Today's market and selling question

Abuelo

Hello ladies and gentleman. The marked has been really crazy lately so I think is time for me to sell few of the non core coins. While the following question has been discussed in the past I the the fact that now people are paying high prices for coins, begs the question. Would you auction (no reserve) your pieces on eBay and get the money right away or would you send to an auction house for possibly a better money (maybe, maybe not) but then get the money on 3 or 4 months... Thanks for the comments.

Abuelo

BTW I am talking coins that are over 1500 dollars very likely.

Boosibri

Have any examples to help the discussion?

MrBreeze

Honestly, I’ve seen different types of coins do well at both venues. The very first thing I would need to know is the vig you’re paying for each venue.

neildrobertson

For me it's probably eBay, but my coins aren't generally worth enough to consider the top national auction houses. The debate for me would be whether I try to send them back to Europe.

Abuelo

@Boosibri few top pop CARs including g 8 reales and quarter reales.

@MrBreeze you ae correct. eBay will get 10% + fees associated with PayPal or credit cards etc. In my experience total is about 14% of the sale. Auction houses will give you a dal depending on the value of you whole submission. But not sure is that different at my level.

bidask

Auction house !

Abuelo

@bidask the reason is...?

JohnnyCache

My line of thinking would be to try and negotiate the best terms I could for myself at a major auction house or, explore utilizing a specialized dealer such as CRO, who garners a pretty good crowd on his early bird offerings.

You could also explore any or all of these options by auctioning just one at eBay/Heritage/Stack's or placing one for consignment at CRO in order to see how it goes before fully committing the rest of the coins.

bidask

@Abuelo said:
@bidask the reason is...?

I think you will get more eyeballs viewing the coin you want to auction .

TwoKopeiki

If you don't mind waiting for the funds, I would consign them to a large sale by Stacks or HA. Still a better choice in terms of maximizing what goes in your pocket. Just negotiate at least a 0 seller fee beforehand.

pruebas

Here's my take. First, I totally agree with you (and everyone else) on the market. I have been selling like crazy into this market and it is very liberating. Once you start, you may not want to stop! In my case, I am trading multiples of lower-valued coins for a couple of higher value coins in my specialty area. The side effect is that it frees up safe deposit box space. I am also selling cool coins that just don't float my boat anymore or that I didn't properly think of an exit strategy when I bought them.

To the question at hand.

You will get more eyeballs on ebay, but if the coins are even remotely special (which these seem to be), those additional eyes are not getting you anything. Most of the "serious eyes" are watching HA and SB (at least, but also others to a lesser degree) as well. Generally bullion buyers, casual collectors, or "crazies" (all of which exist in quantity on ebay) will not be helping your selling price. Most of them are looking for a "deal," and coins like you are selling don't (ever) sell for deal pricing.

Ebay will give you more control over the sale (timing, description, etc.), but in this market, I don't see that as much of a positive anymore. Ebay has significantly more risk. Risk reduction has value, and most people don't properly assess that value. (Think of the cost of an insurance policy to get an idea of the value of risk reduction.) A big auction house minimizes your risk but reduces your control.

Shipping. Are you ready to ship coins to Asia or South America? A big house will take that work off your hands (and the associated risk).

Payment. A big house will take on the work of getting paid and send you a "good check" 45 days post auction. If your coins sell in a weekly sale (and I see no reason why they shouldn't), assuming they are sale ready, they will usually be auctioned within about a month of receipt. So ~3 months from submission to payment. Not too bad unless you are desperate, and in that case you shouldn't be liquidating coins, you should be taking a loan.

A big house will encourage you to sell unreserved (and give you better terms for doing so). Actually, that isn't so much of a problem these days. Most coins are in good demand. And good coins are in heavy demand. Some of my patterns are a bit esoteric, so a reserve may be a good idea for them because the market doesn't understand them and value them "correctly", but CAR is pretty widely-understood, popular, and not esoteric by any means.

If you have $5000+ of decent material to consign, I see no reason why you couldn't get auction terms on par with ebay. Let's say you auction one coin and it hammers for $1000. The buyer pays $1200 and with a 0% seller's fee, you receive $1000. $1000/$1200 is 83.3%. So you receive 83.3% of what the buyer pays. Granted, this is less than ebay (excluding the cost of risk), but you may be able to get better terms.

Did I address it all?

amwldcoin

1 thing I would like to point out is if your not an established seller on ebay it could..not certainly hurt your results.

WCC

@JohnnyCache said:
My line of thinking would be to try and negotiate the best terms I could for myself at a major auction house or, explore utilizing a specialized dealer such as CRO, who garners a pretty good crowd on his early bird offerings.

You could also explore any or all of these options by auctioning just one at eBay/Heritage/Stack's or placing one for consignment at CRO in order to see how it goes before fully committing the rest of the coins.

I asked CRO about this once. They told me (last year) that the minimum coin value they handle on consignment is $3000. Maybe they make exceptions such as for regular customers but that's not me. I have bought from them occasionally.

I do agree with you that if it is an option, it is worth considering.

Wasserwerks

Depends on what you're looking to sell and when you want to move it. I have sent stuff out to the big auction houses and moved a fair amount of product at the precious metals auction. That was at the end of May. Check was in the mail...going on 3 weeks now. Seriously? I can send money around the world with a click and I'm still waiting on a paper check? Ugh. They only nailed me 5% on the total sales. What I will receive is exactly on point with expectations.
On the other hand, sure Ebay is convenient but you're paying their fees, plus the shipping aspect and paypal fees (if any) associated with it. There are plenty of facebook and Instagram routes that can be taken also if you have the connections.
I posted a 1904 2 Mark Bremen ms67 for sale in a private chat group yesterday and it instantly sold. Paypal just arrived and the new owner was messing with me, asking to remove it from my inventory. It went that fast.
Good luck with your sales.

TwoKopeiki

@Wasserwerks said:
I posted a 1904 2 Mark Bremen ms67 for sale in a private chat group yesterday and it instantly sold. Paypal just arrived and the new owner was messing with me, asking to remove it from my inventory. It went that fast.
Good luck with your sales.

To build on this, if you know what you want to get out of a piece - use FB/IG to move it. The problem with the current market is that you're potentially leaving money on the table as you're trying to estimate the value yourself.

mkman123

I feel like FB/IG/Forums would be the first choice, name a price and see if it sells. Ive seen coins sell for much more than auction records on IG/FB and you get the money immediately without fees. If the coins don't sell, then the next route would be ebay/auction houses.