Top Dollar for Old Comics!

Wow! I gotta go through my comic book collection and sell some stuff!

The Most Expensive Stuff You Can Buy At New York Comic Con

The Daily Digg – “While comics may have started as disposable entertainment, it’s no secret that many books can fetch a hefty sum based on their rarity, CGC grade*, illustrator, and/or characters that may have first appeared in them.

We talked to the people working every collectibles booth at this year’s New York Comic Con and asked them what their most expensive item is, and what made these items so astonishingly valuable.

$17,000
Original Palitoy Star Wars figures, complete set
from the 1970s

$20,000
Gobbledygook #1 and Gobbledygook #2
(Only 50 copies made)

$35,000
Pep Comics #22 [Restored**, CGC Grade 8.0]
(Introduction of Archie)

$45,000
Strange Tales #110 [CGC Grade 9.4]
(Introduction of Dr. Strange)

$65,000
Robert Crumb complete four-page story

$75,000
Original art from Spider-Man #32

$250,000
Cover of Spider-Man #300

$550,000
Detective Comics #27 [Restored, CGC Grade 9.4]
(Introduction of Batman – 1939)

and, finally…

$3,200,000+
Action Comics #1 [CGC Grade 9.0]
(Introduction of Superman!)

*CGC, or Comics Guaranty, is in independent grading service that launched in 2000 whose purpose is to determine how well preserved a book is. The scores are given out of 10, and the color of the label implies its state: blues are unadulterated books, purples are restored, greens have a significant defect and yellows are books that have been signed in the presence of a CGC employee.

**Restoration can be accomplished in a number of ways including conservation (removal of dirt, debris, or stains) leaf casting (which fills in missing paper that may have rotted away) and color touch (recoloring worn pages). The process can be quite expensive, and restored comics are usually worth less than a blue labelled version of the same book.”