A retired decorator has made a life-changing fortune after selling a collection of Pokémon cards stored in his attic for an extraordinary £1.56 million at auction.
The seller, who has chosen not to be named, had kept the cards at home for 15 years without realising they were worth a fraction of their eventual value.
His interest was sparked after he read a local newspaper report about a Pokémon card selling for more than £6,000. He then decided to have his own collection professionally valued.
Pokémon cards have become highly sought-after collectibles in recent years, reaching cult status as demand has surged. The boom has even been linked to a series of robberies at shops selling card packs across the country.
High-profile collectors, including YouTuber Logan Paul, have helped fuel the market. Earlier this year, the American reportedly sold an ultra-rare Pokémon card for $16 million, equivalent to around £12 million.
The latest remarkable sale involved the retired decorator from Woking, Surrey, who brought a selection of the cards from his attic to Ewbank’s Auctions in nearby Guildford.
Auctioneers were stunned when they examined the 42 sets, all described as being in mint condition. They initially believed the collection could sell for as much as £270,000.
Ewbank’s head auctioneer Andrew Ewbank (pictured, left) and head of trading cards James Spooner (pictured, right) with the Pokémon collection, which sold for an astonishing £1.56 million
A selection of the Pokémon cards from the retired decorator’s attic collection
That estimate was dramatically surpassed during Wednesday’s auction, with YouTubers, collectors and investors competing fiercely. One lot attracted bids of up to £100,000.
James Spooner, Ewbank’s head of trading cards, said the team was amazed by both the condition of the cards and the owner’s lack of knowledge about their potential value.
“When we saw what he had, all in mint condition, we couldn’t believe it — especially as he had no idea what the collection was worth,” he said. “When we discovered there were 42 sets, our jaws hit the floor. We sold 41 of them, while he decided to keep one.”
Spooner described the sale as the most valuable collection Ewbank’s had handled. The auction house had expected the cards to reach £270,000, but early bids quickly showed that demand was far greater than anticipated.
“By the day before the sale, we had already received £825,000 in commission bids,” he added.
Named Pokémon: A Decade of Masters (1999-2009), the single-owner collection went on to become the most successful sale in Ewbank’s more than 30-year history.
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The collection’s headline lot was the Legendary Collection Complete Master Set, containing all 110 cards, 110 Reverse Holo “Firework” cards and four Box Toppers
Called Pokémon: A Decade of Masters (1999-2009), the single-owner collection became Ewbank’s most successful auction result in more than three decades of business
The star attraction was the Legendary Collection Complete Master Set, featuring all 110 cards, the full set of 110 Reverse Holo “Firework” cards and four Box Toppers.
With the vital Charizard in near-mint condition, it had been pitched at between £15,000 and £20,000 – but went for a hammer price of £100,000.
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The collector, from Woking, Surrey says that he bought the cards relatively cheaply in the 1990s – with one set he bought for £300 selling for £75,000 at auction.
He said: ‘When my son was young, in the late 1990s, he started getting cards and swapping them at school. I thought they looked nice and wondered whether they might be a good investment.
‘I was lucky enough to find someone in Malaysia who sold complete sets, and I bought a couple of things from them on eBay.
‘They then asked me if I would be interested in buying a complete master set of Pokémon cards as they had about two or three master sets for each issue.
American YouTuber Logan Paul sold his PSA 10 Pikachu Illustrator for $16.492million at auction in February, setting a Guinness World Record for the most expensive trading card ever sold at auction
‘I thought that it would be cheaper to buy the full set rather than keep buying sealed packs of random cards in hope that when you opened them you could complete a set.
‘The first set I bought cost me around £300. It’s the Sky Ridge Charizard set.’
The cards, which were all carefully inserted in the bespoke Pokémon binders while still sealed and in mint condition, had been stored in the attic after the owner’s son lost interest in Pokémon.
The collector added: ‘He had his own cards, but he never got to touch these, I’m glad to say.
‘I know people always talk about finding treasure in the attic, but in my case that is literally true. I had no idea what I had until the team at Ewbank’s explained it to me.’
At the end of the auction, Andrew Ewbank, who runs the business set up by his late father Chris and conducted the sale from the rostrum himself, thanked bidders and told them he was ‘going for a lie down’.
Later, he said: ‘The build-up to this sale has been phenomenal, and on the day it did not disappoint. We had bidders from all over the world and more bidders in the saleroom itself at any time since before the Covid pandemic.
‘The buzz was incredible, especially because the collectors could not believe how good this collection was – extensive, untouched, complete, and with just about every rarity you could hope for.’
Pokémon cards date back nearly 30 years, with the Pokémon Trading Card Game launching in Japan in October 1996, based on the Pokémon video games, before arriving in North America and Europe in 1999.
The Pokémon video games themselves had launched in Japan that same year, with Pokémon Red and Green becoming a hit before the franchise spread around the world.
The cards were designed to let fans collect their favourite characters while also building decks and battling against one another, helping turn the video-game phenomenon into a social collecting and gaming hobby.
The cards have become a serious investment market and must-sell item, with rare Pokémon cards steadily increasing in value and continuing to command eye-watering prices at auctions globally.
American YouTuber Logan Paul sold his PSA 10 Pikachu Illustrator for $16.492million (roughly £12.32million) at auction in February, setting a Guinness World Record for the most expensive trading card ever sold at auction.
Paul, a YouTuber-turned-WWE star, had acquired the card in 2021 for $5.275million (roughly £3.94million), meaning its latest sale price was more than three times that figure.
Their surging value has also made them a new target of thieves, with a spree of burglaries for the cards ‘more valuable than gold’ happening at collectible and gaming shops across the country as the franchise celebrates its 30th anniversary.
