An Adelaide man has turned his childhood love of Pokemon cards into investment gold.
It started as a way of making some cash in his first year of university – six years later Jordan Hagicostas was able to put the money he’d made buying and selling Pokemon cards towards purchasing a property.
The Adelaide mortgage broker says he is a collector first and foremost but his investment knowledge helped him make the hobby lucrative.
With the Covid pandemic fuelling demand for the popular cards and increasing their value significantly, Mr Hagicostas said he made $30,000 to $40,000 within a few years.
He has always been a fan of Pokemon, which is a Japanese franchise featuring creatures with special powers that humans capture and train to battle.
“I grew up collecting Pokemon cards,” Mr Hagicostas said.
He started collecting them again in 2019 as a way of making money during his first year of university.
Demand for Pokemon cards – and other collectables – skyrocketed during the pandemic.
As an 18 and 19-year-old living at home with limited expenses, the “couple thousand dollars” a month he was making offered plenty of cash to spend.
“It was enough to sustain my lifestyle – it got me through my first year of uni,” Mr Hagicostas said.
He started to take it more seriously during Covid when demand for Pokemon cards – and other collectables – “went ballistic”.
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“As a Pokemon collector, what I was doing was effectively buying cards and holding on to them,” Mr Hagicostas said.
“I was also buying booster boxes as well.”
Booster boxes have 36 packs of cards, with each pack having 10 cards in it, and different series are released each year and only printed for a limited time.
Many people buy them to find rare, valuable cards or build their decks to play competitively.
Mr Hagicostas would buy the unopened boxes then store them in a wine cellar for years where preservation conditions were optimal.
Jordan Hagicostas bought his home with proceeds from his Pokemon card collection. Picture: Facebook
“Those are being ripped open every single day so supply is always dwindling,” he said.
“I resist the temptation to open the cards because I know they hold more value sealed.
“I would have probably invested around $10,000 over a three-year period.”
That $10,000 soon turned into $30,000 to $40,000 in value.
“(That is) what I put towards purchasing a second investment property,” he said.
“At the end of 2024 I sold all of them and bought a house.
“I used some equity in my first property, the sale of the Pokemon cards topped up the deposit and paid for the buyers’ agent to help me secure the investment property.
“I would have had about 20 to 25 booster boxes and probably another 20 to 30 other products – all up 40 to 50 different items over that period of time.
“It still pains me to this day that I sold all of them.
Collectables could be a ticket into the property market for many people.
“I’ve started rebuilding that stock pile again, I’m probably up to $15,000 to $20,000 now.”
Mr Hagicostas said he saw people using money generated from selling collectables and other side hustles that started as hobbies to purchase a home all the time through his work as a mortgage broker.
“I’ve seen this work quite well for people as a way of getting into the market,” he said.
With the help of grants and incentives available to first-home buyers, Mr Hagicostas said he had helped people get into the market with as little as a $10,000 deposit.
He said some people could be sitting on collectables worth that without even realising, especially if they still had some stashed away from childhood.
He encouraged people to get advice from experts before selling any collectables they weren’t sure about to ensure they were getting their full value.
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