Pricing + Comps
Every card in your collection has a live "comp value" — what it would realistically sell for today. Here's where that number comes from, when to trust it, and how to dig into the underlying comps.
Where prices come from
SlabTrack maintains a database of ~3 million cards with prices sourced from sportscardspro (which aggregates eBay sold listings). The pricing chain, in priority order:
- Exact match by cert number — if your PSA cert is in the database, you get the most precise price
- Exact match by player + year + set + parallel + grade — second-best
- Player + year + set + grade (no parallel) — base-card fallback
- Player + year + set — raw card fallback
- Player + year — last resort, often inaccurate
The card detail page shows which level of match was used. If you see "Match: player + year" the price is a rough estimate; if you see "Match: cert number" it's typically within 10% of true market.
Prices by grade
For PSA-graded cards, SlabTrack tracks separate prices per grade. The card detail page shows:
| Grade | Typical multiplier vs. PSA 9 |
|---|---|
| PSA 10 | 3-10× |
| PSA 9 | baseline |
| PSA 8 | 0.5-0.7× |
| PSA 7 | 0.3-0.5× |
| Raw | 0.4-0.8× (varies wildly) |
Multipliers are extreme for modern cards (PSA 10 vs PSA 9 of a Burrow rookie can be 8×). For vintage they compress (a PSA 10 1986 Topps Jordan vs PSA 9 might be 1.5×). SlabTrack's per-grade prices reflect this; don't assume a flat multiplier.
Trend
The card detail shows a 30-day trend chart with a colored arrow:
- ↑ Green — value up > 5% in 30 days
- → White — flat (within 5%)
- ↓ Red — down > 5% in 30 days
Useful for spotting which cards in your collection are appreciating. If you're a long-term collector, you can ignore short-term noise. If you're considering selling, the trend matters.
Total collection value
Your dashboard shows total value as the sum of all comp values across your cards. Refreshes daily. If you imported 1,000 cards and your dashboard shows $25,000 total, that's the realistic liquidation value if you sold everything at comp prices today (minus shipping, fees, etc.).
For insurance, use the total comp value as your declared value. For "what would I actually get if I sold," subtract ~15-20% for fees, shipping, and time-decay during the sale process. For a quick fire-sale (consigning to a vendor), expect 60-70% of comp value back to you.
Manual price overrides
If you disagree with the auto-priced value (e.g. you have a unique parallel SlabTrack hasn't matched), you can manually override:
- Card detail page → Override comp value
- Enter your own value + a note explaining why
- Save
Override sticks until you remove it. The auto-comp continues running silently underneath — when you remove the override, the auto-value comes back.
Verifying a comp yourself
The card detail page has a View comps button. Click it to see:
- Last 10 eBay sold listings (date, price, image, link)
- Average, median, low, high
- Outlier flag (sales > 2 std-dev from median)
If the comp value seems wrong, scan the actual sales. Sometimes the database has a bad outlier pulling the price up — you can ignore it for your own purposes or flag it.
What's NOT in the comp value
| Factor | Why excluded |
|---|---|
| Sentimental value | Subjective, can't be modeled |
| Condition between grades | A high PSA 9 might sell as a low PSA 10 on a regrade — not modeled |
| Auto patches / on-card autographs (if not separately tracked) | Falls back to base parallel value if SlabTrack doesn't have the variant |
| Localized demand (e.g. team-specific in your city) | National average, not local |
| Future appreciation | Only present + 30-day past tracked |