Selling Vinyl

[RT/M]

I have lots of albums that i want to sell, some i guess are worth a small fortune ie lots of Beatles albums...... Can anyone recommend where would be the best places to get them valued and sell them TIA.

[fridaypassion]

Discogs?

[maccboy]

fridaypassion said:

Discogs?

What he said.

[P700DEE]

Valuation , the best place to start is as quoted Discogs. Selling is a different issue. Do you know how to grade your albums? Once you have found out which of the hundreds of versions of Beatles album you have you then need to be able to determine how close is the vinyl and cover to the day it came off the press it is? This has a massive effect on "value". If you can evaluate and use the "for sale" offers on Discogs to get a good idea of true value you can then sell. I've never sold on Discogs and would usually go ebay. Alternatively equiped with your valuation you could consider your local record dealer/shop. Expect to get about 50% of real value or 75% as exchange. Sounds awful but avoids the hassle of selling , shipping etc.

[balise]

This guy buys collections around London.

https://linktr.ee/brighterdayvinyl

[Arkose]

Unless they are a rare press or demo Beatles records are unlikely to be worth £££

but yes, discogs, download the app and search for the specific pressing edition, you can even scan barcodes if they have them!

[Chubbyross]

Arkose said:

Unless they are a rare press or demo Beatles records are unlikely to be worth £££

but yes, discogs, download the app and search for the specific pressing edition, you can even scan barcodes if they have them!

Yes, that's the thing with albums from the era of The Beatles and into the '70s: they sold in their millions, not at all like physical music these days. I have a few original Beatles albums I inherited from my parents. They're not valuable at all, sadly. If they're rarities then, yes, they may be worth a quid or two, but a standard album bought from Woolworths will be worth little.

[andy_s]

I have a modestly sized collection, about 600 LPs, and never thought much about their value until I started using Discogs [very good for getting that particular thing you want, not so good at discovering a turquoise Led Zep in a charity shop bin for a fiver]. I spent a few sad days going through them all and logging them on there and it's quite surprising what is valuable and what is not.

From the high days of vinyl it's about vgc first pressing / rare variation, the bulk of the rest tails off very quickly.

From the depths of the vinyl depression, when LPs were a rare afterthought of an optimistic record company, things were generally 'only pressing' anyway and are now very high because of the relative rarity.

In a funny way it's a double-edged sword if you still buy records; never been easier to find but never been more expensive / collection is theoretically worth a lot but adding to it can be costly.

Then you have the dilemma - do you go for an OG 1st press good+ condition or the new UHQR/Rhino audiophile pressing when both are similar prices...

Here are my top ten priced albums based on 'median' price/condition:

1995 The Bends/Radiohead 364
2000 Tom McRae/Tom McRae 297
1997 OK Computer/Radiohead 267
1994 Definitely Maybe/Oasis 242
2003 100th Window/Massive Attack 222
1997 Ladies and Gentlemen We Are Floating In Space/Spiritualised 215
1994 Grace/Jeff Buckley 210
1999 Bury the Hatchet/Cranberries 208
2002 Lost Horizons/Lemon Jelly 205
1999 Showbiz/Muse 198

...and I have a lot of early classics; Led Zep/Pink Floyd/Bob Dylan/Neil Young/John Martyn/Nick Drake/Jimi Hendrix/Cream etc etc, but they only start to appear much further down the list.

[I just worked it out that based on the median price/condition the average value for an album is 36, which is about the price of a new album anyway!]

It's the rueful '3.99' stickers on some of my albums that now fetch around a hundred that give me a pensive yearning for simpler times. Imagine the value that was thrown out in the CD era. Oof.

Edited by andy_s on Friday 20th March 16:27

[Gompo]

andy_s said:

I . Imagine the value that was thrown out in the CD era. Oof.

A decent amount, but then there'd be more around and therefore have less value than now.

[Mark V GTD]

I often think of going through my collection with a view to selling but when I do it just brings back memories and I put them back on the shelf. I don't have anything rare, well I thought I didnt until I saw a piece on line about the 'real zip' versions of the Rolling Stones 'Sticky Fingers' albums and pleased to learn mines worth £100.

Edited by Mark V GTD on Sunday 22 March 20:39

[skylarking808]

A lot of 90s albums are rising in price due to the fact not so many pressed on vinyl. The record companies were pushing cds. So as above if you have vinyl from bands such as Prodogy, Radiohead and Massive Attack or hardcore/drum & bass singles you will find their values increasing more than the classics.

Condition is everything so try and clean/grade records to maximise chance of selling.

[Malcolm E Boo]

Mark V GTD said:

I often think of going through my collection with a view to selling but when I do it just brings back memories and I put them back on the shelf. I don't have anything rare, well I thought I didnt until I saw a piece on line about the 'real zip' versions of the Rolling Stones 'Sticky Fingers' albums and pleased to learn mines worth £100.

On the other hand whats a complete Duran Duran vinyl collection worth - all the albums and 12" mixes? Probably not a lot and has more sentimental value to me so there they stay, for now.

The Wedding Album and Thank you are worth many hundreds.

They have just re-released them though

[Mark V GTD]

Sadly I have zilch from 90's as I went over to CD 100% in '86.

Just found a mint Abbey Road (Mobile fidelity Master recording) from about 1981 in the cupboard so thats a another £100 plus one in the bag!

Malcolm E Boo said:

The Wedding Album and Thank you are worth many hundreds.

They have just re-released them though

Apologies, I should have said 1980's Duran Duran collection as mine is only from the first half the 80's so hardly complete at all.

Edited by Mark V GTD on Sunday 22 March 20:40

[andy_s]

Mark V GTD said:

Sadly I have zilch from 90's as I went over to CD 100% in '86.

Just found a mint Abbey Road (Mobile fidelity Master recording) from about 1981 in the cupboard so thats a another £100 plus one in the bag!

Malcolm E Boo said:

The Wedding Album and Thank you are worth many hundreds.

They have just re-released them though

Apologies, I should have said 1980's Duran Duran collection as mine is only from the first half the 80's so hardly complete at all.

Edited by Mark V GTD on Sunday 22 March 20:40

It's worth checking, like all 'collecting/hobbies' there are depths of appreciation unknown to the casual observer; Japanese/Dutch raw vinyl was of a better quality and an Obi strip will increase the price further, mastering/re-mastering by renowned engineers like Robert Ludwig or Kevin Gray command a premium, very obscure bands may have pressed only 400 or so ever but influenced another, bigger group so collectors want it and price balloons, print errors or 'accoutrements' like leaflets or posters can also substantially increase value, certain labels had good reputations, the label itself can also be a factor. Then you just have 'zeitgeist bubble' stuff, you could have bought an Angine de Poitrine Vol. 1 for reasonable money a few months ago - now you're looking at several hundred. In fact Taylor Swift has probably caused a not inconsiderable amount of the latest resurgence in interest and a first press of her debut album again commands hundreds of dollars. [A major factor in purchase is to 'support the artist' amongst the younger set that sometimes don't even have the means to play it].

This is why 'record hunting' in car boot sales and charity shops used to have an element of the metal detectorist, you never knew what gem was hidden in the 'pound each' bin, although now it is so easy to check that those days may be behind us.

{PS I'm not really a 'collector' or 'audiophile', just things you pick up, nor do I have any intention of selling any of my albums either!]

[Mark V GTD]

Very interesting info, thank you! I have been warned not to dispose of items as a 'job lot' for those every reasons. Its a lot of work to do the research and, as you point out, not at all obvious what might be rare/desirable/ valuable, particularly when you bought the item at retail decades ago.

I'm shocked at the poor condition of many older albums you see on line - I guess they were not so coveted back then and had harder lives. I watched a retrospective review of Wings triple album 'Wings Over America' by John Heaton last night - his copy was all battered and shabby, as was an Instagram post about the Beatles 'White Album' discussing the original numbering system. Having said that of course these item are now 50 years old plus so age will tell.

Arkose said:

Unless they are a rare press or demo Beatles records are unlikely to be worth £££

I was surprised to see the comparatively recent 2014 Beatles mono re-issues consistently offered at £100 to £120 for the single albums, more for the double and trebles. Perhaps its due to the fact they were only available in the box set.

Edited by Mark V GTD on Monday 23 March 13:45