A rare Harry Potter book just sold for over $30,000
By Ariba Bhuvad
Imagine that you bought a Harry Potter book before anyone knew what it was, before it was a global phenomenon, before anything with the Harry Potter attached to it didn’t generate lots of money sight unseen. Well, there are a select few individuals out there in the world that have and/or are in this boat, and they stand to make out like bandits.
The most recent story to come out of this “I own a rare Harry Potter book” subgenre is about an anonymous someone who randomly bought a copy of Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone at a rummage sale for about £1 (approx. $1.20) around 20 years ago. Per CNN, this copy happened to be one out of 500 (yah, that rare!) with two typos in it, which actually makes it more valuable, not less.
So the shopper bought the book for just over a buck. Then, this past week, it sold for…*drum roll*…£28,500 ($34,500) at auction. Talk about profit margin, right?
Of course, this isn’t the first time a rare copy of a Harry Potter book has sold for a lot of money — in fact, rare copies have been known to sell for much more. But this is still a big win for the owner.
This particular story starts with the owner realizing she had the book, inviting over rare books expert Jim Spencer to determine the value, and the rest, as they say, is history. Spencer is reportedly inundated with inquiries from people who think they have rare Harry Potter books — as many as 50 a day at one point — but rarely are they the real deal.
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Think you might have one of these valuable early editions? Here’s CNN’s advice for spotting one:
"Books from the first print run can be distinguished by the two typos: the word “philosopher” is misspelled on the back cover, while the phrase “1 wand” is repeated in an equipment list on page 53. Additionally, on the copyright page, Rowling is identified as “Joanne,” rather than the initials “J.K.”"
To the bookshelves!
The book in our story was bought by an anonymous collector in the U.K. who now possesses one of the few things in life that will likely continue to become more valuable over time. What some of us would do to be that collector right now…
Next. First edition Harry Potter book with misspelled title sells for $90,000. dark
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