I had an AMAZING record collection which, inexplicably, my Mom sold at a garage sale shortly after I got married stating she thought I didn't want them any more
(Like every Zeppelin album first release collection as my Uncles all gave me their albums from the late 60s & 70s). Anyway, my wife and I did a ton of Estate Sale shopping to get college apartment stuff for the kids and during an end of sale, everything must go at one, I took a risk and bought a 1960s vintage self-contained Motorola stereo system. After rewiring it, the sound is incredible. This set me on a mission to recollect my collection. I have found estate sales are much less expensive than vintage stores.
EstateSales.Net is an amazing resource (and can provide quite an adrenaline rush). If I saw LPs I wanted I would try and figure out where they are in the house, get there early to get a number to be in line and work the folks at the door to leak to me where they are (as I was typically not alone in my search). Around here, the largest estate sale company charges $2 per album, another $3. I now have over 200 albums going this route. Regarding mold, I took another risk that scored me over 60 of the albums. At one sale, again near the end of the last day, there was a box of just the albums (including every Beatles album) which has been water damaged about 3" up, but the cardboard centers were intact, but with mold on every album on the vinyl. While basically holding the box hostage in the basement of this house (seriously, these estate salers as cut throat) I Googled up if these could be salvaged. I found a few things that outlined it was rather easy if the cardboard is intact. There are several recommend ways. I found that a solution of 50/50 rubbing alcohol took out the mold. Then, once dry, rubbing the album following the groves the way the album would play, with a micro-fiber cloth got them all to full playable condition. They were asking $1 per/album in the box. I walked up to checkout and offer $5 for the box. They countered with $50. I said no and asked if they wanted me to take them back down the basement or leave them upstairs so it'd be easier to toss them in the dumpster when they cleared out the house. After a bit more back and forth, I got them for $10. While I miss the cover art for sure, I bought 100 white sleeves on Amazon and have them in a brass album rack (I have estate saled 3 of these too).
The whole family loves the collection and we hang out playing cards, drinking beer and spinning vinyl. I thinks its so cool when I play one of my 22-year old son's playlists and there are song like Shout by Tears for Fears, Renegade by Styx or Kashmir by Led Zeppelin on there because he first heard these on vinyl.