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Right now, it’s a tricky time of the year to invest in cards.
Basketball has been skyrocketing in price, and there’s a compressed timeline for playoff flips.
Early baseball season hype is still king, making it hard to find entry points.
Football doesn’t come back for about 5 more months, so quick flips are trickier there.
Of course, none of that stops us!
Here’s what we’ll dive into today:
• Investment Plays of the Week — Two solid investments you can make right now, one that’s short-term and one that’s perfect for a longer hold (Plus, several other options that pair well with these).
• Liquidity Sweet Spot — The small change I made that’s quietly increased my profits and helped 95% of my grading flips sell in 2 days or less.
• Grading Edge — Why most grading plays don’t actually work… and what has to be true for them to make sense.
• Real Deal Breakdown (Video) — A 5-minute walkthrough of a card I just bought, including exactly why I made the move
Here we go!
Investment Plays of the Week
This doesn’t constitute investment advice, more just a window into my overall strategy as well as for entertainment purposes. All pricing and screenshots are taken from Card Ladder—the only pricing & inventory tool I use.
#1. Dylan Harper Topps Chrome Autos
How I’m Thinking About It
Dylan Harper is a future superstar. I’ve heard things like:
“He’s a possible 1st Team All-NBA guy”
“He’ll be Wemby’s running mate for the next 15 years as they win championships.”
“If he were on a different team, he would be rookie of the year.”
How often do guys like that get to play real playoff minutes as a rookie on a championship contender?
I think the Spurs will win minimum 2 rounds, and that’s a lot of time for the world to fall in love with Harper.
And the downside if he doesn’t pop? You keep him until next year when he gets real playing time.
You could grade a clean copy, but with the playoffs happening now, I’m targeting a quick flip.
Specific Plays
2025-26 Topps Chrome Dylan Harper Auto #TCAR-DH
It’s actually gone down slightly in the past month, but it’s a highly-sought after card from a premium brand.
Target Buy: $200
Target Sell: $300 (Knueppel’s sell for $600)
Timeline: 4-6 weeks
Other Options:
Topps Chrome Rock Stars
Topps Chrome Helix
Topps Chrome Sapphire Selections
#2. 2025 Donruss Downtowns
How I’m Thinking About It
I almost put sealed Topps Chrome NBA boxes here as this class is STACKED, but they’re around $1k now. Still might be a good buy, but I’m I’ll keep checking to see if they drop (unlikely, but possible in the offseason).
However, Downtowns check a lot of boxes:
Valuable
Highly desirable (i.e., they sell fast, more on this in the next section)
Long track record of popularity
Right balance of not too scarce but not overpopulated
Gem at a very high level
My goal with these cards is to grade them (I’ve recently sent off a few), so the most important thing, over all else, is this:
Will it get a PSA 10?
So, let’s check GemRate’s universal search, specifically for a Lamar Jackson:
71% of these things are gemming! With PSA specifically, it’s 71.3% on 460 cards.
That’s a great sign that Panini did a good job printing these with few defects.
Target Buy: $250 - $500
Target Sell: Around double what I pay
Timeline: 3 months (Value Plus grading level is 45 biz days. Time to ship there & back, list, and sell pushes that to around 3 months. Sell immediately upon receiving.)
Other Options:
I mentioned Lamar Jackson (I’ve already bought 2 of these), but really, I think any of the most desirable cards in the set work. The key to look for is if there’s enough spread between raw and a PSA 10—I like to shoot for double. So, for example, the Brian Thomas Jr. Downtown sells around $315 raw, but only around $500 as a PSA 10. Not good enough.
On the other hand, a PSA 10 Lamar sells for $750 - $800 while the raw is ~$400. Lot bigger spread there.
The Liquidity Sweet Spot (And Why It’s As Important As Profit)
I’ve been operating a little differently with my card grades & flips over the past few months, and it’s drastically changed my profit margins.
Here’s what I’m doing
I’ve been focused on highly desirable cards designed to sell fast.
Here’s what I mean…
I spent too much time grading cards that I had just lying around. Or, I’d join a break, and have those cards sent to PSA. I didn’t really look at the brand or the card’s popularity.
Then, when it’s time to resell, there are two main issues:
#1. There are 500 other people selling your card “at comps” so your card just sits (unless you severely underprice it).
Or…
#2. You have a random card from a random brand that no one is really searching for. Then it also just sits on eBay.
The Switch I Made
Lately, I’ve been buying almost exclusively case-hit inserts or autos from desirable brands.
For example:
Donruss Downtowns
Prizm Color Blasts
Silver Prizms
Topps Chrome Helix
Topps Chrome Autos
There are plenty more, but I notice that selling those cards is incredibly easy, despite the higher price tags.
Why This is Critical
Speed is almost as important as profit.
It’s great to make 25% on a card, but what if it takes 6 months? You’d actually be much better off making 10% every 2 months, right?
When I’m buying cards to grade, I need to sell cards fast in two situations:
#1. When I get a card that isn’t gradable quality. I want to resell that sucker fast so that I can get that money into another card.
#2. When selling my graded cards. Again, I definitely don’t want that card to take a month to sell. I want 1-2 days. That’s how you create a profitable system.
Plus, when your sales drag on, you never know what’s going to happen to the market. I want to sell cards now because I know what the market is doing. If it takes a while, perhaps the card drops 30%. Now your money is tied up, and you’re watching it go down the drain. Not cool.
Selling Below Comps
In fact, speed is so critical that I frequently sell below comps. Yes, I know. I’m violating the hallowed sanctity of comps.
But speed means profit. Slow-moving cards kill everything you’re working towards.
When I combine a desirable card with a below-comps listing, my cards often sell within a day.
I recently bought a Lamar Jackson Downtown that turned out not to be gradable. I listed it $10 below what everyone else listed theirs for on eBay, and it sold in 1 hour.
Did I maybe leave $10+ on the table? Sure, but now I don’t have to check on that card later or even sort it into my inventory. It’s worth $10 to me to get it off my mind and put that money into another card.
Recent Investment Walkthrough
Fast Takes
Random Things I’ve Been Thinking About This Week
In mid-April, basketball is best for quick flips, while football is best for buying + grading because you’ll get cards back as football heats up. Baseball is best for those “always going to be valuable” cards, like if you wanted to grade an Aaron Judge rookie or a vintage card. Otherwise, the market for current guys is pretty high right now, with the playoffs still a long way off.
If the market is going to 10x in the next 10 years, a small (but loud) part of me wonders if I should put all my money into older stuff. Griffey prices going up with massive pop counts tells you everything you need to know about demand.
When flipping cards without grading, most people don’t lose money on bad players. They lose money from bad timing.
The fastest way to improve your results is to stop buying cards you don’t actually want (i.e., ripping boxes & joining breaks).
Thanks for reading my first issue of HCL Investor! Most importantly, I could really use some feedback to see what I can improve and what you liked.
Do you have 1-2 minutes?
Some recommended products in this newsletter are affiliate links. If you purchase, I may earn a small commission. Every recommended product is something I’ve used and would personally recommend to a friend.
The content in this newsletter is for entertainment purposes only and is not intended to be actual financial or investment advice. Please do your own due diligence before investing your money.
