Hypothetical gamer buy situation.

[garhkal]

Bringing this question over here from one of my ADND sites..

Lets say you have a neighbor who is doing a clear out of the belongings of a son (brother-husband etc) who either is no longer living there or passed away. You are scanning through the box of books and stuff, and come across say a pristine copy of (Insert book) for RPG XYZ. You ask the person doing the 'yard sale' what the cost is, and they say "20 bucks for the box".

Now you KNOW that the book (boxed set, what ever) you have just come across is worth at least 50 bucks ON ITS OWN..

Do you
A) pay her/him the 20, and take it, counting your blessings.
B) pay the 20, but tell the person, that item(s) XYZ are worth a heck of a lot more than that.
C) refuse to buy it, and let them know of the value of the item.
D) Other??

Would it make any difference, if you were actually friendly/knew said neighbor for a while?
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Confucious sayeth, don't wash cat while drunk!

[jawa1138]

If it were a random garage sale and I had no idea who the people were, I might even try to talk it down a bit more. I have no objection to scoring a super sick deal.
If you scored that same book on Ebay for 20 would you then offer the seller more?
Also keep in mind that values fluctuate and what might be a great deal today could be the average price in the future. Or worse. (My poor Star Wars toys collection)

On the other hand if it was someone I knew personally I would probably offer a bit more or tell them they could get more than what they are charging.

[cheshire]

If it was a neighbor, I would probably say, "I don't mind taking this box off your hands for $20, but you probably could do a lot better liquidating it on eBay or something." And (which is quite likely in my neighborhood) if they said that they just didn't want to bother with an auction getting the "market value," I would ask if son/brother/cousin/husband was okay with parting with it. If I knew them, I'd probably buy the box, and then double check with the relevant party and make sure he didn't want to take it back off my hands for the money.
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Before we take any of this too seriously, just remember that in the middle episode a little rubber puppet moves a spaceship with his mind.

[Whill]

I love it. Real ethical questions for gamers.

If the person is not researching the actual worth and just selling it for cheap at a yard sale, they probably don't want to bother with eBay or maximizing profit. They likely just want to get rid of it to downsize. Yard sales are usually intentionally priced to move items quickly, and the prices are usually negotiable. Unless I knew the person who the books previously belonged to, I probably would not consider if the person who the items had belonged to (if still alive) would really want to get rid of it or be mad at their mom/wife/whomever for selling their stuff they left behind.

If didn't know the people having the sale, I honestly would likely tell them that is a good deal, buy the item for the price labeled, but not try to bargain them down further.

In 1994, the mother of my girlfriend at the time was out yardsalin' and randomly found a copy of the original double album Star Wars soundtrack on vinyl in good condition for 25 cents, and she bought it for me. And the records play with minimum crackle! It's hard to explain why, but the album's personal value to me is even more because of who gave it to me, how they found it and how little she paid for it. It is a prized possession (and I would be p!ssed if my wife sold it without my knowledge).
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[ClaytonH]

Pay him what you are willing to pay (what you can afford or what it is worth to you) and inform him of its value. Even if you are unable to afford the cost of "retail" I am sure he will be thrilled from your offer and the fact you are being honest with him as you could have "cheated" him and got it for less.


If he demands more he is a jerk and deserves none of your money. If he accepts your offer then both parties can feel good about the transaction.

I have not had this happen with RPG items but for tools and specialty tools, even if all they were worth to me was half of their market value the person was happy to sell them to me at that price and I was happy to have gotten a nice thing I didn't need at a nice price.

[TauntaunScout]

If they think it's worth it to get them out of the house, buy them for $20. Don't rub it in by telling them they're worth more. Don't complicate matters by offering more.

As someone who buys and sells a lot of new and old gaming and vintage toy stuff on eBay, it takes more work than people think. It's not free money. Since they are explicitly disinterested in doing that work (as shown by them selling it at a yard sale) it's not like you're stealing from them. It's 2019, eBay and google searches are no secret.

Now, there's also a matter of scale. If a child was selling me a shoebox of Magic cards for $10 with a Black Lotus in it, that would be something else.

I've had some amazing scores over the years. The best was probably when someone traded me an $800 musket for a used mess kit. I also once found a complete copy of Heroquest with Kellar's Keep, and Battlemaster's, stacked next to someone's trash on the curb. I've found $400 vintage toys for $20. Or the time someone left a bunch of riveted chainmail on my doorstep cause they heard I liked armor.

All you can do is pay it back to the universe by helping n00b's get into the hobby for free by showering them in cool stuff for free or nominal fees. I find that the more I give away, the more of the above mentioned type of things happen to me.

[Whill]

[TauntaunScout]

Here's a real life example of the question.

A friend's work was having a fundraiser flea market/indoor yardsale thing. People donated stuff to sell and the place kept the proceeds.

He came to me and said "Someone dropped off this stuff. It's worth more than anyone will pay for it at this event. Will you buy it?"

The "stuff" was a pile of 80's SW memorabilia, including 12" Boba Fett and IG-88, an intact Kenner lightsaber, and several other less noteworthy things. I figured I could get maybe $200 for the pile. I gave him $50. He was glad to get $50 NOW, and not have to store the stuff FOREVER to make a bigger sale. $200 seems like a really good markup. Till you deduct 15% for eBay and Paypal fees, and the cost of shipping materials. Then divide what's left by the time you put into, and suddenly $50 seems only reasonable. In the end maybe I got $300? Not sure it was years ago now. But the point is everyone was happy.

If they are selling stuff by the box, the primary goal point is clearing out, not cashing in.

Boba Fett and IG-88 got me $50 apiece despite being incomplete, and I shoulda done them as an auction, I coulda got more, live and learn. At $50 a broken 12" IG-88 sold before I could finish listing Boba Fett!

[garhkal]

Wow.. How much did fett go for?
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Confucious sayeth, don't wash cat while drunk!

[Naaman]

I agree with others regarding the concept of a yard sale: SUNDAY! SUNDAY! SUNDAY! EVERYTHING MUST GO!

Now, as for an RPG book/set, I imagine the market for something like that (especially within the radius that a yard sale is likely to reach) is quite small.

Going by decisions I've made in the past, I can safely say that I would first check the current value of the item (google/ebay/etc) and then inform the seller of what they have, letting them know that I'd still like to buy it at the lowest price they are willing to sell it.

If the price they offer is something that I consider reasonable for a spontaneous purchase, then I'd buy it. If it's too much for me to spend on a whim, then I wouldn't buy it.

I walked into a gun store one day wanting to window shop some shotguns, so I asked the salesman if he had a very specific model/trim level of shotgun. He said, "yeah, this whole section of the wall right here: we've got a bunch of trade-ins from the police department."

Seeing as how they were used (and knowing that a new one would go for $800), I also noticed that some were labeled at $349 and some were labeled at $329. I asked, "what's the difference?" He said, "Actually, all of these are going for $275 right now."

Sold.

Not quite the same moral dilemma, but rather an example of being willing to make a purchase for something I didn't actually plan on buying that day because the deal was just that good (and I can safely assume that the seller would know the market value of a new one, which are not available for retail sale to a common citizen).

In retrospect, I should have bought three or four of them.

[TauntaunScout]