And you don't even have to leave the house

One of the best parts about jumping into the blogging community is the stuff you learn. And I'm not talking about the sets, or the player bios, or the companies or any of that. You learn it; don't get me wrong. I'm referring to the parts of the hobby you never really looked into before.

I remember, years ago when I went to shows, seeing discount boxes, and NEVER looking through them. Ever. I guess I had some kind of "I'm better than you lowly discount losers" air about myself. Like I was buying anything really amazing, important or expensive.

 Four packs of 1991 Upper Deck please.

Nick over at Dime Boxes made me realize the greatness available for a silver FDR (or I silver Washington should I feel compelled). It's now what I head towards first after I make a sweep of any card show. And with my more focused collecting, I get what I want, and who can beat the price. 

However, making it to the card show isn't always happening. Luckily, Listia and Ebay have done a decent job of filling in the discount needs. Now, with Listia credit "exchange" rate, I can't really say I ever picked up a card for a dime (30 credits). Closest was probably thirty cents. But I regularly hunt Ebay for dime cards, what I like to call virtual dime boxing. I simply sort all the cards by price+shipping/lowest first. I work through the list and place bids of 10 cents for any card I would like that has free shipping. 

Then I wait until it ends. 

If I win, then I have my dime card without leaving the house. If I lose, who cares. 

Here's 27 cents worth of cards. The ripken at the front I actually broke the rule and bid 11 cents for, but I wouldn't go higher. Luckily, I didn't have to. The other two I scored for a nickel and a penny each. 

How about 4 cards for the bunting binder, from four different sellers, totaling 28 cents? The thing about show dime boxes: I don't see a lot of junk wax in them, but there are a plenty of junk wax cards produced that I want for my binders. So it's nice to sit in my jammies and buy cards before I hit the sack.

Come to bed, honey.

Throwbacks are the hardest to VDB. Not so much the quantity as most are rarely listed with a starting price of a penny and free shipping. And you can see why as I paid a dime for each one of these. But still good pickups.

Sometimes you have to dig. I got this nice Gomez for 9 cents. And along with it, I got 8 others cards. Lots go up enough with a penny starting bid. Takes a bit of digging, but if you can get the one you want, you can always PWE the other 8. Except in this case, when one of the other cards was a ChiSox I needed, so really, this card cost me less than a nickel.

So now you know my secret. No outbidding me or I will hunt down!