@D-Rog Pretty lengthy post…hang with me lol.
This/these were from a $1 a book garage sale I, by chance, happened upon last summer. I believe I posted about on here at the time.
Hands down the best comic find/“in the wild” find of my lifetime.
It was all modern however, so I can’t exaggerate or say I found things like Hulk 181, but for what it was…just unbelievable. I would say there were about 40-50 long boxes of comics. Every book…absolutely perfect, near mint or better, bagged and boarded. I would say books from about 2000 on, but there were some varied books mixed in that were definitely older/80’s. Every book was a buck.
I happened to get there first thing in the morning. I was first to the sale. As the boxes were all in order/alphabetized, I just started at the beginning (but started with Marvel as all of DC and independent were in another area of the garage and driveway. Within the first minute I knew I may have gotten lucky as books you usually don’t see…were there (again, in terms of modern stuff).
The thing is…people began showing up and I started getting stressed out. One of the first people to show up completely dismissed it all saying he hated “modern junk”. Regardless, as time progressed others showed up and it became a bit of a frenzy. There was no way it made sense to ping pong ball so I just kept going in order as fast as I could while trying to sort of “basketball block out” areas of about 3 long boxes as I went. I was about to the "M"s by the time others went got in there and I knew I had done a decent job of already yanking books prior.
I know we all love spec and there are countless opinions on it, but this type of situation is where each of you/your posts/insight/advice, and this site really can make a difference. It was a situation in which having lists, having your phone just really didn’t work out. I didn’t have time to sit and look up books, check ebay, check “key collector” (GASP)…I had to work off memory, varied runs, things I knew were hot, covers I just knew I had seen someplace. Honestly, it was mentally (and to a degree physically) exhausting.
I, to this day, kick myself for not knowing “everything”. There are many books, artists, covers I just am not well versed in. It is pretty tough to know “every key”. I was proud of how I did, but looking back I know there were some great things I missed. There were a few long boxes of Star Wars comics and another couple of Dark Horse stuff…I was able to grab things like Hellboys first and his first mini series but I completely blew it on Clone Wars and Star Wars Tales books that I know were there. The majority of indy stuff I didn’t get to, but I was able to hit the Spawn box right away as I’m a fan and knew to get into that quickly. I also would grab varied runs/story lines I had always wanted to read and for a buck…why not.
In the end, I bought $150 worth of books…every single one of them was a key (or at least part of a key run or books that are really cool). Everyone was at minimum near mint.
Ultimately, I did talk to the seller. He was an incredibly nice guy. He has collected comics his entire life. He loves all of them, but prefers to focus on older stuff. He helped out from time to time at a local comic shop and essentially took payment in books (which is why there were so many variants in this sale). He was moving and just needed them gone. I sensed money was less an issue than space. I have talked to him since and it sounds like at some point he will sell again. I don’t bug him too much, but have checked in. I really thanked him profusely as he really improved my collection. I kept all of them in a separate box just so I could grade them/keep the collection I bought from him intact.
The other funny thing is he even had small promo things inserted behind the boards in many cases. Like the annihilation poster, or Avengers vs Xmen promo cards.
At any rate, sorry for long post…thought you all may enjoy hearing it.
