Selling loot, erg, books

[Yair]

I've a friend who has come to posess a stockpile of old D&D books. Like a 1e Forgotten Realms boxed set in mint condition - that sort of thing. He wants to sell them, but doesn't know how to price them. Can anyone help him out? Is there a site with suggested prices or something like that?

 

[Simia Saturnalia]

I recall eBay has a service that tracks what items similar to your terms have sold for, if that would help him at all.

EDIT: Which would be Advanced Search > Completed Listings only.

 

[Aluvial]

I look to this site for interesting book pricing.... I'm just not sure how recent the information is...

http://www.acaeum.com/index.html

Aluvial

 

[smootrk]

I'll buy such items for a dollar

Just to take them off his hands

 

[JustKim]

When I see words like "mint condition" used to describe D&D books I know someone is going to be very disappointed with the going price on their books. I have spent enough on D&D books to have bought at least one nice car. Now imagine that as I left the dealership with this car it had a head-on collision with a bus, caught on fire, and rolled off a bridge into an industrial waste channel. Imagine that the towing service was having a three day holiday and this new car could not be fished out until the following week. Now imagine I would like to resell that car.

That is how much most old D&D books sell for.

 

[prosfilaes]

That is how much most old D&D books sell for.

Honestly, if you have a Half-Price Books nearby, I think they'll give you a quarter of the cover price. Looking at Ebay, that's a little high for many of them--and the 2ed splat books aren't selling at 99c, but some of the more obscure stuff is doing better than 25%.

One issue is that, like with most old books, is that the stuff you have is probably the stuff that they printed millions of. That means that everyone already has a copy, and there's probably a nice new edition that has what most people want. The D&D stuff that's selling in a lot of cases seems to be the quirky stuff.

 

[frankthedm]

When I see words like "mint condition" used to describe D&D books I know someone is going to be very disappointed with the going price on their books. I have spent enough on D&D books to have bought at least one nice car. Now imagine that as I left the dealership with this car it had a head-on collision with a bus, caught on fire, and rolled off a bridge into an industrial waste channel. Imagine that the towing service was having a three day holiday and this new car could not be fished out until the following week. Now imagine I would like to resell that car.

That is how much most old D&D books sell for.

Aww, you beat me too it.

 

[Whisper72]

The only stuff that sells at premium prices is Planescape material, and a select few modules (the H series (Bloodstone), the old darkmoor series (DA modules such as city of the Gods) and the more obscure M series (for the Master's set of Basic DnD) and the Deities and Demigods with the 'lost mythoi'. The UK series does relatively well also.

Most of the rest sell poorly. With DarkSun and Spelljammer, you could get lucky if several people want them as they do not go up for auction that often.

 

[Mouseferatu]

Honestly, if you have a Half-Price Books nearby, I think they'll give you a quarter of the cover price.

I've sold boxes upon boxes upon boxes of books to Half-Price.

They don't pay anywhere near one-quarter of the cover price. I wish they did.

 

[Angel Tarragon]

Noble Knight