Star Wars figurines sell for thousands

Trade Me is famous for turning trash into cash. One of our members, Melonie found this to be all too true. After the passing of her mother, Melonie spent some time sorting through her belongings before she stumbled upon six unopened old Star Wars figurines with a $3 price tag. Melonie believes the toys were most likely bought as a present for her brother in the 70s. However, the toys had been forgotten and were instead left in the garage gathering both dust and value.

Tempted to chuck them in the bin, Melonie’s friend Sheryl offered to pop them on Trade Me for her instead. The women couldn’t believe their eyes once the bidding kicked off and the plastic figurines had collectors across the country going wild. Seven days later, Melonie had sold the figurines for a cool $52,350.

Receiving the most bids was the famed Princess Leia Organa figurine who received a whopping 178 bids with a winning bid of $6,050. Staggering figures for non-collectors and collectors alike.

That had nothing on Hans Solo, however, who received 115 bids and sold for a final price of $10,000. Luke Skywalker ($8,150), Darth Vader ($9,550), See Threepio (C 3PO) ($9,000) and Ben (Obi Wan) Kenobi ($9,600) also flew out the door.

Star Wars collectables often grace the pages of Trade Me and have fans forking out big bucks. Early last year a complete Star Wars Stormtrooper costume sold for $2,499. And 2021 saw Galactic Snackin’ Baby Yoda as one of Trade Me’s top ten toys. In the last two weeks alone we’ve seen over 25,000 searches for ‘Star Wars’ onsite.

This isn’t the first time that Trade Me has seen collectables reach out of this world sale prices.

Every year we see the number of listings surge each time New World or Countdown release a new collectibles range. In October 2020 a full set of New World’s Little Garden seed pots sold onsite today for a whopping $115, and in 2016 one member sold the full Little Garden set for $210 on Trade Me.

Among brand new collectables, Trade Me members love the golden oldies from rare banknotes to large collections of McDonald's Happy Meal toys. During 'Marmageddon' in 2011, when the Marmite factory was out of action, we even saw a jar of Marmite raise a mind-boggling $810 for the Pediatric Neurology Service.

You could be sitting on a small fortune too. Our 2021 Secondhand Economy Report found that most Kiwis are sitting on $1,700 worth of goods they could sell for cash in hand.