Price Guide Accuracy

[tkusina]

Of the two price guides i know exist (VG Collector and VG Trader), they both seem to be very out of touch with the prices i come across.

For example, Ninja Gaiden Trilogy CIB is listed in VG collector for $45 but if you look on Ebay, Amazon, numerous vg forums (nintendoage, digit press, gametrader) or even local brick and mortar stores i have not seen one sold for under $100 and most are in bad condition. Thats a big difference from just being off a few dollars.

This is only one example but i find the price guides somewhat of a hindrance when making purchasing decisions because i find it does not accurately reflect what the going price is.

Do you guys think this is just from the fact that the magazines are small and to keep up on pricing is rather difficult?

On the flip side do you use the price guides to set prices when selling or are you using another source? i would love to hear from some sellers on ebay and other outlets on how you go about setting your pricing.

[jeffg]

the guides are good for cart prices as there is usually enough sales going on ebay to be pretty accurate. I think when it comes to complete games for NES, SNES, Atari, in the harder to find games they aren't accurate as there isn't enough sales each month.

Especially when you are talking about some Gameboy games too, some rarely ever come up for sale. I had F1 Pole Position complete for the Gameboy, which the guides dont' really have a good price on. I sold it on ebay for $333.

So I think it is hard on complete games that it is tough to get good price guides other than checking ebay completed auctions, amazon seems to be kind of high, but you get alot of people who buy on there instead of messing with bidding, etc.

[betamax001]

Amazon marketplace will gouge and gouge prices. Once I saw a copy of I beleive Vagrant Story that was i think a GH version that was open but not played for 2000 dollars. Black Label in Shrinkwrap was only like 120...

[Poofta!]

price guides are worthless. video game collecting has only a moderately constant price atmosphere, usually prices vary from buyer,seller, time of day, day of the week, month of the year and hell, even recent news. its much like the stock market, with less spikes. most collectors dont use guides, and after youve been in the hobby long enough, and seen enough stuff come up for sale etc, you develop a sense for it and just know the prices. add into this that on ebay, it only takes 2 potential, interested and well-off buyers to spike a game in value immediately. ive had bid wars for something that wouldve sold for 10$ had one of us not been involved sky rocket to almost 90$ (one time it ended up that it showed up on ebay again in 6 months and sold for i believe it was 70). but otherwise very few, if anyone would pay more than 20$ for the item. (it was a rare, little known edition of a popular pc rpg)

so do yourself a favor, ignore price guides. if an item interests you, do your research and check it every week or so, you will quickly get the feel for it. likewise flip out your phone and check ebay/amazon for the going rate of that game you find at the local store that youre 99% sure goes for 2x the price (trust me, often it doesnt).

ive had experiences that there was a particular game i wanted (plus i only collect M-CIB items, making the matter worse) that i was prepared to pay 20-30 for, but after looking and waiting for it to pop up ANYWHERE for over a year, the instant it hit light, i knew it was my chance and ended up paying 90$ for it.

[RASK1904]

There not bad for common games. But rarer stuff is worth what someone will pay. Coff coff Magical Chase Coff. But when you go to sell them on Ebay they tell you average starting price and average selling price. Even a chicken could sell stuff. Hmm....

[tkusina]

it only takes 2 potential, interested and well-off buyers to spike a game in value immediately. ive had bid wars for something that wouldve sold for 10$ had one of us not been involved sky rocket to almost 90$ (one time it ended up that it showed up on ebay again in 6 months and sold for i believe it was 70). but otherwise very few, if anyone would pay more than 20$ for the item. (it was a rare, little known edition of a popular pc rpg)

For the longest time Luciannes Quest could be had on ebay for around $50-70. I put off buying it because it was not a high want at the time.

I ended bidding on a complete copy that ended up selling for $175.00 that i lost. From that point on, which was a little over a year ago, you couldnt find that game for under $125 anywhere. I remember offering a couple people on the boards here like $100 for a beat up copy and they declined.

Anyways, i picked up complete absolutely mint copy for $88 on ebay just last week.

So i see what your saying about the spikes. The volatility in the video game market is huge i am starting to see.

[Poofta!]

For the longest time Luciannes Quest could be had on ebay for around $50-70. I put off buying it because it was not a high want at the time.

I ended bidding on a complete copy that ended up selling for $175.00 that i lost. From that point on, which was a little over a year ago, you couldnt find that game for under $125 anywhere. I remember offering a couple people on the boards here like $100 for a beat up copy and they declined.

Anyways, i picked up complete absolutely mint copy for $88 on ebay just last week.

So i see what your saying about the spikes. The volatility in the video game market is huge i am starting to see.

cool man. im curious, was it the 3d0 or saturn version? or was the saturn version only in japan (sorcery something, i forget)? how is the game btw?

this leads me to a good advice, for anyone, never buy games as investments. first of all, they grow too slow. secondly they almost never grow. youre better off putting it into a CD or even the stock market lol. only buy games cause they mean something to you (to collect) or because you actually want to explore/discover/play the game. and only pay what YOU feel comfortable with paying for it, and never look back. =] (also, dont wait, if you want it, and its 50$, and you dont mind paying 50$, just buy it, you dont want to find yourself in the position tkusina did haha -- new games not including, of course - those always fall)

[tkusina]

cool man. im curious, was it the 3d0 or saturn version? or was the saturn version only in japan (sorcery something, i forget)? how is the game btw?

3DO with long box. I used to play this back in the day. I used to rent it from the video store and only got about half way through.

I havent fired it up yet but looking forward to finishing it.

[Icarus Moonsight]

It's just an objective guide line. They draw upon data from multiple sources and find a mean or trending range within that. You still have to run purchases, sales and swaps through your individual self check value system along with your individual experiences... These things are supposed to help in aiding you making a decision in a buy, sell or trade situation... Not make your mind up for you. They are not definitive, always, something is worth what you can get, or have to give, for it. And that is case by case and instance by instance. A monthly updated mean can never 100% accurately depict the outcome of all these transactions. It's a free market out there, literally. It's just a model, but on the whole, it works.

What they are actually doing, is they are doing the leg work entailed in looking up the value. They are selling you the results of that work in print form. If you want day by day specifics, you are still going to have to keep up yourself. Unless you want to pay big money for hourly updated game prices across all platforms. It would be expensive because the demand for such a service is so abysmally low and the work volume involved is so high. A small pool of people would have to employ a very large pool of people to do this. And a positive return is akin to impossible. They are offering you a fair service for a fair price. They are not worthless unless you want to keep objective printed guidelines out of your value system. And that is only another valid choice, just like using the guide in the manner up above.

Poofta, regarding games as an investment, I wholeheartedly concur. If you want something tangible to store your cash in, silver/gold and other precious metals and gems (no diamonds, they are super-inflated cartelized plague, avoid them as such, created diamonds are better dollar for dollar -- it's only compressed carbon after all) are the longest lasting assets that retain value and negate inflation. That's a store, not an investment. Stores are lower risk than investment, but stores are not intended to make wealth, just preserve it (cash money is riskier, because it is susceptible to inflation, where material stores are fairly immune). Investment varies in risk, but usually, risk = reward. Higher risk for higher return, lower risk for lower return. Investment takes particular knowledge in each different case, so it's dependent on the individual which options are best for them. I can assure you, games may make some money, but it acts as a store rather than an investment. And it's a poor storage medium at that. Inflation will eat it up fast. All it takes is time.

[mobiusclimber]

But I'm always glad that I collect games b/c I know if I ever need money, I need only sell off part of my collection. And since I never pay high prices on my own stuff, I know that I'll probably be making a little profit if/when I have to sell stuff off.

I've never found price guides to be very valuable. They tend to pretty much always be off, by a LOT. But at this point, I kinda know the value on most games, and if I don't, I can always look up completed auctions on Ebay or (if it's something I only want to flip) look up the price on Amazon. Regardless, I always make sure I'm not paying "full price" for any game I purchase.

[Icarus Moonsight]

I get coin silver whenever I can at face value too (vs the silver by weight value). But, that's the subjective rub. Internal subjective value can be higher to a person in relation to their items than the broad external market value or even compared to another person's internal subjective calculus. In those cases, the person rarely sells as the result. Common term, sentimental or nostalgic value, either is purely subjective. It's when the objective value at large overtakes a persons subjective value level that you get people outwardly attempting to sell and capitalize on the disparity of value between the market and them self. It's all those subjective values in play that the objective value is derived from.

Think about moderately rare games that routinely sell for cheap, vs near-common-as-dirt games that sell for similar or slightly higher prices because they are desired for an attribute other than their scarcity. It's all linked up. The objective price is just a mean of all the subjective stuff going on even with objective factors like rarity that do come into play, but are not key to a games value.

[chrisbid]

they are useful in finding out general value relative to other games. its nice to go through a collection and find out game x that you purchased in a cheap bundle, is actually fairly valueable

if the magazines were to ever take off in a big way, more dealers would base their prices off of the guide (like baseball cards in their late 80's heyday)

i also think the prices are based off of actual sales rather than marked prices. the reason you see uber expensive stuff on amazon is because it is too expensive and likely wont sell at that price point. the cheaper copies have already been sold. if amazon had a previous sale lookup tool, the guide prices may appear more accurate

[tkusina]

My question regarding the guides is related to whether they are useful at all given that they seem to me out of touch, not whether the pricing is fair.

To me the guide, just like any guide in any industry servers as a tool on top of other things like my knowledge of the market, other website resources, video games web sites in determining a typical going price.

Perhaps it is not fair to single out the price guides as a dependable tool as it is to question the volatility of the video game market.

[mobiusclimber]

i also think the prices are based off of actual sales rather than marked prices. the reason you see uber expensive stuff on amazon is because it is too expensive and likely wont sell at that price point. the cheaper copies have already been sold. if amazon had a previous sale lookup tool, the guide prices may appear more accurate

This is only true to a certain extent. If you see a game or guide (or whatever) listed on Amazon with only a handful of sale listings, then the price is usually suspect. I've even fallen for it a few times until I learned how to figure out whether it was the actual going rate on Ama or just a false sign of dealer greed. However, games DO tend to sell for $10+ more on Ama than they do on FeePay. Their fees are also higher, tho. It's an even better place to sell if you want to list stuff (like imports) that you know you'll likely be the only person listing. (You have to pay for this privilege, tho, to the tune of $40 a month.)

If I'm looking to trade games, I go by a mix of Amazon and FeePay. If I'm selling on forums or something, I deduct fees from the average FeePay sale of the item. If I'm looking to buy something to flip, tho, I only really concentrate on the Amazon price (so long as it seems to be accurate). Because that's where I'm going to be selling it.

[darkslime]

Its more useful to look at ebay completed listings than price guides.

For selling on forums, I look at what I would sell it for on ebay, then use this to figure out how much I would make after fees: http://www.rolbe.com/ebay.htm and price it at that.

[Icarus Moonsight]

Trend event markers, overall, are still fairly simple to read and deduce/induce. Drop in prices because of new availability via digital distribution (Ikaruga, Trigger Heart and MvC2 for example of games that have taken hits like this lately). It's the crazy stuff like, two overly wealthy Barbie collectors warring and bidding up a CIB or sealed copy of Barbie for the NES, that really throw a wrench in the works for most people. Those intangibles, are harder to determine without more specific knowledge, so yeah, abberations do occur. You can still figure out, when something weird went down, even if exactly what completely escapes you.