Welcome to our community

Be apart of something great, join today!

$1 Prospect Project

Disclaimer: Links on this page pointing to Amazon, eBay and other sites may include affiliate code. If you click them and make a purchase, we may earn a small commission.

All The Hype

Active member
Joined
Aug 7, 2008
Messages
10,250
Reaction score
0
Location
Indianapolis
I've seen it talked about before and it always sounded fun so I thought I'd give it a try.

The idea is to buy one card for $1 and see what you can turn that into over time.

If you haven't heard of the one red paperclip guy (made 14 trades over a year to go from a red paperclip to a house), it's the same idea. Here's the site for that, pretty interesting story: LINK

I think I'm going to try to keep it to one card at a time because I want to keep it moving. I don't want a situation where I buy three cards and sell one, but hold the others, etc. I want it to be a repetition of single-card buy, hold, sell.

Starting at $1, the hardest part will likely be getting going...because there aren't a whole lot of low value cards that fluctuate in price by very much very quickly. Once I get into values of double digits and beyond, it should be easier to move a little faster.

If there is ever any leftover money after I buy the new card, it will be saved to be available for the next card purchase. For example, if I sell one for $15 and buy the next for $13.50 the remaining $1.50 will be saved until the next time I buy a card, at which time I can use it to help make that purchase.

I will be documenting exactly what cards I trade for/buy, so at the end I will have a chain of cards that links the first dollar card with the final card (whatever that may be).

Seems like a fun idea and I invite anyone who is interested to join me in this little adventure. It's not a competition, it's just for fun. But I think it would be cool if a few people tried this out and then we could share results at the end of the season or something and see how far we've all come.

I'll try to keep a running record of the cards and their prices in this thread for anyone interested in following. Feel free to share any thoughts.



Total Purchases: 2
Current Estimated Value: $3

Card-Price Bought-Price Sold
Randal Grichuk Topps Pro Debut Blue Parallel- $1 - $3
Item #2- $3 - ?
 

braden

New member
Joined
Aug 7, 2008
Messages
2,536
Reaction score
0
I did that a few years back with some hockey cards after snagging a pretty good steal for $2.50. I flipped that card for $25 and then slowly worked my way up, one card at a time. No rookies or anything, just looked for poorly labelled stuff etc at that price range. I'd have to check my spreadsheet but I believe I lost interest around the $400 mark.

All the best to you. The #s get a little fuzzy once you have to start figuring in S&H (buying) and fees (selling) but it's still a cool little project.
 

All The Hype

Active member
Joined
Aug 7, 2008
Messages
10,250
Reaction score
0
Location
Indianapolis
braden said:
I did that a few years back with some hockey cards after snagging a pretty good steal for $2.50. I flipped that card for $25 and then slowly worked my way up, one card at a time. No rookies or anything, just looked for poorly labelled stuff etc at that price range. I'd have to check my spreadsheet but I believe I lost interest around the $400 mark.

All the best to you. The #s get a little fuzzy once you have to start figuring in S&H (buying) and fees (selling) but it's still a cool little project.


Yeah, it helped with the first two purchases that both cards were bought on a site that offered free shipping for orders over $25, so they were both $1 and $3 exactly as tack-ons to some other stuff I ordered. I don't like to cheat the numbers so I'll probably end up going with the money left after fees. Not to mention, they were both pretty good buys considering current market price and I expect to be able to get at least a couple bucks more out of the Trout when it gets here.

Thanks for sharing though, good to hear that someone else has had success doing something like this.
 

imac220

New member
Joined
Aug 14, 2008
Messages
6,828
Reaction score
0
Location
Central PA
I just began this project by starting with a Jamie Garcia Tristar Auto that I picked up in a $.50 box at a show this weekend.

Wish me luck, this should be fun :)
 

All The Hype

Active member
Joined
Aug 7, 2008
Messages
10,250
Reaction score
0
Location
Indianapolis
imac220 said:
I just began this project by starting with a Jamie Garcia Tristar Auto that I picked up in a $.50 box at a show this weekend.

Wish me luck, this should be fun :)

I don't know the value of Garcia cards, but I think it's easiest to get going with a card that you get a deal on. The Grichuk Blue Parallel I started with has consistently sold for at least $3 including shipping, so it was a good place to start for $1.
 

imac220

New member
Joined
Aug 14, 2008
Messages
6,828
Reaction score
0
Location
Central PA
ALL_THE_HYPE said:
imac220 said:
I just began this project by starting with a Jamie Garcia Tristar Auto that I picked up in a $.50 box at a show this weekend.

Wish me luck, this should be fun :)

I don't know the value of Garcia cards, but I think it's easiest to get going with a card that you get a deal on. The Grichuk Blue Parallel I started with has consistently sold for at least $3 including shipping, so it was a good place to start for $1.

Good luck with the Grichuk! I put the Garcia on Ebay last night, and it already has a couple of interested buyers. So we will see! I am hoping to get around $6-8
 

darocker80

New member
Joined
Aug 7, 2008
Messages
15,534
Reaction score
0
Location
Lincecum Land
Damn I wish i tracked my purchases when u bought a lincecum green chrome rc for 1 dollar and sold for 7.70. 8-) (that's a nice bounce ffrom 1 to 7)
 

markakis8

Active member
Joined
Oct 31, 2008
Messages
12,081
Reaction score
2
cool idea. so you sold the blue parallel for $3 dlvd? what is your roll left over with to buy the next card after shipping and fees?
 

WoundedDuck

Active member
Joined
Aug 23, 2008
Messages
2,904
Reaction score
2
Interesting idea guys. While I don't want to do it I'll have to check back in to see how those of you doing this are doing
 

KC37

New member
Joined
Aug 7, 2008
Messages
4,663
Reaction score
0
Location
Massachusetts
I was actually considering the same exact thing, except instead of starting with $1, I found a Bowman Draft base Heyward RC. So, I figure it's all found money instead of a $1 investment. So, if we get a few people doing this, one central thread tracking everyone's progress might be real interesting to follow.
 

All The Hype

Active member
Joined
Aug 7, 2008
Messages
10,250
Reaction score
0
Location
Indianapolis
markakis8 said:
cool idea. so you sold the blue parallel for $3 dlvd? what is your roll left over with to buy the next card after shipping and fees?

I cheated a little bit--The first card was sold as a tack-on to another deal with a bigger card. To get me going so I'm not stuck in the single digits forever, I didn't include shipping for the first one and just put down the price the buyer and I agreed upon.

Once I get passed the point where shipping cost dominates any sort of sale price, I will subtract shipping (and any other fees) from the sale so it will be a more accurate chart of exact value.
 

markakis8

Active member
Joined
Oct 31, 2008
Messages
12,081
Reaction score
2
cool. ill be following. best of luck to you sir.

ALL_THE_HYPE said:
markakis8 said:
cool idea. so you sold the blue parallel for $3 dlvd? what is your roll left over with to buy the next card after shipping and fees?

I cheated a little bit--The first card was sold as a tack-on to another deal with a bigger card. To get me going so I'm not stuck in the single digits forever, I didn't include shipping for the first one and just put down the price the buyer and I agreed upon.

Once I get passed the point where shipping cost dominates any sort of sale price, I will subtract shipping (and any other fees) from the sale so it will be a more accurate chart of exact value.
 

imac220

New member
Joined
Aug 14, 2008
Messages
6,828
Reaction score
0
Location
Central PA
imac220 said:
Jamie Garcia up to 3.25 + 2.99 shipping with a little less than 5 days left :D

Auction ended at 10.36 + Shipping

Nice profit in my book :D , gonna try and get something pretty good!
 

All The Hype

Active member
Joined
Aug 7, 2008
Messages
10,250
Reaction score
0
Location
Indianapolis
imac220 said:
imac220 said:
Jamie Garcia up to 3.25 + 2.99 shipping with a little less than 5 days left :D

Auction ended at 10.36 + Shipping

Nice profit in my book :D , gonna try and get something pretty good!


Nice sale, definitely gives you some room to work with. I'm waiting on my $3 card to come in, should be here this week and I think I will do pretty well on it.
 

imac220

New member
Joined
Aug 14, 2008
Messages
6,828
Reaction score
0
Location
Central PA
ALL_THE_HYPE said:
imac220 said:
imac220 said:
Jamie Garcia up to 3.25 + 2.99 shipping with a little less than 5 days left :D

Auction ended at 10.36 + Shipping

Nice profit in my book :D , gonna try and get something pretty good!


Nice sale, definitely gives you some room to work with. I'm waiting on my $3 card to come in, should be here this week and I think I will do pretty well on it.

What is it?? Or are you gonna kill me, and make me wait till it comes in ;)
 

Members online

Latest posts

Top