Ethics of Cherrypicking
JrGMan2004
Posts: 7,557 ✭
Ok, on the topic of cherrypicking. Where do you draw the line? Do you cherrypick every chance you get? Or are you a very honest person, and point out that the person is way undervaluing a coin? Personally, I will not outright offer a rediciulously low price for something I know I am cherrypicking, I would feel very guilty, but if a person offers a ridicously low price, I won't refuse, unless I don't have the money on me of course, b/c that is the value that they have put on the coin, and they are satisfied and I am satisfied (I know, someone could argue that either way, they should be "satisfied" since they agreed to the price you offer, but that may not always be the case)... what opinions do you guys have on this?
-George
42/92
42/92
0
Comments
Russ, NCNE
with regular flea market people 50/50 depends if i feel they know what tehy are doing. gotta play dumb to some extent. but if you can tell they haventa clue well no i cant cherry pick them
at work or at the store yea if i see soemthing i will request it
Check out a Vanguard Roth IRA.
Why do brokers in any business make money selling goods that have relative values? Brokers make money because they understand their products and they can match buyers and sellers. Should they work for free to do that even though they could tell both buyer and seller all of the nuances, educate them and then let them work out a deal that cuts the broker out and evens the prices?
Obviously you can tell that it doesn't make sense. As an informed collector you in essence become a broker. You find items that you know the marketplace may place a higher value on, you negotiate a price and if it works for both seller and buyer a honest deal is done!
Now if a dealer has made an obvious error in his pricing. Let's say the 2X2 holder says $100.00 dollars, you negotiate down to $90.00 and he mistakenly charges you $9.00 by a computation error, then that is a different matter altogother and one that should come to his attention.
Of course it boils down to your own personal ethics, but please don't come ask me for a job at my car dealership!
Tyler
President, Racine Numismatic Society 2013-2014; Variety Resource Dimes; See 6/8/12 CDN for my article on Winged Liberty Dimes; Ebay
Unless you're buying from a poor little old lady who really needs the money, why should you feel any guilt about getting a bargain?
You spend years in this hobby, studying coins, researching variety attributes, sometimes going great distances to shows at much expense. Then when you find a misattributed rare coin or coin variety that you can buy at the price of a common, you tell the dealer?
C'mon.
The dealer in all liklihood is a lazy jeck that won't do any research, just try's to rip and flip.
Cherrypicking is what it's all about.
It IS ethical to be rewarded for your years of effort.
Ray
As an ANA member, I agreed to abide by their code of ethics. As a Christian, I do not try to obviously or intentionally rip people off. However, business is business. Two people have to both agree at the same time on the same price for a deal to take place. If both the buyer and the seller agree to not intentionally rip the other person off, e.g., counterfeit piece, mismark the price, misrepresent the piece, etc., then, at that point, it is a legitimate business deal. I guess what I'm trying to say that a deal is a deal unless there was some obvious deceit involved.
<< Unless you're buying from a poor little old lady who really needs the money, why should you feel any guilt about getting a bargain? >>
You know, I never thought about it that way. I'd feel really bad, and would probably negotiate a lot differently in that case.
Check out a Vanguard Roth IRA.
the most ethical thing you can do when cherrypicking is to not let the cherry-picked know that it's happened. other than that, to the victor goes the spoils.
al h.
That;s the only ay to go.
James
PS If a dealer has a coin marked at a price, he has made his/her mark. Cerry picking is not a problem. Whne you lose money on a coin, doeas the dealer give you a vredit? I don't think so. You jsut take the averages.
Ike Specialist
Finest Toned Ike I've Ever Seen, been looking since 1986
Specializing in 1854 and 1855 large FE patterns
<
Unless you're buying from a poor little old lady who really needs the money, why should you feel any guilt about getting a bargain? >>
i woudlnt and thats what im gettin at. if your a dealer and you sell a 400$ coin for 25$ cause you miss something . whos fault is that? they should know what they are buying and selling. alot like if you buy a mustang for 16,000$ anf when you got home you find out you got a GT mustang Mach1 that books for 34,000$ if the dealership is foolish enough to sell it for 16,000 who are you to say no.
if i saw a little old lady sellinga monte ss for 200 mint and i knew what she had id offer her more. (500$ or so hehe , nah id offer her more. 7 or 8 k the vlaue of the car. greedy is good when dealing with a pro. if you can get something for ntohing at a dealer its ok.
<< <i>Copied from another thread................. >>
I started a thread as to this 1963-D PCGS 66 Jeff -- Pop 1 Coin Wowzer!
Well I have to be honest and tell it's story. I actually am responsible for this coin coming to market -- but I have NO financial interest in it. I found this coin as well as the other toned Jeffersons that Dick has up for auction in my local dealer's shop. (There were 5-10 that were sold last week as well.) The coins were sitting in a Dansco album toning for years that no one bothered to look at it. As soon as I saw these coins I knew they were something special. He had a price of I think $250 on the entire set. I didn't even offer to buy the set.
My local dealer has no idea the value of toned coins or conditional rarities. I told him to change out the toned Nickels and submit them to PCGS for grading. I wasn't sure of how they would grade, but I knew they were exceptional coins. Once he got them back from PCGS, but before I saw the grades, he was offered $10 a coin by a customer. He almost sold them. If the guy offered $20 a coin, he probably would have. Once I saw them I contacted Dick and had him list the coins for him.
The moral to the story, you can find gems anywhere. You just gotta look. And while I have no financial interest in this coin and will not receive a penny from its sale, I now have a local dealer who appreciates my honesty and might be more willing to cut me a deal on some other coins I will buy from him.
It's easy to cherrypick a dealer in this hobby and turn a fast buck, but doing the right thing has its own rewards.
Sorry for being a little misleading in my first post, but I wanted a truly unbiased opinion as to this coin. I thought I might not have gotten if I had said I had something to do with it.
Thanks
Michael
<< <i>Overall, the toned Jeffersons brought over $1000 in sales >>
What is wrong with getting paid back for the countless hours and hours of reading and studying varieties? Looking at thousands of coins! And why is it wrong to turn a fast buck? Now if the dealer had asked me what I thought they were worth then I would have had to tell him. If the old lady asked me what I thought the car is worth, then I'd have to tell her.
A few months ago I cherried my second 1928-D RPM #1 Lincoln at a local coin show. The dealer knew I was cherrypicking him. Once I bought the coin he asked me what had I fouind in this coin. I showed him and educated him. He said he was happy with selling the coin at a 20 percent profit from what he paid.
I guess a doctor who goes to school and studies for 10+ years to become a doctor should work for minimum wage.
In this scenario, it is reasonable to presume the seller's discount was based, in part, on the prospect of a larger deal. If the size of the deal itself is changed, and technically the buyer can do that given the facts stated above, the seller may feel betrayed, because he might well not have offered such a discount had he known the deal would be smaller.
One option is to send back the coins you dislike without any financial adjustment in the original discount. You make a few bucks, but perhaps lose the goodwill of the seller.
A second option is to send back the few coins you don't want but offer to modify the original discount, perhaps in proportion to the reduction in the dollar value of the original deal. This gains you less immediate financial benefit, amd perhaps appeases the dealer, but he still may be suspicious of your tactics in future negotiations. But, at least he's not likely to refuse to do business with you from now on.
Option three is to bite the bullet and simply accept the deal as is, be thankful for your good fortune, sell off any unwanted coins elsewhere, and attempt the next time to anticiapte this possibility in the original negotiations, and raise it for discussion so there are no surprises later. I chose option three.
Haha me too! I just don't throw it up in their face like hey that $5 coin I got is really worth $500 or your cp days will be ended..
<< <i>I guess a doctor who goes to school and studies for 10+ years to become a doctor should work for minimum wage. >>
Interesting, you equate being a doctor with cherrypicking a dealer. C'mon, could you spend 1 day reading a medical text book and the next day perform surgery. I don't think so. But you can spend 3 hours reading about a variety and later that day cherrypick at a show. It's not quite the same.
And I never said that cherrypicking was inherently evil and wrong, it's who you cherrypick. I wouldn't do it to a dealer that I knew well and would do future business with.
Michael
<< <i>I wouldn't do it to a dealer that I knew well and would do future business with. >>
I continually do it to a dealer I know well, and continue to do business with him every chance I get.
Russ, NCNE
<< <i>I screw dealers >>
Oh don't say it Lucy...... don't........
"Senorita HepKitty"
"I want a real cool Kitty from Hepcat City, to stay in step with me" - Bill Carter
.......i always return to a dealer that i've cherry picked. you never know what else might be had!!
these "ethical dilemma" threads always run the gamut of responses. without calling anybody's response into question, i just have a hard time believing those who say they insist on paying full-fare when a discount is offered. the Golden Rule should apply, though, and that's a personal thing. for those who don't know/remember the Golden Rule, it bears repeating----do unto others as you would have them do unto you. i assume i've been cherried, so it doesn't bother me to cherry another.
wake up guys, cherrypicking is a time honored aspect of the hobby. learn and enjoy. of course, you could insist on always paying full fare, right??
al h.
2003 Cherry Picking Hall-of-Fame entrants, purchased raw and subsequently holdered with a total cash outlay of about $275. why would i have paid the full fare of ______ ??
<< <i>wake up guys, cherrypicking is a time honored aspect of the hobby. learn and enjoy. of course, you could insist on always paying full fare, right?? >>
So let's change this a little.....I'm an attorney, overbilling clients & doubling billing clients is a time honored aspect of my profession. (for arguments sake
Now how would I fare if I tried to defend that position on the Boards. It's all the same isn't it? Shouldn't I use custom and practice as a defense to over billing. If I worked for anyone on the Boards who says it's okay to screw someone and I came out and told them, "oh, yeah, well I only spent 3 minutes on the phone call, but I billed you for 30," who would defend that. No one.
I might be moralizing a bit here, but I think it's funny. So many complain of being screwed by a ______________, (add your favorite -- attorney, used car salesman, real estate agent, copier sales person, ect) but they don't mind screwing someone else. Hmmmmmmm
Michael
<< <i>I'm an attorney, overbilling clients & doubling billing clients is a time honored aspect of my profession. >>
Honor among thieves is not honor. When you bill for two hours, and only worked one, that isn't fudging, it's fraud.
When two people negotiate the sale of an item, with both having equal opportunity to evaluate the item, it is subjective. If the seller knowingly misrepresents the item, then it is wrong. Other than outright theft, pricetag switching, or passing counterfeit bills, it's pretty hard for a BUYER to unethically conclude a deal.
On the other hand, if somebody is relying on me, ie., family, youth, elderly, or people who obviously may not be playing with a full deck, or in any situation where I know the people and we have an ongoing relationship where, arguably, there is some trust in each other (mainly that they are trusting in me for some reason of which I am aware), then I think I am ethically bound to be honest about it when I find something way out of line to my favor.
I'm the first to admit that the line between the two is fuzzy.
Hi dollardude. The WORD is not silent on the matter of ethical business dealings (Matt. 16: 26, Proverbs 11: 1, etc.).
Whether Seller to buyer or Buyer to Seller - HONESTY is required in transactions. Dealers should NEVER willingly overgrade, and they should always reveal a coin's problems (if they know). That is what "business is business" (in the Christian sense) really means.
When I cherrypick, I reveal what the Seller may not know. matteproof.
The only consideration I think the buyer should show would be that for the dealer's time. If someone spent three hours digging through my mercury dime bin hoping I missed a 1942/41 (not very likely, mind you) and then left without making a single purchase, I'd probably be a little peeved. That person probably wouldn't get "red carpet" treatment next time they stopped in.
https://www.civitasgalleries.com
New coins listed monthly!
Josh Moran
CIVITAS Galleries, Ltd.
if you're going to point out responses as being off base---Interesting, you equate being a doctor with cherrypicking a dealer---then you should probably stop making them, unless of course you don't care to be taken seriously.
to equate taking advantage of superior knowledge in a specific area with overbilling clients & doubling billing clients is absolutely absurd. i realize you understand this latter example to be wrong, why is it so difficult for you to accept that the former is right and acceptable??
to make my own example, would you go into store "A" and tell them that store "B" is charging 3X for a particular item and insist that you pay the higher amount?? certainly not, unless you're stupid. my point being that cherry picking isn't even an ethical issue, it's a knowledge issue. to carry your lawyer comparison a bit further down the line, think of it in terms of money. if you charge $XX for a crtain service and another lawyer charges $one-half for the same service performed in the same manner, why would you pay the higher amount, unless you are stupid. it has nothing to do with ethics.
al h.
<< <i>I'm an attorney, overbilling clients & doubling billing clients is a time honored aspect of my profession. (for arguments sake )
Now how would I fare if I tried to defend that position on the Boards. It's all the same isn't it? >>
Michael,
No it's not the same. That's a specious argument, and you know it.
The attorney is possessed of specialized skill and knowledge for which he charges a fee. The client is not possessed of this knowledge, (although if your business is anything like mine, some THINK they are). To deliberately overbill is clearly theft in that situation. It is essentially the opposite of cherrypicking a dealer.
A dealer has set himself up in business and should know and understand that business. He is selling the product. Theoretically, he is the one who possesses the superior knowledge about that product, not the customer. If he hasn't done his homework, should the customer train him in how to run his business? Of course not.
Russ, NCNE
<< <i>Honor among thieves is not honor. >>
I love this....I'm a thief and you're a standup guy because to YOU cherrypicking isn't stealing.
Lawman -- I am surprised at you! As an attorney, you should understand the legal ramifications of cherrypicking -- a contract based upon unilateral and or mutual mistake. No meeting of the minds, no contract, the sale can be voided and or resititution can be instituted against the seller.
It's not capitolism, it's not a binding sales contract. Have you forgotten Contracts 101? A party is not allowed to snap up an offer that he knows is based upon a mistake. What if I were selling widgets instead of coins and I placed an ad in the national widget collectors periodical that said a 1000 count bag of widgets sealed by the US Widget Manufacturing Company for $1. You know the bag is worth $10,000 and you call and speak to my receptionist (because I am out that day) and purchase that bag for $1. Is that cherrypicking? Is that a mistake on my part or on the magazine's part. Does it matter? What if the mistake wasn't in a periodical but at a show. Does the price on a bag of widgets or a coin constitute an offer?
I didn't want to take this is the legal direction, but you have to understand, cherrypicking might be a rush and it might be fun, but it is questionable, morally and legally.
Has anyone ever heard of someone getting sued over a cherrypick? Perhaps where the stakes were extremely high and there was mucho dinero involved? I'd be interested to see what happened in that case.
<< <i>I love this....I'm a thief and you're a standup guy because to YOU cherrypicking isn't stealing >>
Let me restate/clarify:
1-If someone bills a client for two hours, and they only worked one, they are a thief. I intended no reference to you directly.
2-Nowhere did I say I was a "stand up guy."
Boy you bout crazy.
Let's say I go to my local dealer and I notice that his office is in the back of the store, but his open cash box is in the front, next to the door. He trusts me, so as I am looking through his coins he does some work in his office. He can't see the front of the store. Not very intelligent on his part. I think to myself "gee, the cash box is open, he can't see me, so as I leave, I'll just grab a $20, not all the cash, just a $20." I'm smarter than he so I guess I'm entitled to this money. Sorta a "you snooze, you lose" thing.
Is that okay?
Same thing as cherrypicking, he's dumb, I'm smarter, I'm not really hurting his business too much. Why not?
Michael
<< <i>Has anyone ever heard of someone getting sued over a cherrypick? >>
If it was a professional dealer suing a collector, they'd get laughed out of court.
Russ, NCNE
<< <i>Okay.... let's change the facts again.... >>
Dude, if you cannot grasp the difference between willful theft and informed negotiating, no amount of convincing is going to work.
<< <i>"gee, the cash box is open, he can't see me, so as I leave, I'll just grab a $20, not all the cash, just a $20." I'm smarter than he so I guess I'm entitled to this money. Sorta a "you snooze, you lose" thing.
Is that okay?
Same thing as cherrypicking, he's dumb, I'm smarter, I'm not really hurting his business too much. Why not? >>
Getting pretty desperate there, Michael.
Russ, NCNE
as your comparative attempts get more absurd, my respect for your intelligence shrinks. you oughta just leave well enough alone and try to accept the fact that with regard to cherry picking, you are lost!! skipp all your education, lawyerly knowledge, whatever. none of them apply. what we all know, you seem unable to grasp. it doesn't make either of us right or wrong, good or bad.
all the same, you aren't helping yourself with the irrational comparisons of thievery.
al h.
<< <i>No meeting of the minds, no contract, the sale can be voided and or resititution can be instituted against the seller.
....
I didn't want to take this is the legal direction, but you have to understand, cherrypicking might be a rush and it might be fun, but it is questionable, morally and legally.
Has anyone ever heard of someone getting sued over a cherrypick? Perhaps where the stakes were extremely high and there was mucho dinero involved? I'd be interested to see what happened in that case. >>
the problem is there is a "meeting of the minds." there is a coin, it is a penny, or a nickel or a dime, etc. The professional coin dealer says "it's yours for 10 bucks." you say "sold."
are you actually saying a customer has an affirmative duty to inform a professional that he selling a coin for "less than it's worth."
this is more like the client retaining you, you performing the service requested, billing out your usual $550 an hour and having the client tell you you're actually worth $800 and here's the difference.
i'm sure you're worth the difference, just not sure it's the client's duty to inform you/ pay up.
z
<< <i>informed negotiating >>
It's not, if you tell the dealer what you found and he realizes it's value -- that's informed. You seem to be missing that point!
Russ -- I am having some fun. This is actually how they teach law school. The professor provides a concept, rule of law and then they change the fact pattern.
As for getting laughed out of court, if I cherrypicked a 2 cent piece from you for $100 and it was a rare variety and was worth over $250,000 on the open market, you would be fine with that? Would you not try to claim a share of the windfall? Would you at least want to if you could. Or would you huddle in the corner and lick your wounds and chalk it up to experience?
Michael
better watch those frankies.......
"Senorita HepKitty"
"I want a real cool Kitty from Hepcat City, to stay in step with me" - Bill Carter
Boy you are really crazy.
Stealing is against the law but cherrypickin aint.
Your receptionist selling me $1,000 bag for $1 is a mistake. Me taking advantage of that or a typo or pricing error is wrong. No ?? about that.
A dealer not attributing some kind of die varietry and selling it as a normal coin is not a mistake. It's normal business.
Merry Christmas Michael. Enjoy this bliss in which you have so thoroughly shrouded yourself.
Why in the world would I say,
"Sir, this Winged Liberty your selling for $40, I believe will grade ms67fb, so heres $150 instead.."
"Senorita HepKitty"
"I want a real cool Kitty from Hepcat City, to stay in step with me" - Bill Carter