Basic Collector's Questions
Mike_P
Posts: 7 ✭
Hello, my name is Mike, and I could really use some guidance. I am trying to get up to speed a little on coinage, because I have a distant relative who recently passed and left behind hundreds of coins. All of them were individually cased and in racks(?) of 15-20. If I had to guess, he probably had 40 of these racks filled.
So just to test a few out, I went to list them individually on ebay and I realized how out of my wheelhouse I am. I wonder if it would generally be better to sell these all together or one by one, or maybe rack by rack.
Here are the front and back of one of them. 
When I went to list this on ebay, it asked for the certification, but nothing here on this one was on their list of certifying organizations. PCGS is on a lot of the coins, but not this one. Is this one not certified? Or is SEGS the certifying org but just not on eBay's list?
Does the alphanumeric (MS-64) designate this particular coin and the M$1 define the condition?
Sorry for all the newbie questions, but I really appreciate any help someone can give me. Thank you in advance.
Mike
Comments
It appears your relative had some nice coins. IMO, you need to get an appraisal before you do anything else.
The upper right part of the label is the denomination, In this case Morgan dollar, otherwise maybe S$1 or $1. The MS-64 is the grade. You can get an IDEA of the retail value on the Internet.
TAKE YOUR TIME disposing of the collection and after an appraisal plus consultation with at least three dealers and members here, there might be some coin you should not sell at this time. Great Collections, Ebay, consignment with a dealer, etc. are all options.
Good Luck! You have some pleasurable work ahead - especially if you don't rush it.
I am pretty sure SEGS is not an "approved" third party grader for eBay. You can still sell the coin, of course, but you can't promote it as certified.
SEGS is a lower tier grading service. That does not necessarily mean that the coin is bad or that the grade is necessarily wrong, but the coin market/hobby/business does not give SEGS coins the same respect as PCGS, for example.
Guys, thank you so much for the solid advice and information. I was thinking I'd shop the same set of a sample of these around to different shops, but I didn't think about finding an appraiser. I did take one case/rack (whatever it's called) to a shop who valued them at $750. Then I looked up the same coins on ebay that have actually sold, and the same set came in at over $2200. It would be nice to get that, but I wouldn't count on it. That first quote gave me a bit of mistrust for those buyers.
If you are looking on eBay you need to make sure you are doing a direct comparison. You can't compare PCGS or NGC prices to SEGS, for example.
Maybe post photos of a few random coins here and some experts can weigh in with opinions on value. There could be some gems in there.
I tried to match the coins on every detail. The year, the grade, and the certified. I filtered for sold items only, but I think I'd need to get a larger sample size of each to average out. At this point, I was only doing this to get a feel for the market value.
I can definitely post some pics of other coins. Would you suggest I do this in this thread, or is there another section of the forum where that's more appropriate?
You did OK by starting the Q&A section, but if you post in the US Coins section you will get a TON of replies. It will seem like a rollercoaster, and you will get lots of advice - most of it good but also some of it contradictory. If you can handle the onslaught of all the feedback, post a few coins out there and see what happens.
The nickname for the plastic holder from the grading company is a "slab" and the boxes they come in are just for storage - not sure how your relative had them organized, if at all. He might just have had a bunch of good looking coins with no particular order to it.
If they are all Morgan silver dollars they might just be "common" coins - very collectable but more or less a commodity to be bought/sold (possibly the reason for the dealer's offer). Or, he may have had some real showpieces that could bring big $$$. I am no expert at all but the front of the dollar you posted seems to be outstanding. I only wish it was in a top-tier company's slab.
If they are all in SEGS holders that would worry me a little. Not that the coins have no value, but for coins in lower tier holders they often trade as if "raw" (uncertified). In that case, a great coin is still a great coin, but the buyer needs to be convinced of its grade based on his own observation rather than reading the label. And, when selling an uncertified coin, the buyer always seems to place a lower grade on it than the seller....
If you have already identified some dates/mintmarks that seem to trade higher than the others, you could post those. Also, abbreviations like DMPL on this one (Deep Mirror Proof Like) are superlatives that represent a higher quality (and value).
@JBK good stuff. Thank you for all of that help. I'll go to the US Coins section and post more pics, as you suggested. There appears to be no order to the way they were stored. Most seem to be PCGS. Here are a few more examples from one of the slabs. (thanks for the jargon lesson!)
Just to clarify, the slab is the individual holder.
I saw the other pics. You have some nice stuff.