Author Topic: Place Your Bets! AFA Grading my FF Weequay  (Read 12897 times)

SilverZ

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Place Your Bets! AFA Grading my FF Weequay
« on: May 25, 2004, 06:58 PM »
Alright, I'm sending off a figure to AFA for grading and casing as an experiment. What I'm thinking is that once I get my collection room set up again (at some point, somewhere, in the future) I will want to only display a select few carded figures. Probably one of each modern era cardback, plus the exclusives, like TF Vader. I figured I'd do a test with Freeze Frame Weequay.

I thought it would be fun to see what everyone else would guess the carded figure's rating as. When it gets back from the AFA, we can see how their rating of it holds up to our own criteria. Here's the card, front and back:



Here's the AFA grading criteria is here:
AFA Criteria

I have three main concerns with the card.
- wear on the front bottom edge below the warning label.
- crooked front plastic J hook support
- scratch mark across J hook on rear (scratch, not crease)

Based on their "criteria" I'm going to place my bet as:

AFA 70

Anyone want to play along? :)


Offline jokabofe

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Re: Place Your Bets! AFA Grading my FF Weequay
« Reply #1 on: May 26, 2004, 12:12 AM »
i'll say afa 65 just to be different, but i think you're just about right on the money thinking a 70 there. should be interesting to see what they grade it. how much is it costing you to get this figure graded, if i may ask? i've been thinking about sending in some of my stuff to get graded, but i don't know how/where/how much it would cost me.

SilverZ

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Re: Place Your Bets! AFA Grading my FF Weequay
« Reply #2 on: May 26, 2004, 02:01 AM »
Yeah, this should be interesting to see what it comes back as.  It's more because I'm bored than I actually need someone to tell me what condition my stuff is in.

This is running me $28 bucks for the "Premium" service and another $15 for the UV coated case. The cost tier system is completely bizarre and is based on if its a vintage or modern figure, as well as it's "market value", which is lame because I paid $4.99 at Target for something that is now going for triple digits on ebay, so I get to pay more. The submission form was way overcomplex, too. I think it's to give the illusion of the whole deal being more official and archival than it is.

What's worrying me is that it'll get a 70, then my obsessive-compulsiveness will take over, and I won't be able to enjoy the figure because I need it to be perfect.  ::) As I said, this whole thing will be a big experiment for me.  :)

Offline DualSaberMaster

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Re: Place Your Bets! AFA Grading my FF Weequay
« Reply #3 on: May 26, 2004, 04:01 AM »
I place my bet on AFA giving it a 50 overall.  I personally would give it a 60+.  I don't have any experience with professional graders,just assuming they will be pretty thorough.
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Offline JediMAC

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Re: Place Your Bets! AFA Grading my FF Weequay
« Reply #4 on: May 26, 2004, 04:12 AM »
I'll let you know after I've taken a better look at it tomorrow Jared!   ;)  I'm curious too, and it was interesting learning some of the in's and out's of AFA figure grading from you earlier today.  Definitely only a small handful of modern figures really worth bothering with AFA, the FF Weequay definitely being one of them.  I'm anxious to hear how they resolve the "value" issue.

Do they actually ding you when grading the figure on stuff like a crooked plastic peg hook, or sticker (or even the figure bubble, for that matter)?

Whatever the hell they grade it, it's definitely a great figure to have.  I'm one jealous M.F.  One of the last two figures I don't own yet there...   :'(

Offline jokabofe

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Re: Place Your Bets! AFA Grading my FF Weequay
« Reply #5 on: May 26, 2004, 09:16 AM »
Do they actually ding you when grading the figure on stuff like a crooked plastic peg hook, or sticker (or even the figure bubble, for that matter)?

i'm 99% positive they do. same way when getting baseball cards graded they take into account the centering and overall straightness (is that a word?) of the card. not that i made it, but if i pull a griffey rookie out of a pack that's not centered, it's not worth as much as a centered mint one.

SilverZ

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Re: Place Your Bets! AFA Grading my FF Weequay
« Reply #6 on: May 26, 2004, 02:26 PM »
I'm sure they take into account the plastic alignment, too, as it certainly effects the visual presentation of the card. If only I was more "into" the carded side of my collection at the time I bought Weequay, I would have searched for a nicer card. Such is life.

Offline JediMAC

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Re: Place Your Bets! AFA Grading my FF Weequay
« Reply #7 on: May 26, 2004, 05:48 PM »
Alright, got a good look at this puppy a couple hours ago, and I'd go with the AFA 70 too.  Some slight edge and corner wear, and the crooked hook and scratch on the back will probably drop it down to that range since I think AFA is pretty strict with it's grading.  The rest of the figure and card look beautiful though!   8)

$55 (including return shipping and insurance) is damned expensive for getting that sucker graded though!   :'(

SilverZ

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Re: Place Your Bets! AFA Grading my FF Weequay
« Reply #8 on: May 27, 2004, 01:45 AM »
Yeah, its  pricey, but again, this is an experiment.  8) And I opted for the UV dealy. It's off in the mail to them now. We'll find out what they give it.

Offline Morgbug

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Re: Place Your Bets! AFA Grading my FF Weequay
« Reply #9 on: May 27, 2004, 10:37 PM »
AFA scares the hell out of me.  Not because they grade stuff, I suspect they do a pretty darn good job of it.  But I don't trust them.  

A friend of mine from snowtroopers.ca and a guy I've traded with a lot lives up in the Yukon, so he's a fair piece away from them.  He sent in one of his toy fare Vader's to be graded.  He got it back, around AFA70 which is pretty poor, but not all that surprising considering how the fan club packed them up, ala Amazon.com.  The problem is that this guy is positive that AFA sent him back the wrong Vader.  He knows his didn't have certain markings that it came back with.  He commented and AFA responded that they received it in that condition due to his poor packing job.  That is utter bullsh!t as I've received his packages before and they are packed well and carefully.  The guy's an anal carded collector.  His assertion, with no recourse, is that AFA flipped him an inferior Vader and took his.  

So, due to my overwhelming cynicism about AFA, I grade yours as a 60.  

I completely agree with Matt, this is one of the very, very few modern figures that merits an AFA rating.  The other two HTF FF would be others, Toy Fare Vader, Jorg Sacul, maybe Dagobah Vader with Secret Luke sticker and if by some miracle, you found an Ephant Mon that wasn't bent in some way.  Anything else?
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SilverZ

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Re: Place Your Bets! AFA Grading my FF Weequay
« Reply #10 on: May 28, 2004, 12:01 AM »
Quote
His assertion, with no recourse, is that AFA flipped him an inferior Vader and took his.  

And some schmuck sent in a low graded one and got an AFA 90 instead. That's frightening. Did he send in the TF Vader right in that period of time when they were just arriving? I could imagine that if so they probably had in inordinate amount of the same figure floating around their offices, though that's certainly no excuse.

I appreciate your point on trust for these folks. Their site doesn't offer a lot of assurance about their process, either. It mostly seems to point to the added resale value their process brings. Which isn't my goal with the figure.

What I hope, personally, is that I have enough resolve, regardless of the rating, to be happy with the "graded"quality of the figure for my display. I'm not known for very secure or content with what I have, and tend to look to the next big thing... getting an AFA 70 figure may prompt me to upgrade to say, an AFA 85 one off ebay, which is a road I have to build my resolve to not go down.

Again, this is turning into a multi-layered experiment for me.  :)


Offline JediMAC

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Re: Place Your Bets! AFA Grading my FF Weequay
« Reply #11 on: May 28, 2004, 07:56 PM »
I completely agree with Matt, this is one of the very, very few modern figures that merits an AFA rating.  The other two HTF FF would be others, Toy Fare Vader, Jorg Sacul, maybe Dagobah Vader with Secret Luke sticker and if by some miracle, you found an Ephant Mon that wasn't bent in some way.  Anything else?

Heck, even on Sacul and the Dagobah Vader you'd wind up paying more than the figure's worth these days.  I'd say aside from the FF Weequay and TF Vader, the only ones really "worth" sending in would be the several other triple digit figures, like the SOTE tooling Vader on green card, the "Collection 1" Boussh Leia on SOTE card, and perhaps the FF Sandtrooper.  Maybe even the POTJ MOTDS set as well.  I suppose the Sacul is still worth throwing their way though, if you've got the extra cash.  Though an Ephant in real nice shape is VHTF, even that's not technically worth the money it would take to get it graded.  But I suppose it'd be a nice "bragging piece" if you had an AFA 80+ Ephant to show off to your pals...

P.S.  Anyone looking for an AFA graded Bail Organa?  You can have this one off of eBay for the low BIN of only $33.  Better hurry though!   :P

« Last Edit: May 28, 2004, 08:05 PM by JediMAC »

Offline JediMAC

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Re: Place Your Bets! AFA Grading my FF Weequay
« Reply #12 on: May 28, 2004, 08:08 PM »
BTW, here's an AFA 90 Weequay.  Sitting at $400 with no bids yet (4 days left).



And here's an AFA 85 for $430.  No bids and 3+ days left...



Good luck with yours Jared!   8)
« Last Edit: May 28, 2004, 08:10 PM by JediMAC »

Offline jokabofe

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Re: Place Your Bets! AFA Grading my FF Weequay
« Reply #13 on: May 28, 2004, 11:27 PM »
Heck, even on Sacul and the Dagobah Vader you'd wind up paying more than the figure's worth these days.

i would have to disagree with that.

i'll be the first one to admit that i am not really up on my afa grading, and how important it really is to the hobby. but if it is anything like the cgc in the comic hobby - you are in for a shock.

i can take a comic book that would sit on any shelf across the u.s. and have it graded. if that book is graded high - i.e. 9.5 or above (they use the .0 system instead of the 100 system ::) - i.e. cgc 10.0 is the same as afa 100) - you can bet that book will now fetch at least $20. i've seen some "hot" books - books that are selling in the $8 - $10 ungraded market - sell on ebay for $500 and up with cgc grades of 9.8 and higher.

for example: one of the newer wolverine mini-series is called "the end". cover price was probably about $2.25 or so. here is an ungraded copy that sold on ebay for $.99. now, here's a copy that was listed on ebay with a cgc 10.0. it ended at $255 - reserve not met. that's a big price difference. and it didn't even sell because the reserve was not met. now, take into condsideration that a perfect 10.0 is hard - really hard - damn near impossible to come by. but you see that the cgc grading does have an effect on the prices people are willing to pay for stuff.

now, i did a little searching on ebay for star wars figures - current potf 95 and up only - and here are some of the auctions i found:

jorg sacul afa 100 - $395.99

afa 95 potj sandtrooper - $50

afa 95 saga o2 yoda - $39.99

episode 1 ric olie afa 90 - $51

now granted, again, an afa 100 jorg sacul is not an easy thing to find. but yoda? ric olie? my local rite aid probably has these figures still sitting on the shelves. i know for a fact they have ric olie. and i could probably go to a toy show this month and pick up a yoda for $3 - $5 tops.

just goes to show you that some people will pay extra for figures in great condition.

Offline JediMAC

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Re: Place Your Bets! AFA Grading my FF Weequay
« Reply #14 on: May 29, 2004, 12:45 AM »
Yeah, you're right to an extent there Dave.  I guess I was speaking more along the lines that I know for a fact that Jared has no plans of selling this or any other figures he submits to AFA.  But if you plan on selling, or if you're a buyer who only wants the best and from a trusted source, then yeah - AFA does wonders to the eBay value of an item.

In regards to the Sacul and Dagobah Vader, I was also just commenting on the fact that they've dropped in "value" a LOT over the last year, going for as low as $15 and $30 respectively from what I've seen.  So the $55 Jared's spending for AFA grading seemed substantially higher than those two values.  But you're right, if he wanted to sell 'em someday, they'd be much easier, and far more profitable, to move with a solid AFA grade attached to it.

But when I think of SW figure values, which is not very often, I usually just observe the going rate of a particular figure (in non-AFA graded condition) on eBay and call it a day.  That's what I consider the "market value" of something.  AFA is a totally different game, that really only seems to pertain to a very small percentage of collectors out there.  The serious skewing of a figure's value when graded by AFA is so far out of whack from the rest, that I don't even consider it really.  You know - remove the highest and lowest from a population, and then take the average of the rest.

Anyway, that's how I generally look at AFA.  It does wacky stuff to the brain...   :P
« Last Edit: May 29, 2004, 01:09 AM by JediMAC »