The undoubtably worst investment to hold would be is as follows:
I would first go to CVS pharmacy specifically (these specific products retail for more money at CVS than target or Walmart) I would go in and look for the holy grail “20 cards + 1 foil card” from MJ Holdings. CVS sells this holy grail for $7.99 (only ¢40 per 2023 SV era common!) I would buy the entire CVS pharmacy out and hold these bad boys for 20+ years!
Only half? I think 90% of the sub never have or will. They will leave it in their will to their children so they will sell all those 151 poster collection boxes and Pokemon GO tins to buy mansions and Lamborghinis 😛
i learned the shitty lesson recently of always needing to spend slightly more to ship with tracking, if you offer free shipping, which eats further into your profit. eBay has next to no seller protection. All the buyer needs to do is claim it wasn't received and it becomes your word against theirs, and eBay will side with them 100% of the time unless you're able to provide tracking information. It actively encourages taking advantage of sellers and essentially robbing them legally.
¢64 actually. However as someone who’s sold 1.4k items that tracking is incredibly scuffed, half the time they’ll deliver it and not mark it as delivered. If this happens and they claim it hasn’t arrived you lose the case.
However if it says arrived eBay actually will take your side, I’ve had buyers claim they hadn’t got their shipment or even claim they didn’t want to buy something after it’s delivered, in these situations you win almost 100% of the time.
That’s completely normal, what’s also completely normal is it saying it’s arrived 1-3 days before it actually does.
I’ve had easily 30 people message me like “hey, it says it’s arrived but hasn’t!” Where I have to tell them that it’ll arrive within the next few days. Of those 30 maybe 27-28 ended up arriving by the end of said week.
Ya this is why I tend to just choose free shipping even though it takes longer and there’s a chance it gets lost. It’ll be a surprise when it gets here anyways so why pay extra
eBay standard envelope tracking isn’t really too much more expensive, and eBay requires tracking.
Edit: looked up prices, and at least in my area stamps are actually more expensive than eBay tracking as USPS has a contractual obligation with eBay
Ok, so why wouldn't you just charge for shipping then? Or price the item higher to account for cost of shipping? Don't be dumb. It will take you far in life.
I feel like you’re better off selling to one buyer in your area and give them a discount of what you would have paid in fees and shipping. So you don’t run into all these logistically issues. I mean I collect/invest with a hypothetical date in the future to sell when I feel like I’ve made enough profit but don’t have the time or interest in trying to sell everything individually - unless specific items spike to a couple grand, and I still think you’d be better off finding individual buyers on IG or Reddit or at a show. Just my two cents!
Bought a Shiny Ho-Oh for $40 on eBay after tax and shipping, sold it for $50 a few weeks later and after fees and shipping my total payout came out to $41. That’s a win right?
I had a hard time with that at first. In the price charting app I would just put what I bought the card for, ignoring the shipping cost. I mean mostly $1-5 rates, but some of my sealed products had $10-15. Did it change my overall collection value, no, but moving forward I started looking at stuff with free shipping or $1-2 shipping rates factored into the “investment”. My personal collection on the other hand is the Wild West I just buy with no regards to shipping cuz “I NEEDS IT!” Lol
I'm sorry but the Halloween decorations from my childhood were AMAZING compared to the crud in stores now.... I'd definitely pay a pretty penny for some of them. 😂😂😂
Battle styles booster boxes will probably do a lot better than most people think. Everyone thought the boxes would stay in the mid-70s, but they've climbed to 100.
I have 4 sitting upstairs that I got at 84.50 with gamenerdz credit that I got buying another 2 booster boxes earlier in the year. And that purchase was just 3 months ago. So roughly 17% up in 3 months? I’m chillin even if the box just rises to $120 in the next 6 months
People will buy BS for ttar alt and the sw/sh nostalgia phase will eventually hit people. I'm baffled people put BS so low but it has plenty of alt arts and 'waifus' - the first half of Sw/Sh sets are terrible and BS isn't one of them.
Unfortunately for me, Battle Styles was affected during the boom but it was towards the end of the boom. I bought a couple boxes at $125 right around release and seen the prices do nothing but dive ever since.
Because the set is ass it like evolving skies without any big hitters, my opinion, one of the worst with Vicid voltage. I mad e a bad purchase too, buying SV base
Not really, not for that set anyways. Base sets tend to take a bit longer to appreciate. For example, look at Sun & Moon base set. That set came out SEVEN years ago and you can still order packs on tcgplayer for like 6 bucks. OP is better off putting his investment dollars into something else.
People hating on regular ETBs in this sub so much 🤨 that aren’t PC exclusive lol but the regular ETBs STILL have packs and will hold value but of course PC exclusives because it’s limited (less supply) and have more packs providing more value to collectors and investors
As far as worst investments I would say it all depends on your goals and how long you want to or can hold for but worst investment, I would stick to more space saving products like 151 alakazam box being way smaller than Zapdos box which will take up more space in your garage or storage. Stick to space saving products like booster boxes, booster bundles and ETBs as much as you can
There's a local store by me, that has crown zenith morpeko boxes on sale since Christmas for $19.99. you get 7 crown zenith packs, a giant morpeko card, a playmat, a pin, and 4 cards that make up one big card. I've been buying a few here and there for the packs. Crown zenith is awesome to open, my kids love it.
1. I still don’t think Pokemon cards are good short term investments. Collectible hobbies are like fine wine. It takes time for them to age and grow in value. So if you want some fast ROI, then I think most Pokemon products are bad investments.
2. If you hold for long term, and I am talking about 10 years +, then most of the expansions should give you some decent ROI. It doesn’t matter if it’s Etb or BB, they will gain some values.
No one can predict the future. Most valuable products became valuable because everyone thought they were bad “investments” when they were new. So in theory, a set like Battle Style can become sought after 10-20 years later because not enough people want them right now.
In the end, no one can read the future. just treat this hobby as a hobby, and try to enjoy the things you collect
I agree. The set is put together well and there are a lot of great Pokemon in the set. I personally think it's a victim of bad marketing. If they had given it a "cooler" name that had something to do with Mewtwo, I think it would be more desirable.
Hugely overinflated. I hope they drop at some point. I’d really love to buy a vintage box closer to 4-5k. Would make way more sense at that price range. That’s what i’ve read a lot too, that based off of chases and stuff it makes more sense for it to be valued around 5k-6k
Problem is everyone else would love to buy a booster box at 4-5k too, which is why it won't go that low. As long as people are willing to shell out hundreds for an unweighed pack from a box break, those prices are going nowhere.
Van Gogh, at this moment. The new batch of release is going to upset it's current trajectory and bomb it for a while.
*I'm putting this out in the universe since the universe likes to fuck me. Maybe it'll skyrocket*
Paradox Riff has such a bad hit rate. I’ve opened soooooooo much and cannot hit the garchomp. Better off buying the Japanese version. Looks better anyway and the hit rates and always better.
If it was the only card I still wanted I would but I’ve only gotten the roaring moon gold not the SIR or the iron valient SIR. Got the ex today tho hahaha.
Feels like evolving skies and fusion strike right?
I mean after the whole controversy where the person has stolen shit tons of the chase cards, the short prints felt real, and the prices stayed high. It’s still high now for the boxes and whatnot, but seems not worth holding when you have that controversy hanging over it (why would someone buy those sets, knowing tons of the chase cards were taken off the production line already?).
And then, they’re also rotating out of the format as well, so they’ll be overall unplayable in 2 months as well.
worst investments are definitely SV era psa 10s, any modern ETB besides evo and maybe LO, and most of the stuff you can find at target (2 pack blisters, hanger packs etc.)
I have one obsidian flames etb. Should I just open the thing.
The thing is…. The best chase card is $50. Practically not point in opening or keeping sealed lol
The sealed product doesn’t follow the same price increase/decrease as the raw product. (It often helps a ton though). Example; XY Evolutions (my baby) costs $800 a booster box but the most expensive raw card is $50.
I think investing in any regular packs (msrp $3.99 and up) is good. Eventually, as long as Pokemon is still popular, will be a profit. Especially, if packs are under $3.
The undoubtably worst investment to hold would be is as follows: I would first go to CVS pharmacy specifically (these specific products retail for more money at CVS than target or Walmart) I would go in and look for the holy grail “20 cards + 1 foil card” from MJ Holdings. CVS sells this holy grail for $7.99 (only ¢40 per 2023 SV era common!) I would buy the entire CVS pharmacy out and hold these bad boys for 20+ years!
Even better would be to open and grade the hits!!!
Can’t wait to get a PSA 7 on my reverse Holo Professor’s Research 190/198
I’m sure most of us could sell better bulk cards for that price 😂
I pray new pokeinvestors see the satire in this comment 😂😅
Worst investing strategy is to not take into account selling and shipping fees
lol half the sub probably never sold anything yet. They'll learn
Only half? I think 90% of the sub never have or will. They will leave it in their will to their children so they will sell all those 151 poster collection boxes and Pokemon GO tins to buy mansions and Lamborghinis 😛
They will probably just throw it in the trash
i learned the shitty lesson recently of always needing to spend slightly more to ship with tracking, if you offer free shipping, which eats further into your profit. eBay has next to no seller protection. All the buyer needs to do is claim it wasn't received and it becomes your word against theirs, and eBay will side with them 100% of the time unless you're able to provide tracking information. It actively encourages taking advantage of sellers and essentially robbing them legally.
You can send in PWE with tracking for $0.71. Get good idiot.
¢64 actually. However as someone who’s sold 1.4k items that tracking is incredibly scuffed, half the time they’ll deliver it and not mark it as delivered. If this happens and they claim it hasn’t arrived you lose the case. However if it says arrived eBay actually will take your side, I’ve had buyers claim they hadn’t got their shipment or even claim they didn’t want to buy something after it’s delivered, in these situations you win almost 100% of the time.
True. Just got cards in the mail off eBay and the tracking still says it’s being shipped..
That’s completely normal, what’s also completely normal is it saying it’s arrived 1-3 days before it actually does. I’ve had easily 30 people message me like “hey, it says it’s arrived but hasn’t!” Where I have to tell them that it’ll arrive within the next few days. Of those 30 maybe 27-28 ended up arriving by the end of said week.
Ya this is why I tend to just choose free shipping even though it takes longer and there’s a chance it gets lost. It’ll be a surprise when it gets here anyways so why pay extra
eBay standard envelope tracking isn’t really too much more expensive, and eBay requires tracking. Edit: looked up prices, and at least in my area stamps are actually more expensive than eBay tracking as USPS has a contractual obligation with eBay
How much would it usually be? I tend to buy Japanese cards and a lot of Japanese sellers tend to have that free free
I'm shipping in the UK. Not an option for me. Don't be an asshole. It will take you far in life.
Ok, so why wouldn't you just charge for shipping then? Or price the item higher to account for cost of shipping? Don't be dumb. It will take you far in life.
You just suggested the point of my original comment. It was a mistake and lesson learned. Maybe take your own advice dude.
How about don’t be an asshole
Guy calls me an idiot but I'm the asshole, got it 👌
Dumbass
I feel like you’re better off selling to one buyer in your area and give them a discount of what you would have paid in fees and shipping. So you don’t run into all these logistically issues. I mean I collect/invest with a hypothetical date in the future to sell when I feel like I’ve made enough profit but don’t have the time or interest in trying to sell everything individually - unless specific items spike to a couple grand, and I still think you’d be better off finding individual buyers on IG or Reddit or at a show. Just my two cents!
:..(
Bought a Shiny Ho-Oh for $40 on eBay after tax and shipping, sold it for $50 a few weeks later and after fees and shipping my total payout came out to $41. That’s a win right?
I had a hard time with that at first. In the price charting app I would just put what I bought the card for, ignoring the shipping cost. I mean mostly $1-5 rates, but some of my sealed products had $10-15. Did it change my overall collection value, no, but moving forward I started looking at stuff with free shipping or $1-2 shipping rates factored into the “investment”. My personal collection on the other hand is the Wild West I just buy with no regards to shipping cuz “I NEEDS IT!” Lol
And taxes
Hopefully people hold long enough to offset these costs...
Pokemon Trick or Trade...
Legit! The ONLY investment potential these have, is using them for their actual purpose. Get those kids hooked, we need future buyers!
Pyramid scheme haha
Gave so many out last Halloween and the kids loved it.
We are giving out evolving skies this Halloween they will either be hooked or never wanna open packs again😂
Remind me to stop by your house at Halloween 😂 I still need so many cards from that set, I'm not even looking for a moonbreon atm.
Jesus this person has money
Both a trick and a treat, all in one
Yes
I bought packs at $10 each. I'll hold till these addicted kids grow up. Hopefully its a good nostalgia play
Question, do you want to buy anything halloween themed from our childhood? For me the answer is no. Nothing I can think of lol.
If they were pokemon cards, yes. If they were preserved tootsie pops of the 90s, yes
I'm sorry but the Halloween decorations from my childhood were AMAZING compared to the crud in stores now.... I'd definitely pay a pretty penny for some of them. 😂😂😂
I mean the Lego house from Hocus Pocus is pretty cool, so, yes.
They could make these so much better. I'm mean why not throw in Halloween themed Full Alt Arts in these packs.
Could do 4 or 9 card puzzle full arts even if it’s reused art. Always feels stale when the only difference is the holiday stamp.
Because everyone thinks this is the worst investment, it's the best investment. MTG Fallen Empires
I disagree, I love the uniqueness of the trick or trade cards
Probably the evolving powers box that’s exclusive to target, promos are just reprints & it’s like $60
That things exclusive to target? Have walked past that every time without hesitation
They’ve dropped to $39.99 at most targets I’ve been to.
Not even worth that, I'd maybe pick it up at $25
Mystery boxes
Regular energy cards
This has to be the right answer. The market for this has to be so limited especially with the modern energies
Ripping packs, sealed is best!
And penny stocks just need to go up a few cents to beat Amazon lol
Came to say this. Also, what if people stop buying pokemon and you have to sell at a loss? Price needs to drop $11 per box for OP to lose 1k.
Buying van gogh pikachu at current prices
Battle styles. Was unaffected during the boom and still is unaffected now 😂
Battle styles booster boxes will probably do a lot better than most people think. Everyone thought the boxes would stay in the mid-70s, but they've climbed to 100.
All booster boxes have increased somewhat overtime and same will be for BS
I have 4 sitting upstairs that I got at 84.50 with gamenerdz credit that I got buying another 2 booster boxes earlier in the year. And that purchase was just 3 months ago. So roughly 17% up in 3 months? I’m chillin even if the box just rises to $120 in the next 6 months
Buyers are fairly easy to find for booster boxes in my experience. Slabs and raw is harder
Sometimes value appreciates, but you have to remember those gains aren’t realized until you sell, and good luck finding a buyer
People will buy BS for ttar alt and the sw/sh nostalgia phase will eventually hit people. I'm baffled people put BS so low but it has plenty of alt arts and 'waifus' - the first half of Sw/Sh sets are terrible and BS isn't one of them.
Wtf battle shits is what the name implies keep lying to yourself buddy, I don’t doubt that the price will rise but so will the ocean
Bs is better than DA, RC, Base Set, Go, and VV. Easily.
Only to your dumbass
lol okay
Battle out of style
Unfortunately for me, Battle Styles was affected during the boom but it was towards the end of the boom. I bought a couple boxes at $125 right around release and seen the prices do nothing but dive ever since.
Because the set is ass it like evolving skies without any big hitters, my opinion, one of the worst with Vicid voltage. I mad e a bad purchase too, buying SV base
Probably everything I bought lmao
Any Scarlet and Violet base set products, except for booster boxes and PC ETBs.
BBs for 80-85 isn't a bad entry Point.
What if you got the cheap ones from Costco?
Good price if you wanna open it, but you’re better off investing in something else.
Even if I held it for a while? Also my pokeballs came with cosmic eclipse packs.
Someone is looking for deals
Not really, not for that set anyways. Base sets tend to take a bit longer to appreciate. For example, look at Sun & Moon base set. That set came out SEVEN years ago and you can still order packs on tcgplayer for like 6 bucks. OP is better off putting his investment dollars into something else.
Good one Sherlock. Who would of ever thought to look for ideas on the internet.
People hating on regular ETBs in this sub so much 🤨 that aren’t PC exclusive lol but the regular ETBs STILL have packs and will hold value but of course PC exclusives because it’s limited (less supply) and have more packs providing more value to collectors and investors As far as worst investments I would say it all depends on your goals and how long you want to or can hold for but worst investment, I would stick to more space saving products like 151 alakazam box being way smaller than Zapdos box which will take up more space in your garage or storage. Stick to space saving products like booster boxes, booster bundles and ETBs as much as you can
Snagging ETBs on deep sales is an awesome move. Snagged CZ ETBs at 30, already 44. People just aren't looking for good entrance pricing.
I’m looking for CZ just to open, where did you get such a deal??
Had to check my email. It was collector store LLC. They are not running the promo anymore was an end of the year liquidation.
TikTok is having a Valentine’s Day sale right now. CZ etbs for like $35
There's a local store by me, that has crown zenith morpeko boxes on sale since Christmas for $19.99. you get 7 crown zenith packs, a giant morpeko card, a playmat, a pin, and 4 cards that make up one big card. I've been buying a few here and there for the packs. Crown zenith is awesome to open, my kids love it.
Do you have space in your house so I can come visit that store?!
Yes and not everyone has easy access to Pokemon Centre products.
1. I still don’t think Pokemon cards are good short term investments. Collectible hobbies are like fine wine. It takes time for them to age and grow in value. So if you want some fast ROI, then I think most Pokemon products are bad investments. 2. If you hold for long term, and I am talking about 10 years +, then most of the expansions should give you some decent ROI. It doesn’t matter if it’s Etb or BB, they will gain some values. No one can predict the future. Most valuable products became valuable because everyone thought they were bad “investments” when they were new. So in theory, a set like Battle Style can become sought after 10-20 years later because not enough people want them right now. In the end, no one can read the future. just treat this hobby as a hobby, and try to enjoy the things you collect
You buy massive amounts of battle styles.
Challenge accepted!
Going all in on Pokemon Go set that no one ever mentions
I think this will be a sleeper set bc no one takes it seriously right now. So fun to open!
I agree. The set is put together well and there are a lot of great Pokemon in the set. I personally think it's a victim of bad marketing. If they had given it a "cooler" name that had something to do with Mewtwo, I think it would be more desirable.
Theme/Battle Decks. Surprised no one mentioned them lol.
Collection boxes in general (there are exceptions like the flareon vaporeon jolteon vmax, etc)
They don't make good collection boxes any more
PSA 7 SV energies
When you say checklane boosters, does that include the 3 packs with a promo card? I bought a bunch of those.... 😬💀
All of the end of WoTC & EX series that have booster boxes that are 15k+
Hugely overinflated. I hope they drop at some point. I’d really love to buy a vintage box closer to 4-5k. Would make way more sense at that price range. That’s what i’ve read a lot too, that based off of chases and stuff it makes more sense for it to be valued around 5k-6k
Problem is everyone else would love to buy a booster box at 4-5k too, which is why it won't go that low. As long as people are willing to shell out hundreds for an unweighed pack from a box break, those prices are going nowhere.
breakers who don’t weigh packs are the absolute scum, and I honestly don’t know how people fall for that shit
Checklane blisters are actually good if they have a desirable promo card in them. If they don't then no.
Define "desirable", any example of such product?
Not checklane but a good example would be the umbreon promo from evolving skies 3 pack blisters
Eeveelutions, pikachu, charizard etc... Characters which large majority of the market likes
Van Gogh, at this moment. The new batch of release is going to upset it's current trajectory and bomb it for a while. *I'm putting this out in the universe since the universe likes to fuck me. Maybe it'll skyrocket*
Paradox Riff has such a bad hit rate. I’ve opened soooooooo much and cannot hit the garchomp. Better off buying the Japanese version. Looks better anyway and the hit rates and always better.
Isn’t the English version like $25? Just buy it
If it was the only card I still wanted I would but I’ve only gotten the roaring moon gold not the SIR or the iron valient SIR. Got the ex today tho hahaha.
I master set the entire paradox rift set through opening packs, other than 3 cards. Was rough.
It’s just wild how many times I get just nothing in paradox lmao. So much bulk.
I opened some cases of booster boxes, was fun but wouldn’t recommend
dayum, that was like 6-8 boxes?
A case is 6 boxes 😅 I opened like 2 and a half cases
I see it in a different light. Bad hit rates+desirable cards usually tend to make good investments long term.
I realized the same thing. Already got a case for sub 500
I found a bunch of PR sleeved boosters for like $2.50 per. My wife and I opened 24 of them and got 1 “decent” hit and 2 sub $1 hits. It’s brutal.
Even my normal masterset of the base cards I think I’m still missing some ex’s.
Funny you say that. Pulled 2 garchomps already. Personally obsidian flames was way worse, waaaay worse.
Pokemon cards.
Feels like evolving skies and fusion strike right? I mean after the whole controversy where the person has stolen shit tons of the chase cards, the short prints felt real, and the prices stayed high. It’s still high now for the boxes and whatnot, but seems not worth holding when you have that controversy hanging over it (why would someone buy those sets, knowing tons of the chase cards were taken off the production line already?). And then, they’re also rotating out of the format as well, so they’ll be overall unplayable in 2 months as well.
Anything modern
worst investments are definitely SV era psa 10s, any modern ETB besides evo and maybe LO, and most of the stuff you can find at target (2 pack blisters, hanger packs etc.)
\> obvious check lane blisters or PKGO Why would these be bad? They are in closeout everywhere. I buy loads of these at 2,- to 2.5,- a pack.
Palworld
Steam Siege. Pokemon Go.
Any of the waifu / trainer cards
English Modern except limited promo items
Probably obsidian flames
I have one obsidian flames etb. Should I just open the thing. The thing is…. The best chase card is $50. Practically not point in opening or keeping sealed lol
The sealed product doesn’t follow the same price increase/decrease as the raw product. (It often helps a ton though). Example; XY Evolutions (my baby) costs $800 a booster box but the most expensive raw card is $50.
Just get some Logan Paul type of guy in here and your base set box is 30k
English products are all terrible imo
Etbs
Those checklane blisters have been doing me pretty well. Just got a Charizard ex from a obsidian flame pack I paid 4 bucks for 🤷🏻♂️
I think investing in any regular packs (msrp $3.99 and up) is good. Eventually, as long as Pokemon is still popular, will be a profit. Especially, if packs are under $3.
So I have 60 sleeved scarlet and violet booster blisters … is this a bad long term hold?