$2.88M Baseball Cards & Rents: Prices Too High?

 

“’It’s no good, it’s no good!’ says the buyer- then he goes off and boasts about the purchase.” (Proverbs 20:14)

 

The ex-NFL football player, Evan Mathis, made headlines earlier this year when he sold his mint condition, 1952 Mickey Mantle baseball card for $2.88M.  $2.88M!  That’s $2,880,000.00 for a small piece of cardboard for those scoring at home.  It seems to be a lot of money for something that doesn’t love you back, you can’t live in or drive, and really shouldn’t eat.

 

When I collected baseball cards as a kid, I would have died to have a card like that.  I thought I was going to make it big with my 1986 Topps Dwight Gooden card (even though the 1984 was the one to have), 1986 Donruss Jose Canseco “Rated Rookie” card, and the 1988 Kevin Seitzer Fleer rookie card.  Alas, my dreams of million dollar baseball cards were undone by mass production, drugs, steroids, and fading play.  The value of even my best baseball cards for consistent players on the straight and narrow are worth very little now, even 30 years later.

 

But somehow Evan Mathis got someone to pay him $2.88M for one of his.  Wow!

 

As a Charlotte property manager, I’ve been seeing a real estate version of this play out in the past couple of years.  Rents have been going up steadily almost everywhere which has skewed the old values of what particular houses in different areas would rent for. 

 

For example, we had a rental house that rented in the $800 range in a non-desirable area last year.  A new owner took over the property, did some improvements, and wanted to rent it in the $1,300 range.

 

We talked about it and the conversation went something like this:

 

Owner: How about renting it at $1,350 a month?  As the expert, what do you think?

 

Me (expertly replying and wearing my glasses): The data I just pulled up would not support that price.  It looks like a much larger house rented for $1,150.  There has never been a house in that area that rented that high…

 

Owner: Hmmm… well list it at $1,350 anyway.

 

Me (expertly): Okay.

 

Ultimately, the house rented for $1,350 and was on the market less than a week.  So much for the “expert” opinion…

 

In hot markets, it’s really tough to gauge how much properties will actually rent for.  Beauty is in the eye of the beholder and it gets exacerbated by perceived scarcity. 

 

Years ago, I made the decision to adopt the rental pricing policy of “I recommend, but the owner can ultimately pick the listing price.”  I go off of data and will typically recommend what I feel the existing market pricing will allow.  However, that’s not always right.

 

Evan Mathis could have heard that expecting to get $3M for his 1952 piece of cardboard with Mickey Mantle’s photo on it was lunacy.  But someone, somewhere is bragging about buying it.  And he’s bragging as well! 

 

Happy Landlording!