Counterfeit records first appeared on the market in the late 1960s or early 1970s and while the early attempts were rather obvious and fairly crude, technology has improved in recent years, making many counterfeit records difficult for the layman to identify. The practice isn’t limited to rare or valuable titles, either, as a number of mass-produced titles were counterfeited in the late 1970s. These titles were sold by chain record stores alongside the legitimate record company issues.

What the “common vs. scarce” factor means is that the most valuable record by a particular artist may not be their best-known title, but rather one that was disregarded by the public and/or critics when originally released, making it relatively scarce today. A good example of this would be Music from the Elder by Kiss, released in 1981. Released after a string of best-selling albums, Music from the Elder had a different sound from their previous releases and offered no hit songs and no songs that regularly received airplay. As a result, the album sold poorly and soon went out of print. This online edition of the Rare Record Price Guide is the largest and most comprehensive ever. It has been compiled by the expert research team of Record Collector, the world's leading magazine in the field. Collectors are interested in buying records in the best possible condition, and ideally, they’d like to own copies of all of their records in the same condition in which they were originally sold – mint and unplayed, with pristine covers. It also really important to consider how you want to sell your record collection. There really can be potentially two different values on a record collection. One is the individual selling value and the other is the bulk selling value. What ever type of collection you have I am always keen for you to get in touch. Of course I may want to buy your record collection, but I’m also happy to just offer some advice and options as to what you could do with it depending on your circumstances. Please do get in touch with me here.The list of qualities that can affect a vinyl record’s value is constantly changing, and the list shown below should not be considered to be definitive. As this post on vinyl records value is going to be fairly lengthy, we’ll divide it into sections. Vinyl Records Value Categories Old records” may have some value, but as a rule, it’s not because they’re old. It’s because of something else. The difference in price can range from modest to quite significant, depending on the artist and title. A sealed copy of a relatively recent release may carry a small premium over an opened copy, but older and/or more desirable titles may exhibit a substantially larger premium. Sealed copies of older albums by the Beatles might sell for as much as ten times the price of an opened example, for instance. They can also be played on a turntable and are often used to evaluate the sound of a song or an album prior to putting it into formal production. While acetates can be played as one would play any regular record, they don’t wear particularly well and will become quite noisy after only a few plays. In this post, we’ll go over a number of factors that may determine the value of a particular record. Keep in mind that there are many factors that need to be taken into consideration, and it’s quite rare for a record to be valuable based on one factor alone. It’s usually a combination of things that add to a vinyl record’s value, and other factors can sometimes turn a valuable record into one that isn’t worth all that much seemingly overnight.

When it comes to a vinyl record’s value, condition is paramount, and worn copies of a record usually sell for modest amounts of money except in the cases of items that are rare to the point of being unique. On other occasions, a record may be issued only as a promotional item. Such albums may be live recordings, made for radio broadcast, or perhaps compilation albums, again intended to stimulate airplay. These “promo-only” releases are usually sought after by collectors, though the interest in them will be directly related to the interest in the artist. A promo-only Rolling Stones record, for example, will attract far more interest from collectors than one by Andy Williams.As with acetates, test pressings are usually used for evaluation purposes by record company personnel, though they are occasionally sent out as promotional items. As they are rather unusual and limited in production to just a handful of copies, test pressings are highly regarded and sought out by collectors. Sometimes, test pressings may contain different versions of one or more songs from the commercially released albums. This can also add to their value. Launched in 1987 and published bi annually - the Rare Record Price Guide 2022 is the16th edition of the World's most comprehensive guide to prices of UK releases from 1950 to the current day. These pressings are highly regarded by collectors for both their unusual appearance and their sound quality. Prices for foreign (non-U.S.) records can vary widely, depending on age, condition, and all of the other factors mentioned in this article. In general, collectors in the United States will always be interested, to some degree, in any foreign record by artists whose records they collect. Sometimes, foreign pressings may have different titles, or different covers from the more common versions from the U.S. or UK. On other occasions, record companies in other countries may choose to press albums on colored vinyl.

Record changers, which were phonographs that were capable of playing up to a dozen records in sequence, were popular in the 1960s and 1970s and were particularly prone to adding scratches and abrasions to a record’s playing surface. Many covers were poorly stored, leading to ring wear or splits in the covers. Furthermore, owners often wrote their names or other information on the record’s cover or label. Condition matters a lot. In the 1960’s most of the earlier 1960’s Lp’s sold in Mono around 1966/67 even numbers of Mono and Stereo records were sold and in the late 1960’s most were sold in Stereo. So another great example is the very first issue from 1963 of Please Please Me by the Beatles, it’s worth so much more in Stereo than Mono. One simple reason scarcity, hardly any were sold in Stereo. Move forward 6 years and look at yellow submarine. This sold way more in Stereo than Mono. Which ones worth more… Mono. Again scarcity is what pushed the value up. One factor that’s of vital importance in determining a vinyl record’s value is condition, which we’ll discuss at length later. Because the condition of a record is held to be important by collectors, the ideal example of a record to own, in the eyes of many collectors, would be one that has never been played at all. Because of this, collectors will often pay a huge premium for sealed, unopened examples of records they are seeking.One factor that can influence vinyl records value is having the autograph of the artist on it. While autographed albums and single aren’t particularly common (while forgeries of them are), they usually do command a premium over regular copies of the record that are not signed. Autographed records with provenance, such as a photograph of the artist signing the record, tend to bring the highest prices of all. A warped record often produces inferior sound due to the physical shifting of the vinyl, which means a collector won’t be willing to pay as much for it. Rare records with slight warping issues may still sell for large sums, but it’s best to take warping on a case-by-case basis. • Scratches: If your record has deep scratches on either of its sides, you’re likely to deal with sound issues like skipping , noise, and distortion. These issues can take away from the resale value of an album, and they’re common problems in records that are stored improperly. In the case of records that are common to moderately rare, anything copy that isn’t in something close to new condition may have little to no value at all.

People have tended to take better care of their records in recent decades, so it’s a lot easier to find a nice copy of a 1980s album by Bruce Springsteen than it is to find a near mint 1960s album by the Rolling Stones, for example. Record collecting is a fascinating hobby, however, and the many factors that can go into determining vinyl records value are among the things that keep the hobby interesting to collectors. We have written an extensive article about white label promo records; you can read it here. (new window) Many of the people we’ve spoken to about records over the years have the impression that “old records” must be worth more than new ones. While the age can have an effect on a vinyl record’s value, it’s one of the less important factors. Releases from early in the career of a famous artist may have more value than those from later in their careers, particularly if they didn’t become famous right away. A good example of this would be the recordings of Elvis Presley. While his first five records for the Memphis-based Sun label sold reasonably well for their day, their sales figures were minuscule compared to those of his later releases on RCA, making the Sun versions fairly valuable.

However, it can be tougher to figure out exactly what year the specific pressing of an album was released, especially if that particular album was issued pre-1973. On top of that, a record from the 1950s or early 1960s will often be worth more than one from the 70s or 80s. We have written a more in-depth article about test pressings and acetates. You can read it here. (new window) This factor is pretty straightforward when it comes to vinyl records value; records that sold well and are quite common are going to be less valuable than records that sold poorly or are hard to find. A lot of albums sold in the 1970s and early 1980s sold millions of copies when new, and as such, it isn’t difficult to find copies in nice, playable condition. Sometimes an artist will release records on a small label and then move to a larger one. In these cases, their earlier releases tend to be more collectible than their later ones. The country group Alabama released a couple of albums on the small LSI label under the name “Wild Country” before changing their name and moving to the large RCA label. As the records by the group issued by RCA sold quite well, they tend to sell for modest prices. The two albums on LSI, on the other hand, are quite rare and sell for several hundred dollars or more when they’re offered for sale.