If you were selling your coins today...

Abuelo

Will you auction them? Where? Will you sell to a dealer? Why?

FilamCoins

I think it depends on country, value and size of collection. If diverse, large and higher value, I would go Heritage or Stacks and negotiate the split of the buyers fee. If specialized, smaller or lower value, maybe try a smaller, specialist auction house or dealer willing to buy them outright. If very small and low value, eBay.

neildrobertson

I sold about 20-25% of my coins over the past couple weeks. I sold most of them on Facebook and Reddit. I sold some on eBay as well. This was lower value stuff and I was going more for a quick sale rather than to optimize returns. The money to time ratio wasn't good enough for me to do much more.

I agree that the answer will be totally different for different parts of my collection.

jgenn

I have tracked my purchase information so that I can calculate my cost basis for my capital gains (unlikely) and losses (very likely). I need to make sure that the year in which I sell can offset other gains.

Now to your question, because I expect to record capital losses, I prefer to sell through an auction house that provides good documentation of my sales. I don't really care about the buyer's premium because that is part of the cost of selling my coins that I can use to add to my cost basis. And since I would be selling world coins and, in some cases, unusual world coins, I would like to use a venue that would attract a broad range of potential buyers because they might be more likely to end up in a collection where they will be appreciated.

I've sold through Heritage and will probably do so again. I was able to negotiate 0% commission because many of the ones that I did sell had been purchased through Heritage. I will also try Stack's Bowers and Dan Sedwick (especially Dan for my raw, low value 8 reales because I bought many through him).

Why not a dealer? I have met many friendly dealers but I haven't established a strong relationship as a buyer to expect a level of service that I would be comfortable with. Plus, I will be selling a mix of low end raw, medium slabbed and higher end slabbed coins and I'm sure a dealer really won't want to handle the dreck. Certainly not an LCS -- that's just not a good option for world coins in the US.

Boosibri

I would try a few dealers first and if I had no luck they would go to Heritage ANA or Stacks NYINC sale. A few more esoteric pieces could conceivably go to a European house where they may find a stronger bid.

mkman123

I would do no fee places like Instagram, FB, various forums and then consign whatever is left to jkcoins aka airplanenut on ebay

pruebas

This is a very tough and interesting question to ponder.

For me, I have some groups of coins that beg to be donated to an institution since they have more historical value than monetary value (despite that I paid real money for them). But the market doesn't value their historical significance appropriately, and perhaps never will in my lifetime. These items should be institutionalized.

Others have a great deal of market interest and hence can generate some capital that would come in useful for my next project. Those should be sold, though I would really prefer to place coins with other collectors that would appreciate them, not dealers who just see them as another widget to profit from.

I have been greatly underwhelmed by the consignment side of the big auction houses. On the buying side, they are mostly wonderful, but not on the selling side. And few dealers have interest in maintaining a professional relationship that would warrant giving them first-shot at my better coins.

To be honest, I really don't know.

Abuelo

@pruebas I agree with "place coins with other collectors " like myself

pruebas

@Abuelo said:
@pruebas I agree with "place coins with other collectors " like myself

@Abuelo it doesn’t mean they will get them free. Just at reasonable cost. And they wouldn’t have to participate in a bidding war.

I’m forever grateful that Clyde Hubbard and others sold me some patterns from their collections back in the late 1990s and early 2000s.

Of course, there are some coins those same people didn’t sell me and which I later had to fight for!

Abuelo

Sure did not imply free @pruebas

This came to be as talking with my wife on what to do if I depart before selling the coins. The plan has always for me to sell while alive at certain age. But one never knows, and as my family cannot differentiate a Hookneck from a Washington quarter, we have a plan for her. But wanted to know what others would do.

pruebas

@Abuelo said:
Sure did not imply free @pruebas

This came to be as talking with my wife on what to do if I depart before selling the coins. The plan has always for me to sell while alive at certain age. But one never knows, and as my family cannot differentiate a Hookneck from a Washington quarter, we have a plan for her. But wanted to know what others would do.

My plan was always to sell my collection myself before I pass. But unexpected things do happen.

One way I am helping to mitigate that is by having all the valuable coins slabbed over the next ~10 years so I can make sure they are identified correctly and the slab correctly represents the coin. (Most of my collection was raw up until 6 years ago.) That not only helps making sure heirs don’t get duped as to what it is, but helps inventorying, tracking, and valuing the collection.

In addition, I am trying to ensure my inventory spreadsheet is accurate and current. Right now it’s slabbed coins only, but the slabbed inventory will grow and I’ll start adding non-slabbed over time.

ChopmarkedTrades

The temptation is there to sell at auction just to ensure that the coins are on public record at a particular time and place, but there are other means of documenting a collection. Personally, I'd opt to offer most of my stuff to the others who collect in the same area first that I've known for years, then move the rest at a specialty auction house that focuses on world stuff and allows raw pieces, like Stephen Album.

jgenn

Yes, make a deaccession plan. I'm sure we've all seen the posts on various forums from heirs that just want a quick and easy way to sell a collection at the best price.

Certainly catalog all your items and include a suggestion as to how and where they should be sold if you can't get to it yourself.

jdmern

@Abuelo said:
Sure did not imply free @pruebas

This came to be as talking with my wife on what to do if I depart before selling the coins. The plan has always for me to sell while alive at certain age. But one never knows, and as my family cannot differentiate a Hookneck from a Washington quarter, we have a plan for her. But wanted to know what others would do.

In our office safe, and in my safe deposit boxes, I have a list of a handful of dealers who my wife knows to contact in case something were to ever happen unexpectedly. These are dealers who I would trust to advise her on the correct routes of liquidating our inventory and my personal holdings in a way that would allow her to cash out at a fair price.

bidask

These are dealers who I would trust to advise her on the correct routes of liquidating our inventory and my personal holdings in a way that would allow her to cash out at a fair price.

Want to share some names please ?