Vintage Magazines worth a lot? Ebay asking a lot, but.....

[slackmax]

I was ready to take some old magazines from the 80's down to the recycling center but just for kicks, looked them up in Ebay.

Somebody wants $30 plus $10 shipping for Sept 1984 McCall's magazine.

Ladies Home Journal Oct 1980 asking $10 plus $10 shipping.

I am not thrilled about opening up an Ebay account to sell magazines, but I guess I have to, in order to sell these old magazines.

Does anyone buy these old magazines for $30 ?  I guess it's possible.

I can't tell from the Ebay listings if any magazines have sold at these high prices.

As of now, I have about 10 vintage mags cluttering up my house.

Any input appreciated.

[ender]

Look for recent sales, people list things at all sorts of absurd prices.

[slackmax]

Look for recent sales, people list things at all sorts of absurd prices.

Thanks.
I can't find anything on the Ebay screen that mentions what sold, for these magazines. The sellers have storefronts, and buy-it-now pricing. Click on seller, and still no listing of what he/she has sold.  I can see selling prices for other stuff, but not for these magazines. How do you find that info?

[NotJen]

When you do a search, look at the left side of the page - there should be filtering options, one is under ‘Show only’ and says ‘Sold Items’.

If you are looking at a particular seller and choose ‘See all items’, you should see the ‘Sold Items’ option on the left again, and it will show you recent sales.

Edit: I searched September 1984 McCall’s Magazine and didn’t find any that sold over the past few months.

[thedigitalone]

Do they have barcodes? 

There are apps for Amazon and Ebay that will scan the barcodes and show you current sales info, the percentage of cut that the service will take and how much you will receive when the transaction is complete.  Great for quickly sorting through a pile of stuff just like you have.

[Papa bear]

To add on, anyone know if the old 80’s Nintendo power, or 1950s - 70s National Geographic worth anything? 




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[ROF Expat]

My understanding is that old magazines are generally worth very little.  I think the high prices for specific magazines are from sellers who are hoping that one person will want a very specific magazine enough to pay a premium for it.  By coincidence, I have purchased one old National Geographic and one old McCall's because they had very specific articles in them that I wanted to give as gifts.  I probably paid $20 bucks each. 

So, if you are willing to set up an ebay account, advertise each magazine individually, and wait for as long as it takes (possibly years) for someone to want that particular issue of that particular magazine, you might get as much as $20 or $30 bucks for a few of your magazines.  But a stack of old National Geographics or pretty much any other mass circulation magazine has little or no cash value.  I have heard that National Geos are particularly low value because so many subscribers saved their magazines rather than throwing them out at the end of the month. 

To me, this is one of the great virtues of Ebay.  It creates value by matching up hard-to-sell items with hard-to-find buyers.  I will happily pay $20 rather than scour used bookstores for a  30-year-old McCall's magazine, and very few bookstores want to carry 100s of old McCall's magazines for years waiting for one guy who wants one issue.  And if they put a $20 price on each magazine, people would ridicule them.  But on Ebay it can work. 

[Nightwatchman9270]

I've tried to sell old guitar magazines, the kind with sheet music in them.  They didn't sell.  If they did sell they sold for a few dollars.  After ebay and paypal fees I didn't make enough to buy a gallon of milk.  Toss them.

[Michael in ABQ]

My understanding is that old magazines are generally worth very little.  I think the high prices for specific magazines are from sellers who are hoping that one person will want a very specific magazine enough to pay a premium for it.  By coincidence, I have purchased one old National Geographic and one old McCall's because they had very specific articles in them that I wanted to give as gifts.  I probably paid $20 bucks each. 

So, if you are willing to set up an ebay account, advertise each magazine individually, and wait for as long as it takes (possibly years) for someone to want that particular issue of that particular magazine, you might get as much as $20 or $30 bucks for a few of your magazines.  But a stack of old National Geographics or pretty much any other mass circulation magazine has little or no cash value.  I have heard that National Geos are particularly low value because so many subscribers saved their magazines rather than throwing them out at the end of the month. 

To me, this is one of the great virtues of Ebay.  It creates value by matching up hard-to-sell items with hard-to-find buyers.  I will happily pay $20 rather than scour used bookstores for a  30-year-old McCall's magazine, and very few bookstores want to carry 100s of old McCall's magazines for years waiting for one guy who wants one issue.  And if they put a $20 price on each magazine, people would ridicule them.  But on Ebay it can work.

I remember when I was growing up we had a couple of large shelves my dad had built in our laundry room to hold all these old issues of National Geographic. I don't really remember when we got rid of them but I'm sure they all got dumped in the trash or a big recycling bin. I'm pretty sure no one ever looked at those after they got put on those shelves. It had to be a decade or two worth - hundreds of magazines.

Reminds me I've got a couple of magazines laying around that I need to throw away.

[evme]

Most old magazines are not worth much. Just like most old books or records are not worth much. They have to either have rare and desirable content or be collectible for some other reason. The first issue of Playboy is worth a lot. The George Magazine February 1997 issue has a couple that sold recently for $6600-6700. But those are the exceptions to the rule.

Just keep in mind, it's all about supply vs demand. Most old issues of magazine lack any sort of demand and will thus be close to worthless. However, if you find the right niche you can probably move magazines in the $10-20 range and make some money. Most will be very slow movers though, meaning expect to wait a long time for them to sell.

FYI, you can see "sold" magazines on ebay with this link (sorted by most expensive):

https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_from=R40&_nkw=magazine&_sacat=0&LH_TitleDesc=0&_sop=16&rt=nc&LH_Sold=1&LH_Complete=1

[evme]

To add on, anyone know if the old 80’s Nintendo power, or 1950s - 70s National Geographic worth anything? 

80's Nintendo Power may be worth something:

https://www.ebay.com/sch/280/i.html?_from=R40&_nkw=nintendo+power+magazine+-lot+-collection+-set&LH_TitleDesc=0&_sop=16&LH_Complete=1&LH_Sold=1

[Car Jack]

Contact the ebay sellers and send them a list of what you've got and ask what they'll pay for them.  Then send the entire, heavy box of everything to them for whatever they'll pay.  I used to sell car brochures to a company who would sell single ones to car enthusiasts.

Anyone need a brochure for an 89 Honda Civic?

[draco44]

OP, especially because you don't already have an ebay account, I don't think it's worth your time to try and sell these. And as others have mentioned, listing prices on ebay mean nothing if people aren't willing to pay that much.  To put your mind at ease, however, it wouldn't take long with only 10 magazines to research if your specific issues are selling.

To refine what others are saying about researching listings on ebay, I actually suggest searching not by "sold items" but by "completed items." This search pulls up ALL completed listings, both sold and unsold. Then you can sort the results from low to high in price. That way you see how high you can price an item before buyers stop being interested. And you can see if, for example, there were 30 completed listings but only two sales, and let that tell you more about if an item is worth the trouble to try and sell.

You could also throw up an ad on Craigslist for the batch of the magazines, and see if you get any bites, if you want an ebay alternative.

Re. National Geographics magazines, the June 1985 "Afghan Girl" issue is traditionally the big seller among non-early (think 1800s) issues, but I think the markets' already peaked.