How to price a collectible from sold comps — the right way
Sold comps only give you a price if you read them right: pull real solds, cut the outliers, take the median for your exact condition, and check the sample size.
The mistake almost everyone makes is reaching for the average. Average a $5 junk lot and a $500 grail and you get a number that describes neither. Here's the method that holds up.
- 01
Pull only sold listings
Asking prices are fiction. Use what actually changed hands, ideally in the last 90 days, so the number reflects the current market and not last year's.
- 02
Separate by condition first
A near-mint copy and a beat-up one are two different markets. Doing the math across them blends two answers into one wrong one.
- 03
Cut the outliers, and know why
A suspiciously high sale is often a bidding war, a bundle, or a misgrade; a suspiciously low one is often damage or a rushed seller. Fence them off so they stop dragging the number.
- 04
Take the median, not the mean
The median is the middle real sale. It shrugs off the one weird result that a mean would chase.
- 05
Check the sample size
Three comps is a guess; twenty is a number you can defend. If the data is too thin, the honest move is to say so, not to invent precision.
That's the whole discipline, and it's exactly what FlipWorth does in one paste.