Issue #116

Wow, it’s been a huge week.

Last Thursday all of the items from our Goosebumps Marketplace find went up for auction on Whatnot. We had 70 items in total, a huge turnout of Goosebumps fans and a massive ROI. I’m going to talk about that, plus showcase some unusual finds this week including 2 that were sold in 72 hours. All that and more.

Let’s get into it.

Mat.

P.S. audio clips of the auction have been spliced into this weeks podcast episode. Check it out, it’s worth it.

In This Issue

• What I Bought

• What I Sold

• How Much Did a 90’s Goosebumps Collection Sell For …

• Official Flip Weekly Podcast

• Win a Free $200 Mystery Box

• Flip Weekly on Social Media

• 100% Free Resources to Help You

What I Bought

When volunteers and staff members at Vinnies put an item on display, it’s very rare to be able to make any money from it. That’s not the case this week.

We have a collection of Dungeons & Dragons books. Usually I don’t pay much attention to D&D books, especially the handbooks and rulebooks which are generally overpriced and don’t sell quickly. These however looked quite old.

It appeared they comped up 1 book, and then based the other 3 around it and the overall condition. $15 for 2, $20 for the others. As we all know, books are a little more nuanced than that.

The one at the front left ($20) had Sold, Australia Listings for around $60.

The ones on the right, a bit less. However the back left was this:

It’s a revised 1st edition and sells for a bit more in Australia.

As I’ve said before, if staff highlight an item it’s generally a waste of time to try and make money on it. However, when there’s little details involved, some which make a product a lot more valuable and it appears staff didn’t put too much effort into pricing it up, that’s where the opportunity lies.

We should be able to turn $15 into either $150 on eBay or $100 on Marketplace.

Next up we have some clothing. I don’t know much about clothes, if I pick something up it’s because it stands out, not because it’s an expensive brand.

I think we should get at least $100 for this very cool Manny Pacquiao windbreaker.

This next one I can’t find comps anywhere.

It’s a Pirate of the Caribbean crew t-shirt from 2015. It’s more of a gamble than anything. It was $12 in Lifeline, I priced it up to $100. I received an offer on eBay from a Jack Sparrow impersonator, I kid you not, for $80. I accepted the offer, it hasn’t been marked as sold, but we’re waiting on Captain Jack to proceed with checkout.

I spoke to you last week abouts Bop It’s and this week I found one that looks totally normal yet is somehow rare in Australia.

This is a Bop It XT and somehow… don’t ask me how… it’s incredibly rare, especially in Australia. When I picked it up there were NO Active Listings and to this day, none besides mine. How does that work? This thing looks so common.

The Sold Listing’s aren’t crazy but I picked it up simply because no-one else had it in Australia. How fast can we sell it for and for how much?

You know what’s even wilder? I posted this on social media and a lot of people came back saying that it’s so rare to find these. For real? I legit feel like I see them in every 2nd op shop. Either way, I’m going to add on my Australia Tax and try and get $80 for it.

Marketplace wasn’t outrageous over the weekend, but I did snag something cool.

This is a Sydney Swans VFL jersey (not 1st grade but reserve grade). Priced at $50, I could see that it not only had a player number but the collar looked like it had the GPS tag meaning it’s player issued. Collectors pay more for this sort of stuff so I went out and got it. My suspicions were right, it was a GPS tag.

The seller told me a short story about knowing a coach and that they can secure more. Sounds good to me, this is priced up at $200 on eBay with plenty of views and watchers already. Remember that weekends are gold mines on Facebook Marketplace.

What I Sold

Gordon Ramsay ran Hell’s Kitchen for 24 seasons. The show is only available on DVD for 14 seasons. I was able to secure 1-8 for $26 from Vinnies and it sold in 8 months.

$26 into $170 in 8 months. It’s not exactly a fast sale, the sell through rate for the show is quite low. If you’re going to be picking up Hell’s Kitchen, you need a bundle and ideally you want the later seasons or if you get lucky, the entire 1-14.

Personally, from here out, I wouldn’t bother with a bundle that’s anything less than the complete series.

We’ve got our next sale that was completed within eBay’s 90 day window.

I paid $4.49 in Savers for one of the coolest pop-up books I’ve ever seen, a 1999 illustrated edition of The Hobbit. You can see some of the pictures in Issue #106 here or watch the video here. I was the only person selling this within Australia so I set the price: $119.95 - a bit higher than the comps at the time. Now, if you want to buy this book the cheapest you can get it here landed is $180.

I’m immediately drawn to Tolkien in the book sections of op shops, and one day I still hope to find that 1st edition Hobbit or Lord of the Rings, no matter how impossible it seems.

Now, we’ve gotten rid of all 3 Crush Gear Turbos that were bought from Lifeline just 10 days ago. The last one was missing a packet of gears so we had to list it at a pretty steep discount.

However these models did turn a $6 investment into $379.85. I know for certain that I’ll be looking more carefully at these sorts of things moving forward. Remember… if the plastic satchels aren’t sealed, you’re going to struggle.

The gift that keeps on giving… Bratz.

It feels like a lifetime ago but it was only in October that I bought a huge tub full of vintage Bratz dolls for $20. Once I parted everything out and slowly pieced it back together I realized we had an extremely valuable collection. The total listed value was $2,510 and since then we’ve had dolls sell for between $100-$500.

This week, we’ve got Dylan from the Funk Out collection. It’s not enough that the bloke was named Dylan, he also dresses poorly and doesn’t crack the $100 value mark. Nevertheless, he’d be profitable even if you spent the entire $20 just on him.

We’ve got 2 of the relatively cheap Skylanders figures selling this week on eBay.

We paid $140 for a huge bundle last week and so far have recovered $269.85 with only 4 listings left totalling $649.80. As expected it’s taking buyers a bit to convince themselves to shell $250 for a Skylanders toy but don’t worry, they will soon enough.

Ever choose your sale price based on dumb things?

A dude messaged me on Marketplace on Saturday wanting to buy this jersey. He asked if there was any wiggle room, it was for his kid who is apparently obsessed with the team. I had it listed on eBay for $149.95 and Marketplace for $100.

With the game on TV and a drink in hand d, I told him he could have it for what the Roosters scored that night. They scored 62 points, so it was out the door for $62.

We’ve got a 3 day turnaround time for a t-shirt.

The gamble paid of and it’s off to Netherlands. Trust your gut when you can’t find comps.

Just like that, the other piece of clothing we picked up this week has sold, also in 3 days.

An unusually fast turnaround time for both of these pieces and an overall decent sales week.

How Much Did a 90’s Goosebumps Collection Sell For at Auction?

I’d been waiting patiently for this day to come. No matter how hard they tried, Australia Post could not stop the huge bundle of 90’s Goosebumps from being auctioned off on Whatnot.

The items had arrived in Melbourne and unfortunately a few of the smaller items were missing. Maybe they slipped out of the original box, after all it was opened by Aus Post. We lost the Yo-Yo, a pencil topper, majority of the pogs and slammer, a few bits of stationary and pins. The approximate value was $150.

For the rest, I had comped up most of the items on eBay and made educated guesses for those that were one of a kind items. The entire lot was valued at $2,495. With a few items missing, and my past experience with Whatnot being that you don’t get full eBay prices, I was hopeful we could make at least $1,500.

The day arrived. Retro Rescuers (Erin & Mitchell) had taken photos and allowed people to place pre-bids on the items. I had a quick scan, we have 70 items and it looked like 90% of them had pre-bids. Just in case, I send through a quick message saying that if anything wasn’t bid on, to re-run it half off or just give it away.

The auction started right on time, 7pm on Thursday night. Immediately the room was filled with Goosebumps collectors. The energy was high, the chat was going off with excitement and it was time to run the first item. A VHS copy of The Haunted Mask which came with the original proof of purchase card.

In my spreadsheet I had valued the VHS at $20 and to my surprise, pre-bids had it at $27. The auction starts, the bids go up very quickly: $33, $38, $42…. and sold!

That’s a solid start, we’re double expectations on the first item.

The next 2 items both sell for above what I expected. A tube of fake blood that I valued at $10 sold for $25 and a mouse pad that I thought would struggle to gain bids considering the graphic was peeling sold for $38.

Next, I had originally sent through 16 pogs plus 1 slammer valued at $30. Arriving in Melbourne, those numbers had dwindled to just 3. What happened to them? Lost in post somehow, I’ll never know. Still, those 3 pogs alone sold for $15.

I have something to tell you before we move on, and this is important.

When creating the spreadsheet, there were 39 items that I lotted together and valued at a collective $10. I labelled them essentially as junk. Cut outs from newspapers, full magazines that had maybe a page or two dedicated to Goosebumps, a sticker missing it’s back. I had an eBay mindset and I really didn’t see any of it selling.

I was very, very wrong.

A Goosebumps bumper sticker sold quickly for $15 and then up came something that I didn’t think deserved to even be in the auction.

A piece of newspaper clipped out from the Herald Sun back in the 90’s. The clipping was promoting Werewolf of Fever Swamp making its way onto VHS. I’d guess it was around 20cm x 10cm and had a tear right in the middle. I honestly was a bit embarrassed that this was even going up for auction, I should have thrown it out immediately.

The starting bid was $2. Mitchell described it as a “unique piece“.

Bidding starts. We’re at $2, jump up now to $9.

“You are never gonna see this again“ Mitchell was doing his best to sell this piece of rubbish.

Bidding jumps up to $16, then $18, and with 3 seconds to go it’s up to $20.

I’m thinking… this is funny.

Someone snipes last second, $24… $26…

“It's a fight. It's a knuckle duster, this one's a true UFC match right here” Mitchell kept the energy up.

Then we see some huge swings. $42… $54… $69… $99…

Now I’m thinking… this is funny but in a dumbfounded way.

No way it cracks $100. Boom, one bidder taps out and it ends at $114.

What… I’m left speechless. Over $100 was spent on a newspaper clipping that was lucky not to be thrown out. The chat is going off, the bidders take a moment to realize what they’ve done and we move on to similar types of items. This time people calm down on their bidding.

We’ve got a full magazine that has a few pages dedicated to Goosebumps and R.L. Stine and it sells for $15. Hallmark invitations that sell for $30, and an original order form for a flashlight going for $15. The Cuddles squishy keychain goes out the door for $50 and a simple eraser ends at $15.

I thought things had calmed down again until we go on an insane run.

5 bookmarks go up. They’re just cardboard, they have perforated edges and a splash of water would ruin them in an instant. Pre-bids have them at $16 and I’ve valued them at $2 a piece.

Bidding starts and immediately we’re going much higher.

“Oh, too fast. Too many names flashing. I'm just going to stand here and wobble my head”

The flurry of bids end and they’re sold for $56.

Next up we have the pencil case. I’ll let Mitchell’s transcript do the talking here.

I valued the pencil case at $30. It sold for $184. I’m officially out of touch with Goosebumps pricing. From here I have no idea what everything will sell for, let’s just go along for the ride.

Now’s when the ride starts. We’ve got a 1996 Enter if your Dare poster.

Someone in the comments writes “I came to replace this. I got it the day it came out, 30 years ago.”

Pre-bids have it at $205, double what I valued it at. The bids come rolling in extremely quick and within seconds we’re at $270 and then $430.

Can we get it to 5?

Yes, we can.

$510 turns into $550 which turns into $570.

We have 2 bidders going back and forth, one of whom has vowed they aren’t leaving without it.

We’re at $570 with seconds to go but it doesn’t end there. It’s pushed to $600, then to an incredible $690. One of the bidders driving this up drops out, the person who vowed to leave with the poster sticks to their word. The final hammer price is $690!

The energy is the highest its been all night and Mitchell can’t contain himself.

From here I have to be honest and tell you that the next few auctions were a haze. We had just sold a poster for $690. A reminder… I got all of this stuff (barring the books) completely free. This is insanity.

We move on with brain fog. We have $47 for the velcro wallet, $112 combined for the 1996 and 1997 calendars, $81 for the Glow Zone kit and a few bucks here and there for smaller stuff. Then comes an order form. A simple little order form that I wrote off as worthless.

Pizza Hut 1996 order form for the Escape from Horrorland PC game. I’m not a complete idiot, I’ve done basic research and I know that a lot of Goosebumps collectors own the actual Escape from Horrorland PC game but I didn’t expect this level of interest in a paper order form.

Pre-bids have it already at $35, the auction starts and the price is only going up.

$39… $51… $71… $91… it shoots past the $100 mark.

$121 with 4 seconds to go… somebody jumps in last second and snags it for $141.

A reminder, this is a piece of paper. Not even a full A4. Ridiculous.

Ironically, the actual PC game follows and doesn’t beat it, it sells for $43.

The next 5 items don’t cross the $50 mark. It doesn’t surprise me, they’re mostly 1 off books that you can buy on eBay for a couple of bucks. Still, we collect an additional $114.

We move onto the t-shirt and baseball cap and add another combined $149 to the piggy bank. Not bad considering the t-shirt is a kids size 12.

The paper and cardboard continues to be bid up quite high, a Scare Club advertising flyer sells for $86, 3D bookmark for $56 and 2 regular Escape from Horrorland bookmarks for $25.

We’re getting towards the end of the auction and just when I thought the energy in the room had died, up comes the showbag. Just an empty showbag showing plenty of signs of wear and tear. I valued it at $10 and to be honest if I was going to list everything myself, it might have gone straight to the bin.

To my surprise it ends at $78 and Goosebumps collectors are spamming the chat with how much of a bargain the person got. For real? I found no data on this showbag. Maybe it’s just that rare?

Finally we get to the heavy hitters. The electronic voice changing mask that I valued at $200, complete series 1-62 of the books valued at $500 and the inflatable tombstone promo item, last sold for $350. That’s a combined $1,050 - how close do we get?

At this point in time the auction has been running for 2 hours and it hasn’t had my full attention 100% of the time. I have no idea how much we’ve made so I’m counting on these last 3 to bring us home.

The voice changing mask is up first. Pre-bids have it at $100. The bidding starts, we’re off to $105, $115, $125, $175… 4 seconds to go, can we make it to $200? Nope, bidding ends. Close enough I say.

Next, the books. The complete series 1-62, cheapest you can get it on eBay right now is $527.95. I know Whatnot isn’t eBay so we just hope for something close enough.

$225 is where we start. Bids do not start rolling. It’s quiet, Mitchell has a chance to share a few words and I’m half-seriously thinking of putting in a bid to buy it myself. Then we get a bid, $250. The original bidder comes back at $290. Let’s push it to $300… and… sold. $290 for the full series of Goosebumps. We’re under, a lot under. I’m not panicking but I was originally thinking these books would make up a big chunk. No time to overthink too much, we’re onto the last item.

The inflatable tombstone. A Sold Listing from eBay puts it at around the $350 mark. It’s the last item in the auction, wallets are empty, people are tired and it ends at $270. Close enough.

Phew, what a crazy 2 and a half hours. It feels successful but again, I haven’t been paying full attention so I have no idea what we land on. Mum has been watching it from her place and gives me a call. I ask her what she thinks the final tally will be. I bring up I was hoping for at least $1,500 in total sales but it might have hit $2,000.

“$2,000, really? I’m not sure.“ she brings me back to reality.

I’m going to give you a full breakdown of my valuations and the realized price, along with the total sales below, but before that I just wanted to thank the bidders and also Retro Rescuers for running a smooth auction. It was fun, it was exciting, and I’m hooked. I’m keen to find more collections and do this again.

So, how do we look in terms of total sales? I’m sent through the numbers.

This $100 investment, a Facebook Marketplace find that I was extremely lucky to come across, has total sales of $4,181.

Whoa.

Now obviously I don’t get all of this money, there’s fees with Whatnot and Retro Rescuers commission, but I do receive the largest chunk. Either way, $100 into $4,181. Do I count this as my biggest flip thus far? That title belongs to Sonic books, $60 into $1,600 but that was just 1 sale. This was technically 70. You tell me.

It turns out that having a whole bunch of $30-$50 items adds up quickly. Whilst the bigger stuff under performed, the obscure, the random, severely over performed thanks to intense bidding wars.

And you know what? It makes sense that things like the complete set underperformed. This is an auction predominantly for die hard Goosebumps fans. Those people would already have the books, it would be the entry into the niche. But the posters, the order forms, the newspaper clippings, these are things that you would remember and understand that you may not ever see them again.

Heck, the winning bidder of the poster sent me a message saying she has been looking for this exact one for 26 years. It sounds like embellishment until you see that she paid $690.

Below you will find a table breakdown of all of the items:

I’m still in shock seeing some of these prices. If you want to hear a replay of some of the high selling items, listen to this weeks podcast. It’s worth it just to hear the reaction to a poster selling for $690.

That’s all I’ve got for you this week, thank you again for reading, I’ll see you next Thursday.

Mat.

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