Before grading services were established...........................

NumisOxide · September 4, 2005 1:20AM

how did collectors and dealers come to an agreement on a grade and then a price of a coin? Hopefully, some board members can give some of their experiences.

majorbigtime · September 4, 2005 1:30AM

When buying, it seemed all coins were choice and gem; when selling the same coins, they were all dogs!

Purple73 · September 4, 2005 1:32AM

<< <i>When buying, it seemed all coins were choice and gem; when selling the same coins, they were all dogs! >>

It is still that way to a point.........instead of them being dogs......they are now "overgraded" / "undergraded".

PURPLE!

jcping · September 4, 2005 1:33AM

Many coins only had prices on it but grades since the grades were useless when you were trying to sell these coins.

291fifth · September 4, 2005 1:41AM

Dealers would grade very conservatively when buying and very liberally when selling. This is still true today for raw coins.

Xokie · September 4, 2005 1:44AM

For those of us that started collecting in the late 1950s or early 1960s, the only guide was Brown & Dunn. It was a good book, with pretty easy to understand differentiations for the grades. There was, as I recall, only ag, g, f, vf, xf, au, and BU or proof; no finer distinctions were made. You could pick out your own idea of what constituted the best BU from a tray of BUs; dealers mostly didn't try to have "better" BUs or "better" VFs than other BUs or VFs.

But you did have to be smart about grading, both buying and selling, as dealers made most of their money in grade manipulation. You could (literally) go to a coin show and buy a real XF coin; take it back a little later (same day) to ask about selling it back and it had magically transformed into a VG. With the standard buy/sell difference and losing two grades, there were a lot of collectors that got somewhat discouraged about the financial aspects of coin collecting. This is why ebay, which does a good job of splitting the buy/sell difference, and certification of coins, which reduces the scope of disagreement about a coin's grade, have facilitated the explosion of the hobby. Scammers-both buyers and sellers-have to be somewhat more ingeneous now.

I havn't figured out how to do links yet, but this is a bit of Brown & Dunn info. Just FWIW, probably the only coin I bought from a dealer that was definitely undergraded was from Brown in his shop in OKC.

http://www.coingrading.com/intro1.html

DHeath · September 4, 2005 1:44AM

For me grade mattered, but not the seller's grade. The circ grades were straight out of the book, but the uncs and proofs were yes or no coins. I went into a local Jewelry store in the early 70's and bought a 55 proof set, and the display set was terrible, so I got the clerk to let me look through the stock for a set I liked. The sets were marked $40. I picked out a set with a nice heavy cam half. The store owner saw my selection and gave the clerk a dressing down for letting me pick, and charged me $75 for the set. I still have the set. It's my wife's birthyear.

NumisOxide · September 4, 2005 1:51AM

Xokie, heres the LINK.

Danegeld · September 4, 2005 2:13AM

RED BOOK

ARCO · September 4, 2005 2:44AM

I have been to many coin shops that still resemble the old days. The coins are displayed all over the shop in their respective glass cases with the coins in the 2X2 cardboard holders. On the holders are the listed grade and price. Buyers do not get to haggle over the grade, just the price of the listed grade the dealer has assigned it. If a collector doesn't agree with the grade he/she passes, but I am confident a buyer for most coins is not going to get the dealer to drop his grade. He would probably get a middle finger and a boot from the store before that ever happened.

roadrunner · September 4, 2005 2:55AM

In the 1975-1986 era, the grading of MS coins using different gradations was already in vogue. There was a pretty uniform set of guidelines for instance when buying at auction. While you couldn't trust the catalog grade for spit (just like today), the other bidders and yourselves could usually agree whether something was BU, nice BU, Choice BU, Gem BU, Superb Gem BU, and a monster. Much earlier than this era and coins tended to be called UNC or not UNC. As far as premiums being paid for extra nice ones.....I don't know....I wasn't around.

roadrunner

JRocco · September 4, 2005 2:58AM

Back then grading was easy on circulated pieces, but not so on MS coins. Here is where an established relationship with your dealer really helped. You still did the back and forth, but usually ended up where you should-provided of course that you knew how to grade yourself.

WANNABEDEALER · September 4, 2005 3:09AM

I know a major dealer who used to adverstise of choice AU coins and then sell them as 63's, he made millions that way. I bought a coin from him in the 80's a much better date coin, 2 weeks later I was at a major show. The coin was still in their sealed flip, when I went to sell to sell it back to them it dropped from au to xf. The person who sold it to me told him that she had just sold the coin less than a month ago, but the principal in the firm held firm that the coin was only and XF. I had used my American Express to pay for the coin and I called them, and they charged the whole amount back. A few days after that happened the same principal called me and called me a theif and that he was going to prosecute me for retail theft. I said fine, let's go to court on this one, you sold me a coin as AU, when you went to buy it you called it XF. You attempted to manipulate the grade for profit, now who is the theif here. I never bought from them again and never will.

veryfine · September 4, 2005 3:24AM

Grading was generally straightforward for circulated coins but dealers would often find other ways to reduce the value of your coins. When they sell, the scratch is "small and well-hidden" but when you buy from them, the scratch is "major damage." Don't think for a second that today, they wouldn't do the same thing if the opportunity strikes. As for uncirculated coins, many dealers simply did not know how to grade, to the point where AUs would easily be called Uncs. When it comes to uncirculated as well as circulated coins, the grading services give collectors much more security. Plus, there is peace of mind knowing that your scarce and/or valuable coin is genuine and original. Before the grading services, can you imagine how many collectors got burned with fake 16-d Mercury dimes?

PerryHall · September 4, 2005 3:24AM

WANNABEDEALER---Is this dealer still in business? Who is he? Use the PM if you want.

Conder101 · September 5, 2005 6:30AM

<< <i>how did collectors and dealers come to an agreement on a grade and then a price of a coin? >>

It was quite simple, the dealer had his grade, you had yours. If you were close you asked what he wanted and if he was in the ballpark of what you felt the coin was worth you negotiated a mutually aceptable price and bought or sold the coin. If you were too far apart then no transaction took place.

BillJones · September 5, 2005 6:53AM

Serious collectors started out with first the Brown and Dunn book, then Photograde and finally The ANA Grading Guide. You looked at a lot of coins, if you had the talent, you learned to grade.

After you learned to grade you used the current price guides and the Gray Sheet as a guide. The Gray Sheet only had numbers for type coins when it came to the "classic coins." You matched the grade and the price and if it worked, you purchased the item.

About the only difference from then and now is that now the slab give you are third party starting point for the grade.

Elcontador · September 5, 2005 7:07AM

Most of the material I bought was on bid boards and at auctions. The dealer always screwed you; ie., it was a BU when he sells a coin to you, but an Unc. or a slider when you wanted to sell it back to him.

skerke · September 5, 2005 7:14AM

WaterSport · September 5, 2005 7:20AM

If it was in the junk box and I needed it, I bought it!

WS

BigAlan · September 6, 2005 5:58AM

You didn't worry about the grade. The dealer had his idea of what it was and you had your idea. The important thing was that the dealer and you could agree on the $$$$ value of the coin.

Before grading services were established...........................

Comments

Leave a Comment