And I thought I knew everything, and then I tried to price railroad books

[bugler1998]

I have been around bookselling online long enough that I thought I had a feel for pricing.  Then I ran into railroad books.

A month or so ago I arrived early at the estate sale of a local estate sale company.  They were definitely not book experts, and I think I got some real deals, as the railroad books were going for $2 each.

With out the time to check online price sources, I picked up around 80 hardbacks, most in pretty nice condition overall. most from @1970-2000. I paid tgeir posted price. 

The second and last day I cam again and picked up most of the remaining books, including paperbacks for a bargain price.

So I am starting to list some of the books as time allows, and I am finding some books that are selling for prices of between $20 and $250.00, with very few going for less than $20.  And they have been selling.

I know this collection is in good but not perfect condition, but many appear to be selling for above the retail price they originally sold for in the 70s and 80s.

Railfans are getting up in age, and their lifetime collections must be up for sale at their estate sales.

Not com,plaining, just wondering what the secret is, so I can figure out the factors to consider in setting a price, and how to know when to pay a higher price when a buying opportunity comes up.

[bugler1998]

AS a follow up question:  Is the ebay market strong enough that I can throw a $100 book up for sale at auction starting at $10, and hope to get a close to market price?

[anthemshop247]

---

wrote:

AS a follow up question:  Is the ebay market strong enough that I can throw a $100 book up for sale at auction starting at $10, and hope to get a close to market price?

---

I suggest you list at 30-day Fixed Price at your desired price and wait for a right buyer to come along. 

[dreambooks]

I bought some at an antique mall. I listed them on Amazon. Although their rank is near 1,000,000 or over, I managed to sell all of them after 1 year.

[taylor_memorial]

Unless the book is highly sought after and extremely rare, I'd not hope for a bidder's war. Start it where you are comfortable. If'n yins have a store then a couple at auction are probably a good way to invite them in and see what you've got. It worked for me. I do regret not putting a 1901 Audel instruction book on steam indicators up for auction because it sold very quickly. Note that it is VERY specific, and contemporary to the industrial revolution.

I first ran into a rail fan lot at a church sale. Bought up what I could a dime a piece, regardless. This was early on in my career, so I made decent money here. I no longer have any of those. Within a short period of time I went to a library sale and picked up "free" (they were heavy) a couple boxes of railway magazines and the donor had a basement full that nearly broke the springs of my Dodge but I got them all home. They sell, slowly. I'll get to them again soon.

Spent a couple hundred on railran books at auction have profited nicely on them with a few remaining here on line. Mostly trolley car, single line books.

Recently we received a 5 box donation of railfan books from an extreme model train enthusiast. Lots of "Like New" and very good books. I took them all on consignment and have done extremely well.

Stay clear of Bonanza books--they are invariably reprints. Small run books command high prices and these tend to specialize on regional railways. By the 80's, University PResses were getting into the local history end of things, which diluted the market some. Also, in general, the earlier the focus, the better. Atcheson, Topeka and Santa Fe is a bit pricier and faster moving than Santa Fe (a later incarnation).

Heaps of steaming color pictures, action shots and so forth are important. Also panorama shots with trains winding through mountains and hills. Modelers like to work from the real world.

I don't do well with UK centered books, although using global shipping program I've sold a couple.

When comping out what you have in hand, be sure to read the expensive ones carefully. One Western publisher from your era would slap down a pocket on the back paste down and put in it some maps and other ephemera which needless to say adds value to the collector. Some of these were issued signed--the entire (small) first run--and in jacket protectors as an add-on value according to a price list I have or have had.

[kenmallorybooks]

"Railfans are getting up in age, and their lifetime collections must be up for sale" I've been saying the same thing since the early 90s, but I still buy the collections and they still sell. The mid 90s was the real time when a lot of stuff was coming around and I thought for sure at that time that the market would be dead soon [figuratively and literally], but I was  obviously wrong.

[bugler1998]

Thank you for the replies.

Taylor, when I compare listing prices on the river and ebay, sometimes I believe that the prices are so different that i must be looking at different books.

there i one particular book i am watching that has a number pf listings on each site that start at $70.

Yet ebay has one auction with a beginning price of $15.  And no bids in the first 3 days.  Wonder how that auction will go?

[reallynicestamps]

@bugler1998

Railfans are getting up in age, and their lifetime collections must be up for sale at their estate sales.

Depends on what you think 'up in age' means.

The eldest of we Boomers are 72 years old. We retired recently, or are still working, and we have spare cash for hobbies.

If you are thinking railfans are in their 80s or 90s, you may have a point. But anyone who is still fascinated by his hobby is going to live longer than someone who never did anything buy work and sleep.

The last time I saw a railway exhibit at a hobby show the guys were in their 40s and 50s, because it is not  a cheap hobby and difficult to indulge if you have kids still in school.

And in terms of the magazines-- the widow is just as likely to toss them out as to put them in the estate sale.

[taylor_memorial]

By way of illustration indulge me in an anecdote regarding an online conversation with an exclusive Amazon seller, because they are a different breed of animal.

He had asked about pricing for a local history book about a 50's eral gangland crime that involved corruption with the local sheriff--perhaps with national interest only because it was Arkansas and the Clintons could be brought in tangentially if he was inclined to write long descriptions--which he wasn't and I didn't not suggest it.

There were no copies on Amazon. He asked if $100 was fair. There were two copies on ViaLibri hovering in the $50 range.

So my answer had to do with adding to the available (unsold copies) and suggested that if he wanted it to sell quickly he should price it a little below the available copies.

He decided I was full of **it and said as much, priced it at $100 because "I have the only one".

I said, "No, you don't, and Amazon is not the collector's site of choice".

Now that latter comment has changed just a little bit, but not much.
The saddest thing about online selling is that nobody bothers with the craft any longer, not that looking up comps on a megasearch site is anything close to the craft, but one does learn.

With niche items like railfan stuff, Amazon is that site that pays for exposure on google. eBay is not. The short term collector will go to Amazon, first, and get burned, and then try eBay and decided that hey! seeing an actual picture (or even better, hand full of pictures) of what is offered is a whole lot better.

It's not so much what that auction will do. There are dealers who use arbitrage software who will snipe that out if it gets no bids, and that will teach the collectors something, too.

The last big lot I got was basically modeller books. So I spent some time researching prices at Amazon, here and on ViaLibri. I did put some books up for auction--little Kalmbach books that focused extremely tightly on one little aspect of the modeler's world. I got multiple bids on two or three.

But my approach to auction is that they are fixed price venues that cost more and get more exposure, which is why I have a store and will push all the train books into auctions when it nears the holidays when sales start climbing for those things.

Buy it now and Auctions have the same bottom price. I'll try and get a little more from the buy it now list price because some aren't interested in haggling, and I'll move it to auction at my "Lowest Acceptable Price".

It reduces thinking through the life of the listing.

[bugler1998]

Taylor:  Thank you for that illustration.

Five years or more ago I listed several thousand books on Amazon.   Many were specially books and hardly any were best sellers.  I am a long-time eBay seller, but ease of listing on Amazon combined with the cost of monthly listing prices on eBay made me consider Amazon.

 I probably sold more than half of the books within a year or two, but even after assuring myself that I had the lowest or best value  Price on Amazon, quite a few books just sat and sat. 

 Amazon finally lost me due to the fact that I was not selling enough to get volume listing fees, and I realized that I was working just to pay my Amazon fees. Recent pricing increases on Amazon  made me decide to stick with eBay exclusively. 

Now I am reconsidering my position, especially on the great number of railroad books that could justify prices in excess of $100 each on Amazon.