How to Sell Your Magic Cards
Diving into the Magic card market as an individual seller can be quite the daunting process. Finding a way to get the greatest chunk of value out of your cards is straightforward enough; put up a listing online and see who bites. But this is very rarely the most efficient process. Time is money, afterall, so selling Magic cards is really all about balancing. How much time do you want to spend, and how much of a return do you want to receive?
This article is meant to be an introduction to the ins-and-outs of the seller’s world, primarily from the perspective of the U.S. market. Most of what is in this article should apply abroad, but some of the websites I mention won’t necessarily be the best choice in other regions. Additionally, this article is going to focus on typical Magic cards, not misprints, alters, or oddities. Those cards are a world in and of themselves – something for another day.
Alright, with that introduction out the way, on to the first marketplace: individual listings.
Individual Listings - Online
This is the category that will make you the most money, per card, at the cost of the greatest amount of time. Here’s why.
Individual listings via the online marketplace (eBay, etc.) put you, the seller, in front of the largest pool of possible buyers, each of which compete for your listing. Rather than putting you up against a singular buyer, the competitive nature of the online marketplace allows you to net a greater percentage of a card’s value in return. Additionally, by focusing on a single card, there’s no bulk discount pressure for your potential buyers. They don’t have to pay for less-desirable cards, and so they’re willing to pay a bit more for a single item.
Now, see how this all depends on competition? This is where we get into listing structure. Traditionally, there are two routes to take for creating a listing: a flat-price listing (think eBay’s “Buy-it-Now” feature), or a competitive auction. Flat-price listings guarantee a return, but there is a lower chance that the listing will ever close (be purchased) because there is no urgency on behalf of the buyers. Auctions, however, only guarantee the floor - or starting - price, but receive much more attention thanks to the competition they inspire. Selling Magic cards either way will usually net a good amount of money (relative to their market value), but listing via auctions is often a more reliable process. Competition closes deals, and some money is better than none - an adage which is going to become increasingly important as we look at the rest of our categories.
Next up, our second group: large lots and collections.
Large Lots and Collections - Online
A lot of what I mentioned in our first section applies here, but now we need to talk about bulk discounts and efficiency. First, efficiency.
Creating a listing for a card takes time. You need to figure out not just what it’s worth, but compare it against other listings and see what people are actually paying for it on the secondary market. Then there are things like the physical condition of a card to consider. The point is, managing the sale of a single listing is not a one-and-done thing. Now, imagine doing this for dozens, if not hundreds of listings. It’s an inefficient nightmare. This is where large lots come in.
By collapsing all of the individual card listings into a single listing, the odds of selling all of your cards becomes a much more probable, binary event. Either you'll sell everything (the listing closes) or you won’t and then you’ll have to try again. Regardless, you won’t get stuck in the slog of selling things bit by bit. The trade-off here is that you’ll be averaging a lower return per card against their market value, and the reason for this is the bulk discount you’ll end up applying due to the issue of a smaller customer base.
Individual cards (with few exceptions) are mostly bought by players. “Buy singles” has become the motto of the decade, and people stick to it. Collections, on the other hand, are often bought by other card dealers, investors, and collectors. This means that price-per-card is a much more important aspect of the deal, as opposed to any game function which the included cards actually carry with them. So, to sell a large lot, odds are that you’ll have to lower your price a bit more in order to make the potential returns for your customers more attractive. This reflects the nature of a collection sale as a much more business-oriented transaction.
And our final category: trade-ins and buylists.
Trade-Ins and Buylists
This is the most efficient, least profitable way to sell Magic cards, and it’s all because the seller-buyer relationship I described in the Individual Listings - Online section is flipped on its head. Rather than go out into a market where buyers are competing for the opportunity to buy your cards at a price you set, the buylist world is one in which a sale is guaranteed, but the buyer has all the power to set the price. It’s up to you if you want to go for it.
If you’ve decided to take the buylist route, there are two primary options: online services and in-person deals. The world of in-person deals is a bit murkier, especially since things are settled with a handshake and some cash, but it's arguably the more popular of the two, so we’ll start here.
In-person buylists are incredibly regional and are nearly always limited in terms of what cards are actually on the buylist at any given point, primarily due to constraints on cash flow in cardshops. However, as your friendly local gamestore (emphasis on local), it does mean that they are the fastest option to turn cards into cash. If you’ve got cards worth something and you don’t mind netting around 40% of their market value (the average for most trade-ins), then this is actually a pretty good route to take.
The second option, online buylists, usually nets something closer to 50%+ for most cards and has far more exhaustive buylist options, at the cost of being a much more laborious process. Selling a collection via buylist often requires indexing cards (listing their set, condition, etc.) and following strict packaging guidelines, something which can be prohibitive for some collections. If you want to put a bit more effort in and make a little more in return, then online buylists are a great option, but check around your local scene first - you might just get a deal in.
Wrap Up
At the end of the day, selling Magic cards all comes down to your prioritization of time versus money. How much effort are you willing to put in, and how long will you wait, to sell your cards? If your answer is “a lot” for both of these, then chances are you’re in to make a decent sum. If you’d rather things be over quicker, then buylists are an excellent place to get started. I hope this has been helpful in organizing your Magic sales, and good luck on joining the fray!
Further Reading:
Harvey McGuinness is a student at Johns Hopkins University who has been playing Magic since the release of Return to Ravnica. After spending a few years in the Legacy arena bouncing between Miracles and other blue-white control shells, he now spends his time enjoying Magic through CEDH games and understanding the finance perspective. He also writes for the Commander's Herald.
