selling off cds

It is incredibly easy to get at least a rough idea of whether a CD is valuable - simply search amazon using the barcode number. Takes seconds and will identify what might be worth putting a bit more care & effort into getting rid of. Just use the standard amazon search box, but use the full 13 digit barcode number instead of artist title, as this will take you directly to the single listing matching that number.

Sorry, may not be 13 digits now that I look at a couple, but you get what I mean.

https://sellercentral.amazon.com/gp/ezdpc-gui/seamless-listing-start.html/ref=sc_site_map_smless_sml_ezdpc_lst?ie=UTF8&refsrc=sm

Offers a variety of ID numbers to enter to find comparables.

I looked up a few things by name that I had a hunch might be worth something. I found a few in the $20-30 range, but these are by and large not things I'm planning to sell, so I'm not sure it's worth the trouble for me to preserve all the inserts and such.

Probably the most expensive one I found is "Pachuco Cadaver", the Capt. Beefheart tribute by Eugene Chadbourne & Jimmy Carl Black, which is going for $40 used on Amazon. That one does come with a fun comic book insert which I'm planning to save anyway.

Is it even worth it or should I just toss my CDs / drop them off at Goodwill

Goodwill at least! Somebody will buy. But from what I've read and experienced, sure seems like most CDs outlast most downloads, maybe incl. flacs. I'll keep some of both.

imo check out sales on discogs for anything you think might be rare and put em up if it's worth it. was surprised by how much I got for a couple discs during my last purge.

I gave my friend's little brother my 15-20 binders worth of CDs - I don't think I'd even opened one in several years, my car doesn't have a CD player and anything that's not on Spotify or that I don't own on vinyl or iTunes... well, am I really going to miss the local label Christmas compilation from 1999?

He and his boyfriend are having music theme parties with my collection - so I guess there are a bunch of college freshmen trundling down the path of mid-90s ska for at least one night. Sorry, y'all.

Tidying my CD shelves, I found myself wondering what CDs are likely to be in the sweet spot on scales of worth lots v don't really care about.

I think discogs is your best best, sometimes it's really the unexpected stuff going for a decent amount.

Agreed. I'm sure there are variations depending on stores and locales but selling used music to stores just doesn't make sense anymore financially in my experience.

It's more of a pain in the ass, to be sure, but in my experience you get a lot better return by selling things off on discogs rather than in bulk to a store.

all the cds that i have that are actually worth anything are either old delted ones on small labels or collectors edition things where only a limited number were pressed. also any bbc sessions type things

"deleted"

I sold off about 300 CDs over the past year via discogs (some on ebay) and made in total around $3k. so unless you are in urgent need of immediate cash, and depending on what you have, I recommend it, particularly if yiou can sort out how to set up the shipping policies in discogs; I think a lot of people gave up and sellers left. Don't bother listing anything under $4, it's not generally worth it (people will buy but you wind up not making much after fees). I wish I'd done this with the other 600 CDs that i sold back at Amoeba a year and a half ago but I didn't really have time to list all of them until covid hit.

In the US media mail is necessary to make shipping cost-effective and that's a nightmare these days.