Selling off vinyl LPs.

boogieman · June 2016

I'm coming to the conclusion that I don't play my vinyl LPs nearly enough to warrant keeping them. I've replaced most of the collection with the CD version anyway. I've got about 400 albums of mostly 70/80s rock and also some jazz stuff. What's the best way of selling it? Anyone had any experience of dealers buying a whole collection? Do they give decent prices? Some of the albums are quite collectable, though they're not mint, do dealers only buy albums in mint condition?

Just after your thoughts really. Ta.

mudslide73 · June 2016

All depends on the condition I think. VIP Record Fairs hand leaflets out about purchasing collections and I quote: "we do not cherry pick". If you know you have any rare stuff it'd be worth researching before you sell the collection as a whole and maybe selling individually. There's a load of info on the web to ID any potential gems/first pressings etc.

Also there's a guy selling an ex broadcast library of vinyl as individual auctions on Ebay. It would take you some time but you'd achieve the more value this way imo.

darcym · June 2016

I'd say work out the value and availability of them, the ones which are easy available just list them for sale on any record/music sites, or try to sell a job lot,

any that are a bit unusual use the vinyl collectors sites that are out there, some of the values are amazing a record that was £8 and not really of much interest to anyone is now £180 not because it's famous or even really in demand, it's just a small number of people who want it and it's long out of press, so it easy gets £180 when one is available.

darcym · June 2016

just for sport I'd thought I'd look in on the example album, £200 now.

boogieman · June 2016

Not sure I could be arsed to list everything individually tbh. Also I've never sold anything on eBay and I'm quite wary of doing it, that's why I mentioned dealers. Some fair points made though, thanks gents.

I know some of the albums are rare, for instance I've got John Surman's How many clouds can you see? which was worth a fair bit last time I looked it up in the Rare Records Guide. I need to buy an up to date copy to check prices actually. @darcym, what site were you looking at for prices?

stonevibe · June 2016

Discogs.com is the way forward.

Work out your price and list via there.

Bridgehouse · June 2016

If you catalogue them all on discogs then you can get a good idea of current market value and you can sell on their marketplace. Once you have a value then you know if a dealer is ripping you off or not.

I have about 600 catalogued on discogs at an average market price of £3.5k for the lot

lasermonkey · June 2016

We've been selling off the vinyl that we decided we can live without, which amounts to 200-odd records. So far we have sold around 75 of them and made about £1500!

After an unsuccessful couple of weeks on eBay, we went over to Discogs and haven't looked back. Their fees are a bit better, though PayPal is obviously as extortionate as usual.

Follow the Discogs grading system to the letter, and you shouldn't have any hassles.

We did try a couple of dealers, but they only wanted the choice stuff and were only prepared to offer a tiny fraction of what they are worth (ie actually sell for).

lasermonkey · June 2016

Oh, and condition is everything. Damage on the sleeve and/or record itself will knock a huge amount off its worth. Conversely, if yours is in amazing condition, you may well have people fighting over it!

boogieman · June 2016

I'll have to check out discogs. Thanks for the info.

Moss · June 2016

To make things easier, type the serial number so you know the version you have

(Example: this vs this)

Antique_Guitars · June 2016

I've been selling on Discogs for a while some personal stuff and some from the record label I run. Have sold 216 items to date, must be around 2ks worth