Bronkster

Red Hood: not to derail the topic, but where do you get insurance? It's something I've considered and then quickly forget about.

Red Hood

You can check with your homeowners insurance like I have but I complement that with this company's insurance

https://americancollectors.com/insurance/collectibles/

The key here is having your collection organized in a database like CLZ plus reporting additions to it to the insurance. For example, if you add a book over $1000, you need to tell the company about it.

Bronkster

Thank you for the info!

And now we return you to our regularly scheduled complaints about CGC pricing and delays!

movieguru

I think since the pandemic started they increased the number of private signings tenfold and even though they weren't present at any conventions last year, they are likely getting many more submissions than they ever have before. The George Perez signing will likely be in the tens of thousands and many of the other signings are fairly popular as well. The private signings seem to be more important to them than mail-in submissions for blue labels. They don't seem to be in a hurry to have a presence at comic cons any time soon, so they must have found a lucrative niche with the private signings. They also still have some third party companies collecting and witnessing in person signings at cons, so they may not be losing much there. I don't feel comfortable or trust third party companies enough to submit my books through them. Especially when some of these companies are also selling graded signature series books for signings that they were witnessing themselves.

rexinnih

Well I for one have been taking full advantage of the in house signings over the past year and a half.

whotony

I sent 10 books in last week so I guess I’ll see them in about 6 months to a year.

Ill have bout 50 books sealed up, mostly books from the first 50 Amazings and a few others mixed in.

They sure have a scam going on over there with this stuff now.

I dont know how Hood managed to get over 2000 books sealed.
must have taken a decade.

Red Hood

About a decade sounds right. I believe I got my first CGC around 2011. One thing though, is that I've been buying some books already slabbed. One huge issue that has happened over the last 5 years is raw old comic books being restored and then resold without telling the customer about the restorations. Then these books are sent to CGC and the restoration is caught during the grading process and the put a green label to the book instead of a blue one, which decreases immensely the value. Because of this, I tend to buy higher end books already graded unless I get them at a heavily discounted rate.

Bronkster

Looks like CGC will be making it harder for collectors to know what they're getting! CGC is going to stop listing defects on the labels because "members" can simply (ha!) look up the grader's notes online, and CGC is all about eliminating needless redundancy. I used to have a paid membership, but let it lapse since I have no plans to have any books slabbed. And without a PAID membership, you don't get to see the grader's notes! So now if I'm looking at a CGC book - either on Ebay or at a convention - I have no idea what flaws said book may contain! And no access to find out unless I decide to pay for a CGC membership! This whole plan strikes me as horseshit for the regular collector.

Here's the CGC article covering all the label changes.

whotony

My books that I sent in early February we’re checked into the facility mid March.
Two months later they are still listed as scheduled for grading.

Doubtful that I’ll be sending them any more books.

PhantomStranger

Looks like a money grab forcing regular collectors to pony up for a CGC membership. I have done my very best avoiding graded books. It just looks like a huge money sink to me.

Bronkster

I'll grant that I feel a bit more secure buying graded comics on Ebay (I'm only going for Golden Age, and a lot of those have serious flaws that sellers don't/won't divulge), but I agree that it's a pain if ya wanna read the darn thing! Currently, I keep an eye out for good raw copies of the few I have slabbed - if I can replace mine, then I can sell the slabbed book for a bit of a profit, in most cases. And then I have one I can read!

Josh-da-man

From the "It was bound to happen sooner or later department," it appears that there's a huge scandal involving people opening up CGC slabs and switching the comics in them for lower grade comics, and re-sealing them.

You can see it covered here where people discovered an Amazing Spiderman #252 Mark Jewelers variant being switched out and an Incredible Hulk #181 9.0 switched for an 8.5 copy.

There's also a video on Instagram where someone shows how a CGC slab can be opened and then resealed.



CGC has said that this only effects something like 350 books, but we really don't know how long this has been going on, and how many people might have been doing it. Looks like people only just now found out about it because it involved a copy with a Mark Jewelers insert.

PhantomStranger

So earlier this summer I picked up a few CGC books, mostly via eBay. Nothing too expensive, or really that desirable for the wider market. One or two of them felt way overgraded upon close visual inspection. I kept them, but it wouldn't shock me if someone did that with them.

I'd be super worried if I had paid big bucks for some of the mega-expensive CGC items.