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MyBookWorth

Evaluating Book Deals

Work through this checklist before buying or selling a collectible book. Each item can move the price substantially.

Two copies of the same title routinely sell for €40 and €400. The gap is almost never the title itself — it is edition, condition, completeness and whether the dust jacket survived. This checklist is the order to check them in.

It is worth the ten minutes. Around seven in ten lots in our auction data sold for under €100, so the money is concentrated in a small number of copies that are right on every point below. Missing one of them is usually what separates the two prices.

Edition and Book Sets

  • Confirm if it's the full book set or just one volume
  • Check the edition number (First Edition vs Later Printings)
  • Verify the ISBN matches exactly (if applicable)

Author Signature

  • Verify if the book is signed by the author
  • Check if the signature is authentic (not a facsimile signature printed in the book)
  • Signed copies typically command higher prices

Condition Assessment

  • Check for damage (torn pages, water damage, spine issues)
  • Assess overall wear (yellowing, foxing, loose binding)
  • Note any repairs or restoration work
  • Verify condition matches seller's description

Dust Jacket Status (If Applicable)

  • Confirm if dust jacket is present (often 50-80% of book's value)
  • Assess dust jacket condition (tears, chips, fading)
  • Check if dust jacket is original or facsimile
  • Note any protective covers or repairs

Which of these actually moves the price

They are not equal. Judged across roughly 600,000 completed sales, the ranking is consistently:

  1. Condition, by a distance. For twentieth-century books the dust jacket alone commonly accounts for 50–80% of value. A first edition without its jacket is often worth less than a later printing with one.
  2. Whether anyone wants the title. Demand is not evenly spread, and no amount of edition status changes an unwanted book into a wanted one.
  3. A signature, if the author is well known. Within the same author, signed copies typically fetch about 1.63× unsigned — and for the biggest names far more. See what a signature is really worth.
  4. Edition, last. Lots described as first editions sold for only about 8% more than everything else, because the phrase is claimed far more often than it is checked — what a first edition is actually worth has the numbers, and how to identify one shows you how to verify it yourself.

When you have worked through the list, search for comparable sales and compare against copies in the same state as yours — not against the best copy on the page. Is my old book worth anything covers what to expect overall.