+6

Price Graph should include comparison data

Anonymous 7 years ago 0

In an effort to curb the tendency of certain "collectors" to ruin the hobby by acting like they are investors, I would like to suggest that PriceCharting add some controls to the price graphs that can enable some additional comparison data to be displayed on the price graph:


  1. The original MSRP of the game at launch.  This will show that most gamed depreciate in value from their original retail value.
  2. The adjusted MSRP of the game, adjusted by inflation.  This will show how expensive older games really were, and how most games that do hold some value to collectors, even those that are highly desirable to the point where people are now paying over the retail price for them, still do not outperform inflation.
  3. The performance of the S&P 500 over the time since the game was released, showing how much a real investment in the amount of the MSRP of the game into an S&P index fund would have grown over the time since the game was released.  This will show what a real investment portfolio is like.

Rationale: While the pricecharting service is great to help establish the values of games being sold in the secondary market, often times collectible sellers feel like they are justified in charging what a price guide says something is worth, simply because that's what the guide says it's worth, without taking into consideration things like condition, region, and other factors. Worse, over time sellers feel like they can charge a little more than guide in order to recoup their "business" expenses, and will point to charts showing a trending increase in price as evidence that collectibles are a good "investment".  This additional data would easily refute such claims, by and large, hopefully resulting in speculators dropping out of the market, which would tend to keep prices lower, which would benefit real collectors who want to own and play real copies of games, not hoard and "invest" in them.