One Touch Holder Investment

Hi all,

I was showing off my Jay Bruce collection to a fellow collector. He looked me straight in the eye and asked why would I have more money invested in one touch holders than the cards that are in them. I told him it's just a hobby and not an investment. I've taken the dollar aspect out of the hobby on my end of it. Of course he looked at me like I had two heads.

Do you feel (or know) that you have more money in the holders (pages, sleeves, one touch, snap) than cards in them are worth?

Fordman

I am probably in that boat too especially when it comes to grading cards... I love graded cards even if they are

cards worth only a few bucks....

at current value? yes my adam cowart collection. lol i still buy them when i see them pop up.

One-touches are around $1.20/ea. I'd definitely never have cards under $5 in a one-touch. But, to each their own.

I've got a 1975 Topps PSA 8 set that has quite a few cards worth less than the card price+slabbing fee these days. Back when I built the set, it was about $6 for the cheapest level, and common cards were 25 cents or so. As the populations have increased and 9 become a more appealing target for builders, 8s have fallen and many are selling for $5 or less including shipping.

For raw singles I buy, no, their holders are commensurate with their value. Although I certainly understand the appeal. I put the rarer insert sets and such in thicker lucite and they look great.

I'm with [MENTION=9350]fordman[/MENTION]. It's a hobby, not an investment. All of my standard size Olerud cards are in penny sleeves and toploaders, even common base.

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I've never seen the allure of these or screw downs except PERHAPS your favorite cards.

Personally, the cost, space it takes up, the weight and the thought of putting card worth a few bucks or less doesn't make sense to me.



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I have quite a few autographs that were authenticated by PSA/DNA where the fee was way more than the cost of the actual auto. All were for PC so I don't care.

Look, if you collect Jay Bruce and it's not a common base card(which I doubt you'd put in a one touch anyway), you're probably ok with what you're doing. You normally put valuable cards in one touches. Holders are all about protection. Yes they can be for display but even then, you're kinda protecting them while on display so there's no shame in it. I keep expensive pc cards in one touches. Everything else is in toploaders. Except base, which is in a penny sleeve. Kinda hard to find a card worth less than a penny.

olerud363 said:

I'm with [MENTION=9350]fordman[/MENTION]. It's a hobby, not an investment. All of my standard size Olerud cards are in penny sleeves and toploaders, even common base.

Sent from my Android using the Freedom Cardboard app.

Click to expand...

If you're collecting one player, I can see doing toploaders even for base. Honestly, you can get 25 toploaders for $2.00 so really you're paying less than11 cents a card(with the price of a penny sleeve included) to protect them. Not too crazy. Plus, chances are you add new cards(once you've got a sizable collection) very slowly so you aren't buying a case of these protectors every week.

i think thats a pretty crappy thing to say to someone. If you like the look of your nice PC cards in screwdowns or magnetics go for it

What you do with your cards that make this hobby enjoyable for you is your choice and I am all for that.


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I would like to keep my cards in nine card pages in a binder as its easy to look at but am always worried about damaging the cards. Anyone know of any pages that are specifically designed to fit toploaders? The four cards ones work, but there is way too much empty space. Thanks

I recently bought an autograph jersey collection that was all low end but every single card was in a magnetic. I paid about .75 a card on average... All were team bagged too so they are all still super clean

Have you guys ever wanted to do PSA / BGS style slabbing of your own cards at home simply for protection purposes, not for the purpose of authenticating or grading?

mrangrydonut said:

Have you guys ever wanted to do PSA / BGS style slabbing of your own cards at home simply for protection purposes, not for the purpose of authenticating or grading?

Click to expand...

Yes. Tell me more

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gogosox40 said:

Yes. Tell me more

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Awesome. I've wanted to protect my cards by slabbing them myself ever since I first saw graded card slabs. I am a mechanical engineer with experience in designing platic parts and sealing plastics. I've long thought about figuring out a way for people to do this at home. I figured this would be a good place to test the waters and see how many people would be up for something like that. If there is a ton of interest I could start working on figuring out a solution.

Do you regularly send cards off to PSA or BGS for protection only?

mrangrydonut said:

Awesome. I've wanted to protect my cards by slabbing them myself ever since I first saw graded card slabs. I am a mechanical engineer with experience in designing platic parts and sealing plastics. I've long thought about figuring out a way for people to do this at home. I figured this would be a good place to test the waters and see how many people would be up for something like that. If there is a ton of interest I could start working on figuring out a solution.

Do you regularly send cards off to PSA or BGS for protection only?

Click to expand...

No not really at all but I wanted to hear your sales pitch.

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gogosox40 said:

No not really at all but I wanted to hear your sales pitch.

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Click to expand...

There's no sales pitch. I've got nothing to sell. I thought that if others also wanted to encapsulate cards at home it could be a fun project.

I decided many years back that all of my autographed cards needed to be in top loaders. There were enough in those "sealed" manufacturer issued cases to go along with it, but I also had some in snap cases, one screw holders, etc as well. I went through and eliminated all of the random cases and just had top loaders or factory sealed cases. As my focus grew to primarily autograph cards and I was picking up a lot, I eventually ran out of top loaders. I remember buying my first case and thinking how much money I was dumping into just cases! I burned through that case in time and bought another, then another. I can't remember how many cases I ultimately bought just for signed cards, but it is more than I want to remember! Prices slowly rose on the holders and eventually I found myself needing another case, but the collection (which I housed in super shoe boxes) was just taking up too much space as well. The price on the top loader case has risen to somewhere around $70-$80 if I remember correctly and I decided that was enough.

I went back through, took every removable case off and left the singles in soft sleeves in the same super shoe boxes. The only cards in rigid holders now are those factory sealed and oversized (50s Topps/Bowman, 89 Bowman, etc). The collection was suddenly much "smaller" and I have 1000s of unused top loaders to use elsewhere as I need to. It is hard not to slide a Willy Mays certified autograph into a top loader but they all get the same treatment, be it Wille Mays or Willie Mays Aikens.