Card Collecting 101:

How to get the best value for your money

In my experience, collectors fall into one of two categories: the emotional collector and the investor.

The emotional collector collects what he remembers from his childhood. He opens a fresh pack of Topps cards and immediately the smell of the cardboard brings him right back to the good old days of childhood.

The investor, on the other hand, is looking to build a collection that will grow in monetary value. He views the baseball collectibles industry solely in terms of dollars and cents.

The happy medium is a combination of the two: an emotional collector who is an astute investor. Here are a few rules of thumb to follow that will help you build your collection, regardless of your purpose or level of involvement:

Always buy the best quality you can afford

It’s always best to collect what you really like – and buy it in the best quality you can find. When it comes to collecting, if you intend to sell in the future, quality is more important than quantity. You are better off buying a few high-grade Hall of Famers, than a shoebox full, in really low grades. Anyone can own the low-grade cards, but there is always a market for the big names in the higher investment grades.

Common will always be common; rare will always be rare

If you’re buying art, you’re better off with one Picasso than with 10 Leroy Niemans; the same is true of baseball cards – buy the Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Ty Cobb or Shoeless Joe Jackson, rather than 10 Pat Burrells. You can never go wrong buying the biggest names in baseball history.

Be sure that you know what you are buying

Never buy a high-grade card unless it is certified by the three major certification services. There are too many ways to alter these cards. You certainly don’t want to spend your hard-earned money on a great card just to find out it was trimmed, and it’s often impossible to tell whether the card has been cut. If you buy one of these trimmed cards, the card can never be resold or certified, so you’re just out of luck.

There is nothing like buying a piece of baseball history.   You just have to be smart on how and where you purchase.  You can never go wrong when you purchase these cards at the big auctions, and there are a number of sports card and memorabilia auctions that sell throughout the year.  The rarest and most cherished cards are always available at auction, and you can always bid with confidence that you are getting the real McCoy - and maybe bring home that Ruth you always wanted.

David Epstein is the founder and CEO of Auctionblip.com (www.auctionblip.com), an online resource delivering personalized information on collectibles available at auction, including sports memorabilia and other items. Epstein is a lifelong collector, with a primary interest in baseball cards and coins. He is also the former CEO of American Coin Vault. Epstein currently lives in Valley Stream, NY with his wife and children.

An original Topps 1969 Baseball Uncut sheet including two Mickey Mantle cards, plus the cards of Tom Seaver, Joe Torre, Rod Carew, Tim McCarver, Bob Gibson, Lou Brock, Johnny Bench and Willie McCovey. As they were never sold to the public, uncut sheets are very rare; it’s extremely rare to find a sheet with two Mickey Mantle cards.

A closeup of the Mickey Mantle card from the above 1969 Topps uncut sheet.