity those two have for one another had a profound and lasting effect on the Bukowski rarities market.

To buy any book or manuscript for investment purposes is a terrible mistake. The rule of thumb when collecting is to buy what you like because you might be stuck with it. You cannot predict which authors are going to fall in and out of favor with the general public. I've never bought a Bukowski book with the thought that it might increase in value. That it did was sheer luck. I have a decent Raymond Carver collection that isn't worth nearly as much as I paid for it six or seven years ago. People just don't care about Carver like they use to. I don't care. I bought them because I wanted them on my shelf and have no regrets. Except for some blue chip titles (On The Road, The Great Gatsby, Huck Finn, etc.) you just don't know what the open market will do to the $$$ value of your library.
 
What you really missed were the low prices before that price war. The war itself was no fun to watch. Unless they were bidding on your auctions.
 
nymark said:
To buy any book or manuscript for investment purposes is a terrible mistake.
I would agree with that. If you're just investing, buy gold coins or Exxon stock or something. 36 billion in profit last year, how can you go wrong? ;)

You can see examples lately of people who bought manuscripts or books on eBay and tried to immediately turn them around with no success. Not sure why you would expect to successfully do that, but what do I know.
 
Once he pays the ever increasing ebay and paypal fees, he will probably be left with enough to buy himself an imported bottle of beer...
Bill
 
bospress.net said:
Once he pays the ever increasing ebay and paypal fees...
It burns me that PayPal and eBay are the same company now, yet they continue to charge fees on both services for auction sales.

Though I've got to admit, it sure is easier to business on eBay in tandem with PayPal...I don't miss the old days of writing and mailing checks or money orders. You can even print postage from PayPal with the recipient's address pre-entered. It's so 21st century! ;)
 
God bless PayPal. No kidding. I cannot think of another scenario whereby I would be able to accept credit card payments for the items I've sold. I'm happy to pay the service fee. I think the service they provide is worth the fees they collect.
 
Hi,
Paypal started by PROMISING that they would NEVER charge. That being said, I agree that it is worth it. The issue that I have is with ebay. They recently doubled their fees. This is, of course, their right... I complained and was pissed, but there is no other auction site that brings any kind of traffic. It got to the point where I could not make any money on ebay, which is why I'm getting out of it....

Bill
 
Yea, and I old enough to remember that when ATMs first came out they were free of charge. That changed after we all became addicted to the convenience. It's the same sad story over and over. It will have no end.
 

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