A pair of super-rare items found in an attic turned out to be worth far more than expected.
Owen and Conner Gray bought the Pokemon cards to form part of their impressive collection – the largest in the world, according to Guinness World Records, who verified the achievement back in July.
Their joint collection boasts some 48,339 unique items, beating previous record-holder Benjamin DeGuire’s 34,310. But there are two cards the Grays are especially proud of.
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The cards were found in old shopping bags in someone’s attic and the siblings purchased them at auction, but they were stunned to find out just how much they were worth.
Owen said: “There were probably about 3-4,000 cards just thrown into JD Sports bags and in that combination were two gold star Charizards, which today are worth anywhere between £5,000 and 25,000 each. They weren’t in bad condition at all.”
The pair also have cards in almost every language, aside from Dutch. “Anyone with any Dutch first edition, let us know,” Owen said, after Conner said they had been “impossible to find.”
Their collection is stored in a series of folders “in order of history”, with the rarest and most precious cards graded and kept in special protective packaging.
Their achievement was posted to the Guinness World Records Instagram page recently, where the pair revealed they’ve “gotta catch them all” and have been collecting cards since they were in school. People were quick to comment on the viral video, with one person writing: “The Bro is rich without being rich.”
Another added: “Congratulations,” followed by two confetti cannon emojis. “Super fun record.” “When you have so many cards that not even Charizard could burn through your collection before you retire,” said a third.
Others were convinced their passion for Pokemon could see them beat the record. One person wrote: “Nah I know some people with more for sure.”
According to TCGPlayer Infinite, you can spot a rare Pokemon card in a few different ways. Firstly, its ‘rarity’ symbol can be a good indication: a black circle indicates a common card, a black square is uncommon, a black star is rare and a black star with the word ‘promo’ across it is a promo card.
A card featuring holographic art is known as ‘holo rare’ while a “non-standard card frame or Rule Box Pokemon” is “at least ultra-rare (probably)”, according to the site.
A rainbow hologram is known as a ‘rainbow rare’ and a card with a gold border is a ‘gold rare’. If the collector number is higher than the set number, it is a ‘secret rare’.
Unusual rarity symbols include “Legend”, “Rare holo star” and “Amazing rare”. Ultra-rare and secret rare cards have white rarity signs.