Oftentimes when I am at a client’s home, they hand me boxes full of boxes. Books are things that are easy to collect. They hold countless facts, tell us tales and invite us into the lives and minds of the author. They are amazing and usually treasured parts of a household. But they also take up lots of space and weight a lot – so thus are easy candidates to purge whens simplifying a home.
People tend to think that books should hold their value, particularly those of popular authors. But this is not necessarily true, which is a shame considering the effort gone into producing them. I’ve had to tell many a hopeful client that out of the hundred books they’ve given me, that likely only 10% or so will sell for more than $5. The rest? Probably not worth much more than a couple cents.
Here’s some guidelines on re-selling books:
- Popular fiction author’s rarely hold their value. They are so mass produced in multiple editions, that the bookstores get flooded with them. Which means the resale market for them is rather limited.
- First Edition / First Prints of some of the author’s first titles do hold some value
- Signed copies, if not personalized, can increase their value
- Selling a huge set of an author’s books can increase the value. For instance, I once sold a set of 14 hardback Steven King books on eBay for $37. On Amazon Marketplace, each was only worth a penny.
- Hardbacks usually have more value than paperbacks.
- Small release books hold their value best. If there are less copies in production, then there may be more demand.
- The better the condition of the book, the better the value.
- Books with writing inside are not generally of interest to others
- Books with clean covers and minimal shelf wear can be sold for a higher value
- Non-fiction books that aren’t outdated tend to do better than fiction.
- Mass produced book of any sort generally don’t have a lot of value – if you bought it at a wholesale club, then it’s probably not going to sell for a lot.
- Textbooks only have value if they are still being used in courses somewhere. It’s best to sell them as soon as possible after your course ends, and a few weeks prior to the beginning of a semester. And just because it’s not in use at your campus and your bookstore won’t buy it back, doesn’t mean other colleges and universities aren’t using it.
- Books from book clubs rarely have value. This includes Reader’s Digest collections, and the like.
Usually with each client I discover a few gems that have unexpected value. So the process of going through a stack of books is worth the while and it only takes a few moments to check. And then I get inventive with putting lots of books together to sell as sets on eBay – either in groups by author, genre or topic. The rest get donated.