Quality or Quantity?
Sylvestius
Posts: 1,584 ✭
Often a question asked by people in the hobby, let's say you've got $200 to spend on coins. You've just won this in a competition or something... what would you do?
Buy $200 worth of coins
OR
Buy $200 worth of coin
Well the answer may vary and many dealers might tell you that the path towards progression (or specialisation) is to buy quality everytime. I'll admit i listened to this advice and took it on board.
But perhaps we should not be so hasty?
Some people seem to come into the hobby thinking that it's more fun if it's expensive. That in my opinion is somewhat misleading.
Think back to all your memories in collecting coins, the best purchase, the best find, etc. Which was most gripping and thrilling? Purchasing that elusive top $$ coin that you'd spent years dreaming of? OR rummaging through a junk box?
I gotta admit although i collect mostly with quality in mind, the truth is i find raiding junk boxes and my all time favourite buying bags of spare US change off of ebay and scouring them for silver the most enjoyable.
I think my best memory was when i bought about $35 face value of US coinage (for a little above face value), full of quarters, dimes, a couple of halves and a dollars worth of nickels.
And i enjoyed scouring through this goody bag immensely, i think i pulled out about 15 silver quarters (including two dateless SLQs and a holed Barber), about 20 silver dimes including mercs. Two buffalo nickels and some silver war nickels.
Not to mention some 1964 halves and some half silver issues.
It was a real sweet haul that was. Haven't been so lucky in a long while.
So when dealers tell you to always go for quality over quantity, don't always believe them, whilst it's advisable it ain't half as much fun as going through a junk box half the time!
Buy $200 worth of coins
OR
Buy $200 worth of coin
Well the answer may vary and many dealers might tell you that the path towards progression (or specialisation) is to buy quality everytime. I'll admit i listened to this advice and took it on board.
But perhaps we should not be so hasty?
Some people seem to come into the hobby thinking that it's more fun if it's expensive. That in my opinion is somewhat misleading.
Think back to all your memories in collecting coins, the best purchase, the best find, etc. Which was most gripping and thrilling? Purchasing that elusive top $$ coin that you'd spent years dreaming of? OR rummaging through a junk box?
I gotta admit although i collect mostly with quality in mind, the truth is i find raiding junk boxes and my all time favourite buying bags of spare US change off of ebay and scouring them for silver the most enjoyable.
I think my best memory was when i bought about $35 face value of US coinage (for a little above face value), full of quarters, dimes, a couple of halves and a dollars worth of nickels.
And i enjoyed scouring through this goody bag immensely, i think i pulled out about 15 silver quarters (including two dateless SLQs and a holed Barber), about 20 silver dimes including mercs. Two buffalo nickels and some silver war nickels.
Not to mention some 1964 halves and some half silver issues.
It was a real sweet haul that was. Haven't been so lucky in a long while.
So when dealers tell you to always go for quality over quantity, don't always believe them, whilst it's advisable it ain't half as much fun as going through a junk box half the time!
0
Comments
But I kinda have lower expectations (or cravings) than most. I have only around half a dozen coins that I paid more than $30 for. Quite a bit more that are worth more than that mark... but that's due to patience and selection, which I think is key in the discussion of quality or quantity.
My wantlist & references
Many years of collecting will finally equal quanity.
My World Coin Type Set
<< <i>Quality, quality, quality.
Many years of collecting will finally equal quanity. >>
True, i hadn't quite though of it like that.
Although my collecting habits tend to be more like a pyramid, i started with alot of low value coins and i tend to sell many coins on to buy just one with the proceeds.
I sold about 15 coins once and i bought just 1 with the cash generated. The joke is in ten years time there'll only be one coin in my collection, i'll have sold everything else in my collection to purchase it most likely.
karlgoetzmedals.com
secessionistmedals.com
<< <i>Quality >>
09/07/2006
Experience the World through Numismatics...it's more than you can imagine.
A scarce date or mint mark on a circulated coin is worth as much as a quality Unc 'everyday' piece to me.
I'd gladly spend $200 and my time cherrypicking through all the junk boxes I could find.
World Coin & PM Collector
My Coin Info Pages <> My All Experts Profile
I do enjoy looking through the junk boxes and finding a real deal every now and then, though.
FOR SALE Items
Some might say that what I call value everyone else is calling quantity and there
is certainly some truth to it. If I find a great coin that is tremendously undervalued
I can't just stop with getting one. I'll want every coin available at that price and
then I'll look for it in other places also. To some degree this does put me closer to
my ultimate hobby goal which is completeness. Everything I need for my collections
isn't available or isn't available at a price I can afford. A few things are out there if
you look hard enough but are difficult to pry away from existing owners.
Coins purchased for value are sold or traded after they've increased in price. They
provide excellent leverage to loosen coins from whom they're currently syuck to, and
their sale can provide the cash to seal a deal.
It would be very difficult to say which aspect is the most enjoyable since any part
that gets me closer to identifying or accomplishing my goals is a hoot.
It turned out the F and VF coins had a higher percentage ROI than everything other than the 1877. The ROI was considerably higher than for even the MS graded coins.
It's an interesting study and frankly surprised me. I'd have guessed the MS coins would have led the pack.
Has anything similar been done for GB coins? Maybe 6d?
World Coin & PM Collector
My Coin Info Pages <> My All Experts Profile
Not to me, and this decision did not come easy to someone who once wanted to complete his collection with all dates available. I now only buy very selected and the best that I can find,if I can find it. If I can't afford it, I'll move on to another category where the best will be affordable to me,but I won't settle for mediocre key date or type coins for the sake of completion,they give me too much grief even to look at.
myEbay
DPOTD 3
I guess I'd have to say "quality" now comes first
And, strictly Darkside at that
My OmniCoin Collection
My BankNoteBank Collection
Tom, formerly in Albuquerque, NM.
I've specialised in three very, very narrow areas (along with two others that i only pick up when kicked and forced to).
1) Anglo-Saxon pennies by monarch, currently i'm just focusing on the Wessex line from 871-1016. Which is a total of 9 coins to get, and i've got one of them with another on the way. If i ever complete this set, Edward the Martyr permitting then i might shift onto the kingdom of Mercia, and then onto York etc. But that's no certainty. So this is my 'horizontal' type set as it goes along the historical timeline.
2) Henry VI type set, focusing just on Annulet issue coinage which was struck between 1422-1427 and so named because little annulets or 'o's are hidden within the design and the legends of the coins. I'm getting one of every denomination gold Noble down to tiny silver farthing. This is my 'vertical' type set as it's a segment of the historical timeline going down through the layers of society that used these coins.
3) UNC German 5 Reichspfennigs, Berlin (A) mint only by date 1937-1944, which fulfils my need as a date collector, because i naturally incline towards collecting coins of one denomination by date. Doesn't matter so much for the hammered coins because the coins of the periods i've chosen don't have dates, if they did then i'd be in trouble because i never can ignore the date!
My other two collections are on hold but i keep these for trading purposes generally, so when i have a coin i want to sell and someone in the US or elsewhere wants it then it's easier to trade than send cash.
4) Philly mint Washington quarters in Blast white UNC, 1950-1964.
5) UK Bronze decimals, 2p, 1p, 1/2p, 1971-1984 in BU. This set is actually probably the hardest of them all. All the other sets, the coins are there it's just having the money. With this one it's finding the coins in acceptable conditions.
So by nature i go the quality way. But i enjoy filling up my legendary Silver Jar with low grade US silver too, Washington Quarters being its favourite.
<< <i>ROI?? Roll Over Index? >>
ROI is French for "KING."
I think he's talking about Return on Investment.
I don't stick to either quality or quantity and purchase my coins on a case by case basis.
For example, I will spend $130 for a certain Canadian silver dollar in MS-64/65 instead of $1,500 for one in MS-67. I would rather have a complete collection of silver dollars in EF to Choice BU than one superb silver dollar in MS-69.
As cladking wrote, value plays a big part of the equation.
Obscurum per obscurius
Okay if i'm feeling particularly adventurous then BU.
Personally, I buy only condition rarities in the Victorian series as well as Swiss Federal. You ask, quality or quantity? One needs to specify the "quality" you seek. It's often 'assumed' by quality one means 'good quality', but 'poor quality' or 'average quality' could also apply, as well as FDC quality.
Regardless, know the series you collect, know what's expected in the grade range you select, know when a slabbed (or raw)64 is really a 65, or 66, and vice versa.....and lastly, regardless of the "quality", buy value, good value!!
<< <i>I'm reminded of a discourse which occurred at an otherwise sleepy bourse in 1999 in the Minneapolis; two dealers, a noted copper dealer and another dealer which I did not know at the time, were having some fun trading circ. stuff like Lincolns, Wash. quarters, some circ. early type, etc. A collector wandered up and ask the question; "What do you guys buy"? Randy looked up and said, "I buy value".
Personally, I buy only condition rarities in the Victorian series as well as Swiss Federal. You ask, quality or quantity? One needs to specify the "quality" you seek. It's often 'assumed' by quality one means 'good quality', but 'poor quality' or 'average quality' could also apply, as well as FDC quality.
Regardless, know the series you collect, know what's expected in the grade range you select, know when a slabbed (or raw)64 is really a 65, or 66, and vice versa.....and lastly, regardless of the "quality", buy value, good value!!
Now that is the kind of answer i'd give!
It's never straight forward. You and your adjectives.
Can you hold back on buying coins long enough to save up for that expensive reference book? that upgrade from 2x2s to Airtites that you were planning? or the purchase of a decent digital camera??
Me being more a generalist collector, I abhor date runs of a single series, I tend to bounce from topic to topic, whether it be WWI medals, medieval German kreuzers, Sassanid silver, and several oddities far and wide of those. I'd probably do better off--and become a bit more settled--if I'd stop to buy reference books first. But I don't. Usually my sidetracks are motivated by my historical fascination of the week, so I do have a decent grasp of what to expect in terms of availability. And being so terribly generalized I've become fairly well versed in how to identify decent coins of any type or age. But because I don't bother with specialized references (instead I rely on those skills just outlined and the net and friends) I wind up jumping at what seems most attractive based on history and eye-appeal, rather than investment value. I'll have a helluva time selling off my collection whenever it comes time to do that. But this isn't really something I regret. So is it a bad thing?
Other things, like Airtites and a camera, aren't really necessities either. Sure are nice to have though.
So, given a limited budget, do you regularly splurge on the coins themselves and only think of the supporting material as an afterthought, or do you muster all your strength to buy that dusty old book and hope that awesome coin isn't sold before next month comes?
My wantlist & references
Most of my enjoyment in collecting comes from knowing the history of the coins I buy, so I'd probably buy the book first. It's really a matter of rarity. If I have the chance to buy a really rare coin and have to wait on a book I can find later, I buy the coin. If I find a rare book I want, I'll pass on a coin I can buy at another time and place.
Obscurum per obscurius
Steve
It turned out the F and VF coins had a higher percentage ROI than everything other than the 1877. The ROI was considerably higher than for even the MS graded coins.
It's an interesting study and frankly surprised me. I'd have guessed the MS coins would have led the pack.
Has anything similar been done for GB coins? Maybe 6d?
For the others, ROI = return on investment.
I didn't do any formal study, but having a number of VF and EF coins from my collection that I have upgraded over time, I can at least offer up an anecdotal opinion.
aVF though EF (American AU) do poorly, trading well below catalogue except in the case of rarities. Many date collectors like low grade coins for their Whitman albums, so those do well, matching the comments you offered. Choice and better UNCs generally do well. I would think given the low prices on most coins that MS offers the best return on investment, if one is so inclined.
<< <i>I didn't do any formal study, but having a number of VF and EF coins from my collection that I have upgraded over time, I can at least offer up an anecdotal opinion.
aVF though EF (American AU) do poorly, trading well below catalogue except in the case of rarities. Many date collectors like low grade coins for their Whitman albums, so those do well, matching the comments you offered. Choice and better UNCs generally do well. I would think given the low prices on most coins that MS offers the best return on investment, if one is so inclined. >>
I was about to contradict you there for a moment on that one but then i realised you were talking about modern sixpences and were quite right. I was thinking of the 1674-1787 period again (honestly i keep forgetting they minted any sixpences after 1787).
Back in the days when i was working on my Early Milled sixpence date set, 1674-1787 (which was a massive task, then hammered lured me off them anyhow), but i noted that coins below F sold well as junk, coins GF-GVF didn't sell all that well at all, AEF-UNC went like hot cakes. They certainly sold fast, but it doesn't mean you actually got your money back on them though. But i'm too impatient to shop around i just tend to dump the lot on one dealer to get the cash asap so i can buy that Saxon penny i wanted! So with me there is no investment turn around, if i wanted investment i would be sorely upset now.
Anyhow coins are generally a poor investment anyhow, unless you have high grade rarities. A dealer once told me the only way to invest in coins successfully is to find a niche in the market, coins valued at about £1000 a piece and with very low mintages and buy every single one you come across to try and soak up the supply. I know of one guy that has found himself a certain British coin denomination of one year with an exceedingly low mintage and he's now buying as many of them as he can lay his hands on, i think the market is beginning to react already as the price of these things has been steadily rising over the past few years. If only i could afford one!
<< <i>Quality is number one. That doesn`t mean it has to be expensive. I just get more enjoyment from a really nice coin instead of a number of average coins. >>
Nice answer.....
Ken
1-Dammit Boy Oct 14,2003
International Coins
"A work in progress"
Wayne
eBay registered name:
Hard_ Search (buyer/bidder, a small time seller)
e-mail: wayne.whatley@gmail.com
Ah, the age old question.
I would suggest this…
If you are just starting out… go for quantity (I know but before you flame me… here me out)
When you are staring out, it’s great to have a lot, and of course you’ll have some personal favorites, which will keep you interested and pleased with your collection and the hobby.
As you collection builds… then it becomes quality. That is what you’ll strive for.
You will cherry pick your own collection, and sell off the weaker pieces.
So, why not go for quality over quantity right from the start… because when you are staring out, it’s great to have a lot, and that will keep you interested and pleased with your collection and the hobby.
BTW: I do not mean AG coins and culls… over XF or “as struck ancients”… I am speaking of respectable Very Good ancients to sharper Fines to start out with.
No Junk!
Okay, flame on!
<< <i>Hi,
Ah, the age old question.
I would suggest this…
If you are just starting out… go for quantity (I know but before you flame me… here me out)
When you are staring out, it’s great to have a lot, and of course you’ll have some personal favorites, which will keep you interested and pleased with your collection and the hobby.
As you collection builds… then it becomes quality. That is what you’ll strive for.
You will cherry pick your own collection, and sell off the weaker pieces.
So, why not go for quality over quantity right from the start… because when you are staring out, it’s great to have a lot, and that will keep you interested and pleased with your collection and the hobby.
BTW: I do not mean AG coins and culls… over XF or “as struck ancients”… I am speaking of respectable Very Good ancients to sharper Fines to start out with.
No Junk!
Okay, flame on! >>
Nah it seems quite sensible. Decent approach.
I still buy quantity at times, depending on the series and the method that I am using to buy the coins. If I am buying online, I will almost always buy several of each coin to find the 'look' that I am after. But, in the same light, I am also buying quality and will NOT buy a coin simply to fill a hole in the collection. The one or two times that I have done this, I have regretted the purchase and have hated the 'filler' coin until I replaced it with the look that I was after!
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