Edinburgh woman sells first edition Harry Potter for £55,00 after buying it in a £10 bargain-bucket

The first edition book was bought for a tenner in 1997 - but sold for an eye-watering sum at auction yesterday

A retired Edinburgh woman has made an incredible profit from a first edition Harry Potter book after it went under the hammer yesterday.

The 58-year-old, who lives just north of Edinburgh, bought the hardback copy of Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone for just £10 in a bargain bucket in the Scottish Highlands 26 years ago. The valuable book was kept in a cupboard under the stairs for years - just like story’s protagonist who famously lived in a cupboard under the stairs in the Dursleys’ house.

The forgotten treasure went under the hammer on December 11 at Hansons Auctioneers selling for £55,104 to a private UK online buyer.

Hansons’ books expert, Jim Spencer pictured holding the Harry Potter book that has kept in a cupboard under the stairs for years. Picture: Hansons Auctioneers

The recently retired third sector manager, who discovered the book in 1997 on a family camping holiday said: “I bought the Harry Potter book before anyone really knew much about it, or the author. Because it had no dust jacket, I got a couple of pounds knocked off the price. Our two children enjoyed the wizard tale as a bedtime story all through that holiday.”

The delighted seller said: “My children read something online years back about how to identify first editions and told me they thought we had one of them. But I said the edition was worthless due to it having no dust jacket. Some time later I learned the book was never released with a dust jacket. At that point, we stored the book away. It lived like the young Harry Potter did, in the cupboard under the stairs.”

Only 500 hardback copies of Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone were ever printed and according to auctioneers, Hansons, they are the rarest and most prized Potter books and have become the holy grail for collectors. The elated vendor said she first learned about Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone after reading one of the first ever interviews with its author, J K Rowling, in The Scotsman newspaper in the late 1990s.

She said: “I forgot about it for a long time but then read about the rarity of first editions. I decided to contact Jim Spencer - the Harry Potter books expert at Hansons. I wanted to authenticate my copy and find out what it might be worth. My children are grown up now and it’s time for someone else to have the pleasure of owning a rare piece of literary history.”

The first edition hardback copy of Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone for just £10 in a bargain bucket. Picture: Hansons Auctioneers

Hansons’ books expert Jim Spencer said: “It’s a great result for a great find. This was a genuine, honest first issue and a fantastically well-preserved example. It was fresh to market and it deserved to go full steam like the Hogwart’s Express. Of the 500 first issue hardbacks printed, 300 went to schools and libraries in order to reach a bigger audience. This is one of the even scarcer 200 that went to bookshops.

“These first issues are getting harder and harder to find. This must be one of the few remaining copies that’s been in private hands since it was purchased in 1997. It’s astonishing it ended up on a remote Scottish peninsula, and it was all down to an article in The Scotsman - and perhaps a dusting of magic - that encouraged the inquisitive and very lucky buyer to pluck it from the bargain bin.”

Mr Spencer, who has now sold 19 first edition copies of the precious book, added: “Most examples are quite badly worn, especially ex-library copies. They’ve often been shared among friends and carried around in school rucksacks, which in some ways is lovely, capturing the buzz of Harry Potter when it first gained popularity. However, more traditional collectors are incredibly fussy about condition, which helped this book fulfil its potential.”