How are you guys doing collectingwise?

[kizu]

I've slowed down a -lot-. Mostly because I can't find a lot of things to buy that I like even if many people are selling, most it seems are mostly "culling". Although this year and late last year, I've seen a couple of great cels pop up, but since they're not my main collecting habits, I've passed.

There are still some cels I want from Japanese collectors and sometimes even pop up on YJ but the JPY exchange rate is prohibitive when dealing with large ticket items. Thankfully some understand so I've been able to defer some purchases until things get better (I really have a problem overpaying LOL)... however looking at the trends and forecast of some banks with regards to USDJPY rate, it doesn't look like it'll let up in a year. We'd be lucky to see it go a little over 100 in a year (if it does happen it'll be short burst because any currency will likely experience an upward swing if it's been down for quite some time - natural law of currencies), it'll likely come down again like a see-saw after hitting a price ceiling... Certainly we will not be seeing 120's anytime soon. Some predict even up to 2011. Perhaps once I accept "reality", maybe I'll go back to YJ/Japanese sellers.

[Captain Haddock]

I haven't bought anything since August when I got my last NS cel. Mostly it's because of financial reasons in that I'm thinking quite seriously about a new PC as I got my current one back in 2004 so it's getting a little dated. Also coupled with this I'm getting more fussy, I look at things once go 'hmm' then again and go 'well' and then finally 'nah' most of the time nowaday's. Having said that as I've just got into bleach I might start building up a collection as you can get some decent material for not too much by the looks of things.

[majinuub]

For 2 years I've been a lot more selective about what I want to buy. I'm thankful that I've come to this decision as I've seen a lot of DBZ cels for sale that I wouldn't hesitate to buy back then. I personally see this as a good thing as I've become more appreciative about the production art I currently own. The current recession and the yen/dollar exchange rate is contributing to it as well. I only bought a few production art last year and so far only 1 sketch lot.

[Caroline]

the economy has 100% affected my collecting, sadly. i will still make purchases and consider artwork if they are special pieces, but i am disciplining myself.

[duotrouble]

I took a break in Oct. 2007. Here it is just over a year later and I'm still not that active. I limit myself to one piece a month on average but I'm not really looking either. It's much better than the one piece a day I was doing.

I'm all about fine tuning and being extremely picky now. Plus, my interests have turned more to working on decorating my house and traveling.

[redwolf]

If I don't count the hanken I bought from BWA, I'm pretty sure I haven't bought any production art since last April. While I'm not checking as thoroughly as I used to, I still check every day or every other day, so it's a little depressing. While it does affect me that 10K yen is $117 instead of the $90 it might have been a couple years ago, if the right art appeared, it wouldn't matter. Unfortunately the "right art" these days is quite selective and from series where nothing at all is coming up for sale.

(not counting the Anicyo one I never requested to be shipped).

Never requested? What happened to it, then?

I see a cel has popped up for auction from an anime that I wanted to see something from for several years.

I'm curious, so if you're willing, please message me the title.

But I've still been keeping one eye open on the Ichigo market, and have managed to snag some really nice things.
Been slowly adding to my Ranma collection as well, but that's about the extent of it.

Nice to see Ichigo and Ranma sketches and cels are still on a small portion of your mind. The rest is still on dolls, I bet your avatar. I'd bet mine too, but it's gone on vacation.

[aernath]

Heh. Actually. Got a big fat tax refund check coming in hopefully later this week. And I've been angsting for a week now, trying to decide what to spend it all on. New doll, or Ichigo sketch sets from Midori.
Oooor. Pay some cc bills.
But why would I be responsible NOW? After all these years?

[Keropi]

I heard that the Federal government wants to keep the U.S. dollar weak because they don't want there to be as big a difference between the value of the US Dollar and Canadian dollar/Mexican peso. They're planning on building that international port in Mexico so that they can bypass the wages they have to pay the dockworkers here in Los Angeles. A lot of the ships from China will unload there so the shipments can come by rail and truck into the U.S..

The weaker U.S. dollar helps trade from certain special interest's perspectives. If that is their main motivation for weakening the U.S. Dollar then it might remain weak for quite some time (unless if Japan feels like weakening their own currency).

I wonder how far they've progressed with that ?Baja California port? Anyone know? I know that Mexican billionaire was finalizing the best location to build it about a year ago. An article about the future Mexican port was featured in the Los Angeles Times some months back.

I saw a funny article in the LA Times recently discussing new regulations for Los Angeles port traffic emissions. They're not going to have to worry about emissions later on. Just let them build that Mexican port and the emissions will decline on their own.

Never requested? What happened to it, then?

I don't know. Maybe it got resold. There was too much difficulty figuring out the right way to use the Japanese webpage interface. The Japanese pages didn't show properly under my Japanese translation software program. Hopefully someone is enjoying the sketches right now. The seller received his money so I'm sure he's happy about the original sale.

It wasn't a must have sketch set for me anyway since I already have sketches from that series. If Stephen resold them, that's perfectly fine by me. I would expect him to do so. I had already paid for everything except the final shipping to me anyway.

[kittens]

We bought a house and now we bought a new car.... So we are totally taking advantage of buyers market... But since I bought really expensive cel my hubby limited my cel collecting So I am stopping right now....

[toonybabe]

I thought I would be slowing down a lot more and to a certain extent that is true, but I am just now starting to realize how much the cel market has changed in America. Its definately a buyer's market now. I just won a Secret of NIMH cel on Ebay for well under $200, when it should have gone for $400 - a year or two ago it would have. And on the same day I bought a Chipmunk Adventure cel for $20. I couple of months ago they were going for $250!

Soooo, I thought the economy was going to make it harder to purchase cels, but if I keep coming across deals like these I WILL be able to afford to collect and pay off credit card debt at the same time. Also, I think more and more people will be forced to sell off part of their collections for financial reasons, so I might be seeing some wishlist appear more often. I think thats sad, but I am glad it befefits the buyers in the end.

I am really going to try and stay away from the Japanese cel market. That will pretty much mean no more Inuyasha or Unico cels - unless they are going for extremely cheap. Mandarake's last BWA pretty much wiped me out financially and to a certain extent mentally. I didn't know the exchange rate would force me to pay hundreds more than what I first thought. I just can't do that anymore. I made some HUGE purchases last year, both American and anime production art. I just need to be thankful for what I have and fly under the radar for awhile.

[Keropi]

Well it makes sense. That could have been why I seen that cel from the show I've never seen anything from before. It could very well be someone who sold it off for some much needed cash.

Here's to seeing artwork from shows we've never seen anything from before.

I've only got eleven older series left to find artwork from of which I check a link for every day.