You’re welcome.

Let me emphasize that you should know your plan when looking to buy collections. If you move through a lot of cards you have to be less picky than I am as you’ll need more product. I can be patient as I only want 1-2 collections per year to (partially) supplement my own collection and can just wait for an especially good one to come by. I may in fact go an entire year without buying any collections. As such the person trying to buy stock should be much more pressed to make purchases and will respond to less interesting collections that I simply ignore. I just wait for the hidden gems that come in through my own forum and personal contacts or that fly under the radar due to an especially poor description (got one where the seller showed his Squee’s Toy, but not his Mox Emerald…).

Pi, that is a very sound and useful apprach. Thanks.

Having passed that check I try to get information on the time period the cards are from. Some blocks simply have more expensive cards than others. Obviously, if they’ve listed cards I’ll check on those to. When they played may also be a decent indication of what is valuable to their mind, for example Jester’s Cap and Shivan Dragon were very valuable back in the day. I may also consider whether I would be interested in bulk from that time period from my own collection (I am low on Alliances cards for example).

If things still look interesting I will arrange to meet them. If it’s a small collection I just go through the cards and separate out the high(er) value stuff while explaining to them that that’s mostly what I’ll be basing the value on. If an offer hasn’t yet been made I’ll make it at this point. If, based on the information available, I have already made an offer I am instead just checking if the cards I knew about are present and if so I hand over the money and will inspect the rest later (no need to waste their time or let them see me get excited over hidden gems).

When I get home I will do a more thorough review of the cards.

I don’t often buy collections, maybe 1-2/year, and I tend to go after the ones that seem to be priced relatively low. Every time I met up with a seller I’ve gotten a deal on the collection. Most of the time when I respond to a collection online it results in a deal too, though sometimes it turns out it’s not worth my time or that they are just trying to get a feel for what their cards are worth.

I could have offered him anything and I think he would have taken it. I sat with him in Denny’s for four hours and pulled out everything over $10 and offered him about 75% retail value on the collection. Paid $3,500 and will happily move his collection for a 1.5-2K profit without being a scumbag.

Part of me has a little regret. I could have paid $1,000 and made a ton of money for myself. But I know I did the right thing. Now I’m learning how to buylist bulk ><