45 years of Proof Sets on SAH last night

jrinck

I'm a card guy, and the only coins I collect are the proof sets beginning with 1999.

Anyway, Shop-at-Home was running a deal last night offering the last 45 U.S. Proof Sets (1958-2002) for $1000.00, or roughly $22.00 per set.

I would never buy anything from SAH, but couldn't help wonder why they could offer all those sets for what seems like a very low price.

What's the catch?

Bear

Because they are the bottom dregs of the barrel.
They bought every unsold loser set, from every loser dealer.
Just so they could sell to their admiring public. Bear

coinnerd

Plus there only a handful of the sets that actually cost more than $22, and a lot that can be bought for under $10 from any legit dealer.

Tootawl

QVC has the 25 Year Proof Set Collection 1964-1988 set for $399.00. I'll pass.

cladking

The set's quality probably wasn't that poor. It's probable that these were mostly
store stock and picked over sets and that the sellers picked them over too. But,
there isn't a lot of profit to be made in the typical 98% of coins in these sets, so
lots of nice coins will be left. Also the kind of buyer these guys attract will be more
discriminating than most when it comes to coin and packaging problems, so it's a
safe bet that they also have to remove a lot of inferior sets. Gems? Not likely, but
the average quality is probably comparable to what you'd get from the mint or a
dealer. The problem is price. These RETAIL at a little over $600.

doereme

Yes, I agree with the bear here as I have a friend who went for a deal like this on one of those shop at home chanels. The sets he recieved were awful examples of proof and mint sets with scratched and stained coins in cracked and broken holders. The cardboard and paper sleeves were worn and torn with several of them with colums of numbers writen on them as if someone was keeping score for a game of some kind on them.No thank you, I steer clear of these DEALS ! ... IMO....

baccaruda

prices on proof sets after 1955 are pretty cheap - i can see how they'd use the seemingly low price to deceive buyers. the pre-1960 sets would be the more expensive ones - but still pretty cheap. except for a couple of the modern sets i don't think there's a single one in the lot that should cost more than $22. a great deal of those sets can be had for about $5-$7.

airplanenut

Think of it like this: I got a 71 and 87 proof set for $5.50 each, or $11 total; that's $33 lost in the deal... that cost could pretty much cover me for the 10-coin proof sets with the quarters... factor in a few more like it and you have the few dollars over $22 for the earliest sets, as well as the premium for 97 and 98 proof sets...

Jeremy

baccaruda

and don't forget that they'd send you the worst possible sight-unseen sets they could find (assuming you aren't a coin collector since you went for the deal in the first place).

jrinck

Thanks for the info. Since I only collect the 1999 and later, I'm used to paying the $20 from the Mint for each.

I have no idea as to the value of the earlier sets, although it does surprise me to hear that a '71 set would go for only $5.50.

And from the sounds of things, the Mint's quality control was probably pretty lacking in the old days, and the plastic pouch sets probably allow for the coins to get banged up quite a bit.

And I always wondered about the '98 set, and somewhat predicted to myself that it would one day be highly prized. Since everyone wants the '99 for the quarters, the '98 would get lost in the shuffle... that is until everybody realized that nobody else bought a '98 and thus a demand would surface.

cladking

There is already a lot of crossover to these earlier sets, and this is
one of the biggest drivers of the modern market.