Neopets Cheats Neopets Cheats & Neopets Guides

Neopets Neocash Trading/Investing Guide

NC Trading/Investing Guide
(Trading for the Good Stuff, the old-fashioned way)

General Strategy Tips:


Don’t waste your money opening Capsules.

Instead, trade them. Mystery Capsules are seriously addicting; it’s exactly the same as gambling. Use this to your advantage instead of letting it become your downfall.

The logic behind this is simple:

If you’re looking for buyables, just buy them.

Capsule items are random, and you’ll likely waste $0.50 - $2.00 on junk and duplicates for every capsule you open. Over time, this adds up.

If you’re looking for cap bonuses, then trade for them.

Buyable cap bonuses have a trading value of 2-3 caps... and yet, the chances of you scoring one by opening 2-3 caps yourself is slim. On average, it usually takes anywhere from 5-10 opened caps to get the bonus. Don’t throw $5-$20 or more down the toilet.

Customs and Good Timing are your friend.

This is especially true if you're new to NC trading and don't have much to work with.

If you don’t already know, “customs” means trading buyables from the mall, such as caps, game tickets, or Mysterious Morphing Experiments, for someone else’s (usually) retired items.

Know when to have NC on hand (explained further down), and be prepared to make your move EARLY in the game. NC traders are fickle. Traders ALWAYS scramble for the next newest item in the mall, but novelty wears off quickly, and so does demand.

It’s a good idea to either check the mall OR the NC Board every day for new items. If you decide to check the mall, just be aware that new items don’t always show up in the “New” category right away. You may have to click other category links to find them.

In general, save seasonal items for their corresponding seasons. This means wait to trade your Halloween retireds until about a month or two before Halloween, etc. Demand increases, and so does their value. Traders will “overoffer” for items more frequently than usual to complete their seasonal look.

Make yourself two “NC Budgets”:

1. Normal Budget

This is for your everyday spending, whether it’s buyables for yourself or trading small customs. Make this budget modest, and stick with it, because you’ll want to save your money for your "Event Budget".

2. Event Budget

This is a larger budget you’ll want to have for specific times of the year.

If my “normal budget” is $50/month, then my event budget should be something like $100-$200 per event.

Why?

No one likes feeling left out, and traders will often offer big items for event tickets/caps. Most events also bundle tickets in large “packs” like 5, 10, or 20 tickets, and that saves you gift boxes, and therefore money.

Which events should I stock up on NC for?

I'm glad you asked, because here's a rundown of the biggest NC events of the year, for which NC customs are in HIGH DEMAND....

Ticket options:

Should I Also Buy For Myself?:

• You pay up to $22 for 32 items, including the bonus (automatically awarded for completing all challenges), or an average of $1.45 per item.
• About 7 of them in 2010 were decent, meaning currently trading for more than 2 caps.
• An estimated 78% of the prizes were , and usually rot, including the bonus.

Overall: Maybe. There were no spectacular prizes, but you never know. If you do buy tickets, wait until the last day and only buy as many tickets as prizes you like. Tickets and their prizes retire at the END of the event, so feel free to cherry-pick prizes.

Ticket options:

Should I Also Buy For Myself?:

• You pay up to $17 for 25 items, including bonuses (random but common), or an average of $0.68 per item.
• About 4 of them in 2010 were decent.
• An estimated 84% of the prizes were , and usually rot.

Overall: No. You won’t miss out on much, and Easter isn’t a big-deal holiday anyway, so value is unlikely to dramatically increase. If you do buy tickets, wait until the last day and only buy as many tickets as prizes you like. Tickets and their prizes retire at the END of the event, so feel free to cherry-pick prizes.

Ticket options:

Should I Also Buy For Myself?:

• You pay up to $25 for 32-38 items, including bonuses, or an average of $0.65-$0.78 per item.
• About 3 of them in 2010 were decent.
• About 11 of them in 2009 were decent.
• 71-90% of the prizes were , and usually rot.

Overall: Yes. While most prizes are crap, the ones that are good tend to be VERY good. Also, since you cannot buy these for side accounts, there are less of these prizes flooding the market. You can only get higher-achievement level prizes by completing previous ones, so you should buy the full Game Ticket Pack.

Ticket Options:

Should I Also Buy For Myself?:

• You pay up to $15 for 18 items, or an average of $0.65-$0.78 per item.
• About 7 of them in 2009 were decent.
• 61% of the prizes were , and usually rot.

Overall: Yes. You can choose specific challenges you want to complete though, so don’t feel obligated to purchase the full pack.

Ticket Options:

Should I Also Buy For Myself?:

• You pay up to $20 for 29 items, or an average of $0.86 per item.
• About 13 of them in 2009 were decent.
• 55% of the prizes were , and usually rot.

Overall: Yes. Christmas item values go up in general, it’s one of the two biggest holidays of the year (the other being Halloween). There’s no saying if TNT will do things differently this year, but in 2009, “stockings” had to be “hung” the night before prizes were released, meaning you could not preview the prizes and cherry pick the ones you wanted. If that’s still the case this year, then you should definitely buy a full pack.

These figures are based on personal experience from what I’ve seen past prizes currently trade for. Prizes are always unpredictable, so take these estimates with a grain of salt.

Investing is NOT what it used to be.

Investing in normal retiring items is risky, because…

1. A lot of people are doing the exact same thing, thus increasing supply and watering down their investment potential.
2. It’s hard to predict what will be desired a year or even 6 months from now. Some increase in value while others stay worthless, even when they retire.This depends on subjective taste and unpredictable factors, such as new items released in the future that happen to complement a retired item perfectly.

Case in Point: Paper Lantern Staff

BEFORE NY in SK was released: 10-15 caps

AFTER NY in SK was released: 35+ caps

1. Girly – Things such as dresses, flowers, wigs, items with girly colors, etc. Ask yourself, is it pretty? Does it sparkle? Can it be combined easily with other things? Remember, female users outnumber male users; so girly items are generally good investments.

   

2. Spooky – Halloween items are some of the most valuable items there are, even moreso than Christmas!
3. Backgrounds & Face Paints – Especially if they also fall into one of the first two categories above.
4. Super pack LEs – These are bonus items that can only be obtained by purchasing a full super pack (400-800nc). My advice is, instead of buying full SuperPacks, just trade for the bonus only while it’s still buyable, and for slightly less than what the full pack is worth.
5. MOST Cap LEs – If the cap LE falls into the “Bad Investment” categories below, feel free to pass them up. Not EVERY cap LE rises in value a lot after it’s retired.
   

   Good:

   

   New Years in Mystery Island Background

   (15+ caps)

   Bad:

   

   Rainbow Tiara

   (1-2 caps)

   (not very versatile; non-wig hair accessories are generally not good investments)

6. Unopened Mystery Capsules – Retired capsules are pretty much GUARANTEED to increase in value. The downside is they’re a little harder to trade, but if you have patience, they could bring in quadruple or more X their purchased value.

   The best capsules of all to invest in are the Birthday Capsules, which come out every summer to celebrate the NC Mall’s birthday.

   

   Traders are willing to pay quite a bit for the small chance to get something like Gulp… Underwater Reef Background or Appetizing Caramel Apple, so stock up!

1. Goofy items - No one wants them. Trust me.

   

2. Shoes, jewelry, and hair accessories – Shoes and jewelry are small, often hidden on many pets, and mostly insignificant overall when customizing.Hair accessories like bows, tiaras, circlets, head wreaths, etc. are not generally in demand either, since they can’t be layered with wigs, and most people prefer using wigs.

   

3. Most SuperSale items – Super sale items are on sale for a reason… because they don’t sell. Which means no one wants them, or many people already have a dozen extras from opening caps. Retiring does NOT necessarily make them any more wanted.

   Some people might disagree with me, but here's my reasoning:

   The only SuperSale items that are HIGHLY desired are from years ago before NC was as popular as it is today AND before NC trading was even POSSIBLE. In other words, people only bought things they wanted, rarely bought duplicates, and no one even thought about trading potential and stocked up because trading didn’t exist. That time is gone. And that’s why 2008 SuperSale items are so rare and valuable today.

   The one type I’d make an exception for these days are SuperPacks that are on sale. Retired super pack bonuses are more rare and thus more valuable than regular items.

   

4. Items w/ perfectly good substitutes – Do your research before you stockpile a bunch of retiring items.For example, you wouldn’t invest in a kite, because there are nearly a dozen kites, both NC and NP, which are already good enough for the average customizer.

   

   I always use JellyNeo’s item database to find similar items: http://items.jellyneo.net/

   Just type in a keyword for the item that’s retiring, such as “kite”, “plushie”, “basket” or whatever, and make sure you select “Wearable” for “Is in Special Category:” Are there a lot of good substitutes? Then don’t bother.

5. Grams – Sweetheart Gram (Valentine’s Day) or Birthday Gram (July). Since these don’t require a box to send, many people will give away their non-LE grams for nothing or next to nothing. Even long after they’ve retired.Treat gram LEs like Cap LEs: trade for them while they’re buyable instead of buying a bunch to “open” yourself. You’ll save money.

   

Ask yourself these questions:

• Am I active enough to have the time and energy to trade this specific item later on?
• Am I staying within my budget?
• What is my prediction for this item's future PEAK value? Is that value worth the effort and money now?
• Are a lot of people getting duplicates of this item from caps? (If so, it's probably not going to increase in value much.)
• Do I already have too much retired NC crap I should focus on trading instead of collecting more to rot?