Sports cards can be expensive…but they can also be super cheap! Cards range from worthless to selling for millions of dollars.
So if you think you’re priced out because you’ve heard about the crazy sports card boom, you’re wrong.
To buy sports cards on any budget, you’ll want to stick to a budget, buy & flip boxes, potentially join breaks, scour dollar bins at card shows, and snipe eBay auctions!
Time vs Money
As with most ways to make money, it usually costs you lots of time or lots of money.
For example, you could try to make money with sports cards by buying up hobby boxes of NBA Prizm for $1k apiece…or buy Lebron James rookies…or Tom Brady rookies…you get the picture. Those are good ways to make money, but you’ve got to have a lot of cash to play with.
But for this article, we’re on the other end. We’re going to spend time. Sure, you might have to scour websites, card shows, and eBay listings, but that’s the required currency when you’re not able to spend cash.
So here we go – my 5 best ways to buy sports cards on any budget!
1. Give Yourself a Monthly Budget
This is the first, and perhaps most important, part of buying sports cards on a budget…you have to give yourself a budget and stick to it!
When I first got into collecting, I spent around $2k in 3 months. No, I didn’t really have that much money to burn…and yes, my wife was like “what the heck are you doing?!”
So I gave myself a monthly budget of $100.
I keep a spreadsheet where on one side I have income and the other, expenses.
On the first of the month, I add $100 to the income side. Whenever I sell anything, I also add it to the income side. On the other side (obviously) are everything I spend on cards!
This actually works pretty well for me. If I want something slightly more expensive (like the BGS 9.5 Prizm Anthony Davis rookie I just bought), then I need to either wait a month, sell some current cards, or flip a few boxes.
Buy & Flip Boxes
The next way that I collect cards on a budget is that I need a way to generate money that I can spend on cards! And the most sure way to do that is to find & flip sealed retail boxes.
Now, this can also go horribly wrong if you don’t know what you’re doing! Back in early 2021, pretty much ANYTHING you can find on the shelves at a store was something that you could flip for a profit online (and sometimes 5x – 10x what you paid!).
It ain’t that simple anymore, but it CAN be done!
The key is that you must do your research. You need to know ahead of time which boxes are likely to be resold for a profit on eBay before you’re presented with the opportunity to buy. I’ve purchased many times only to find out later that they weren’t selling for a premium online!
In those cases, I’ll often still sell to just recoup my money because I am on a budget.
The best brand to flip are typically the highest quality retail of both basketball and football. Baseball doesn’t have much that you can flip for a profit now.
Be on the lookout for:
- Prizm
- Optic
- Mosaic
- Select
Also, be on the lookout for severely marked up prices! Retailers have raised their prices on these so there often isn’t any margin left for reselling them (which is what a good retailer SHOULD do…).
My best bet has been Target.com. They usually drop new stuff once per week, around 5:30 – 6:00 am (mountain time). They change up the day, and since I get up at 5:30, I just pull up the app on my phone, see if anything new has dropped (it will show up as “out of stock” as a placeholder until they actually drop the product). Then click it until it updates and no longer says “out of stock.”
You’ll also need to sign up for their red card to purchase most things online. Don’t worry, you don’t have to get their credit card—just sign up for the debit card, set it up as your primary payment, and then toss the card in a drawer when it comes in the mail.
Once I see they’ve dropped product, I don’t check the rest of the week because I haven’t seen them do it twice in a single week before.
My example:
I recently bought 3 Mosaic Mega Boxes on Target.com. It cost me right around $150. I sold them on eBay for $210. After fees, I pocketed around $40.
Sure, $40 doesn’t sound like a lot, but I just increased my monthly budget by 40%. This kind of hustle is what you need to do if you’re on a tight budget.
Here’s my deep-dive guide into which sealed boxes produce the best ROI:
=> Which Basketball Card Brand is the Best for Flipping?
But Aren’t Flippers the Scum of the Earth?
Many hobby purists believe that flippers have destroyed the hobby they love and it ruins everything for the kids!
I find this laughable. We live in a capitalist society. If Target isn’t going to sell these at market value, then a market is going to arise for reselling these. It’s that simple. Much of the US economy is based on buying something cheap and selling it more expensively.
If anyone is “ruining the hobby,” it’s the people who are willing to pay the sky-high secondary prices. If they stopped buying, the secondary market collapses. But to tell flippers not to sell something for a profit when there are people itching to buy the product? Dumb.
And as for the kids? There are still plenty of products out there that aren’t worth flipping so they’re left on the shelf. There’s plenty for them left to collect.
“But if my kid wants to rip some Prizm?” Well what if my kid wants to drive a Ferrari? He’s still getting an old Camry. Same across every market—the high-end stuff is going to be out of the price range for most.
Sports Card Breaks
I’m on the record saying that I hate breaks…but some people love them! A $100/month budget keeps you from buying big singles. But, you can often buy a spot in a break for around $100 for a chance at high-end product. There’s a good chance you’ll get hosed, but if you’re a gambler and want a chance at something big, then jumping into a break might be the way to go.
Card Shows – $1 or $5 bins
These are gold. Cheap bins often draw the most eyes at any card show!
What’s fun about these are a few things:
- They’re cheap (duh)
- You can often get a discount (buy 10 cards out of a $5 bin and pay $45, for example)
- Because they’re so cheap, many big-time sellers don’t mind putting $10 cards in a $5 bin or a $3 card in a $1 bin. They’re worried more about volume on these cards…just getting rid of them while having more activity at their table.
Snipe eBay Auctions for Budget Sports Cards
Yes, eBay has a lot of eyes, but there are still plenty of ways to snag cards at less than market value!
The strategy goes like this:
- Auctions get their most activity in the last few minutes
- Many bidders will bid a small amount when they first come across the auction, and then plan to come back at the end to try to snag the card
- If the card ends at a weird time, you’ll have fewer people coming back to bid at the very end!
So…find auctions that end at weird times, like a Tuesday at 10am, for example.
Also, keep an eye out for auctions with zero bids that start at $0.99. I know as a seller I often have cards that I think will sell for $3 end with a single bid at the last second for $0.99.