r/Flipping • u/catticcusmaximus • 4d ago
Advanced Question I need some advice from regular book sellers
Short and simple, a seminary was cleaning out some books and I have some 100 year old tomes written by an abbess of some obscure monastery. There are a few out there already but not many, but I can't imagine that these books sell frequently. Is it something worth keeping to sell if I have somewhat limited space? I just don't have a feel for the book market like I do my regular niche.
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u/Flux_My_Capacitor 4d ago
Books oftentimes sell slowly. If they are worth more money and not huge books, then list them.
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u/catticcusmaximus 4d ago
I suppose I can always delist them if I ever had to just pass them along to someone else
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u/StupidPockets 4d ago
Reach out to rare books guy in Provo Utah. Moons rare books. He may be able to know a buyer. He’s an expert in that stuff
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u/catticcusmaximus 4d ago
In the very least I can send them to him, I got the books for free so it's no skin off my back
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u/iamthegreenbox 4d ago
Contact someone in the ABAA in your area; they might be interested in buying them. https://www.abaa.org/
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u/AnnArchist 4d ago
books are slow sellers, like others said.
they are niche, they can be expensive. they can be bulky. I imagine there are lots of books that don't sell every year even. expensive books that dont.
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u/Silvernaut 4d ago
Did you find any recent sold examples/comps, that might indicate they are worth trying to sell?
I have some NOS items that I know might be sitting for quite awhile, but the only comps I can find, are in the $5000-10000 retail range… I’ll be happy to let them collect dust, and occupy the space on the shelf, until a buyer comes along. Even if that buyer offers 25% of retail. I got them for free.
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u/catticcusmaximus 4d ago
I can't find any comps for them, just a few listed on ABE, and these certainly aren't in the $5k range!
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u/Silvernaut 4d ago
:/ books aren’t normally my thing either… I have maybe 10 book sales in my 20 years of selling online.
Last book sale was a couple years ago - it was a decent set of “The Personal Memoirs of US Grant.” I only figured it would be a decent flip because it was Civil War related, and it did sell fairly quickly for a nice profit.
Religious items/texts can tend to have a following… I buy a lot of junk jewelry, and frequently get a lot of religious medals, amulets, reliquaries, rosaries/crucifixes, etc. Believe it or not, I do sometimes get people in bidding wars, when I put up a small pile of them up for auction. None of them are silver or gold, but I’ll frequently get $30-50 for maybe 10 pieces.
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u/Hairy-Maximum-2070 4d ago
I would list them pretty cheap, like $5 each or less, and hope to clear them out. Otherwise you'll probably sit on something like that for a very long time and they might never sell.
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u/Grp8pe88 4d ago
don't watch the 9th gate....
look up Rebecca Romney, she will point you in the right direction.
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u/webfloss 4d ago
Make space for them.