Morgans selling far below PCGS Price Guide
FolsomMike62
Posts: 9 ✭
Hello all,
For the past 18 months I have been liquidating a coin collection my in-laws inherited. I sent over 200 Morgans to Heritage auctions. There were 14 key date Morgans auctioned last night. All of them sold for 10% to 20% below the PCGS Price Guide values. I also have the Handbook of US Coins for 2024 and most of the coins sold for less than the value in this book as well with a few exceptions.
Have the values of Morgans been declining recently? Or is it unreasonable to expect to get prices closer to the PCGS price guide. Or perhaps the PCGS price guide includes the 20% buyer premium charged by Heritage? Below are the Morgan Dollars we auctioned last night:
1879-O MS63 HAMMER PRICE: $320
1886-O MS62 HAMMER PRICE: $1,350
1888-S MS63 HAMMER PRICE: $625
1889-O MS63 HAMMER PRICE: $420
1892-P MS62 HAMMER PRICE: $340 - Far below market
1892-O MS64 HAMMER PRICE: $750
1893-P XF45 HAMMER PRICE: $480
1894-S MS63 HAMMER PRICE: $1,550
1895-O XF45 HAMMER PRICE: $725
1899-S MS60 HAMMER PRICE: $550 (Genuine)
1901-S MS60 HAMMER PRICE: $460 (Genuine)
1903-O MS63 HAMMER PRICE: $577
1903-O MS65 HAMMER PRICE: $700
1935-S MS63 HAMMER PRICE: $460 (Peace Dollar)
Thank you for any input you may have. I'm just trying to increase my understanding of how this all works.
Comments
the price guide includes the buyer's fee
the price guide is most often very high above the market, sometimes to the point of ridiculous
the redbook is printed once, so it is not reflective of a moving market. the faithful here suggest the redbook is good for comparing price differential for the grades
then you have to keep in mind a 2024 redbook is published in 2023. so, even if the numbers were right 3 years ago they aren't anymore
they best way to look at the current market price is to check "sold" items on ebay, heritage, stacks bowers and great collections
I'd compare vs CDN greysheet. Also not all coins in similar grades are alike. Your 63 and mine could be night and day. Prices seem 10% back of GS so in the ballpark.
Morgans are so unpredictable I believe.
They are actually very common for the most part. The price commensurates with the grade. A 65 can sometimes sell for a thousands or more than a 64 depending on what it is.
You made a smart move sending them to Heritage auctions. Most price guides are wishful thinking with some exceptions.
Good luck with everything.
Student of numismatics and collector of Morgan dollars
Successful BST transactions with: Namvet Justindan Mattniss RWW olah_in_MA
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I don't think that conclusion can be made without knowing what he ended up netting, or what his terms of sale were. Even then, they'd have to be compared to sales on other venues.
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and the quoted numbers are hammer. bidders stop on their number with the buyer's premium. with the premium included is where the market is.
also, i checked ebay sold items. they are in the next post. those are buy it now listings. it is the forums opinion that the market determination is by true bidding auctions. i would say the 2 coins sold higher than market and the purcasers paid too much
@PeakRarities your probably right.
Student of numismatics and collector of Morgan dollars
Successful BST transactions with: Namvet Justindan Mattniss RWW olah_in_MA
Dantheman984 Toyz4geo SurfinxHI greencopper RWW bigjpst bretsan MWallace logger7
Hello @FolsomMike62,
I work for Heritage. So, assuming you don’t know me, I can understand if you think I can’t be objective. Therefore, I won’t comment on the prices realized and will leave that to others who choose to reply.
However, in order to provide you and other forum members with some additional information, next to each hammer price realized that you listed in your above-copied post, I have added the winning bid with the buyer’s premium included, followed by the current CDN price that I found.
Please feel free to let me know if you have any questions.
Mark Feld* of Heritage Auctions*Unless otherwise noted, my posts here represent my personal opinions.
I've gotten some pretty good prices on common things like most of your Morgans, so in addition to deducting the the selling cost (since you are not going to get near retail as a seller -- just look at the greysheet for an idea of the dealer pricing) I think that you also sold them during a soft spot in the market that cost you like another 5%-ish. I know that I've been getting some pretty good prices on buys lately and it isn't just me being lucky.
An auction price at a widely followed auction house like HA is pretty much the definition of the current market value for items that are not unique or nearly so.
Price guides are just guides, they are not prices set in stone for buyer/seller to abide by. And you can compare various pricing sources and among them, see sizeable spreads. While maybe hindsight at this point, I've found recent auction results to be the best source for getting a sense at what something might sell for, particularly Morgan dollars wherein they are trading every day in significant quantities vs a coin that trades less frequently, say once a year or less. Assessing current auction realized prices AND comparing the quality of your coins (not just the grade), to what is being achieved at auction is probably the best one can do for assembling some sort of expectation on potential results.
In my opinion pcgs price guide is 10-15% too high on average.
Don’t follow the series, but 10-20% below retail list, before buyers’ fees, is about what I expect when I liquidate more common classic material thru auction. Auctions may not net the maximum value, but are efficient. I’ve tried alternatives over the years, and found that my time was worth more to me than what I may have gained “working the market”.
Not all Morgans at the same grade level are created equal- some look better than others and those that don't often trade at a discount. Without seeing images of coins, it seems you did fine. Two of the coins did not get straight grades which is not an encouraging sign in terms of the others.
Guides are merely guides... what matters is the look of the coin. I am struggling to understand why you seem unsatisfied. I doubt there is a dealer that would have paid the auction sum total for these coins.
Experience the World through Numismatics...it's more than you can imagine.
Lately it appears Heritage is offering great buying opportunities.
peacockcoins
In my world (Barber and SL quarters), PCGS prices are usually at least 15%+ too high.
Dave
It appears that you have done ok with the sale.
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Because they sold Morgan dollars for Greysheet..??? (Only one of which was gem.)
Do you disagree?
Are you of the opinion Heritage is not offering buyers wonderful opportunities?
peacockcoins
Sometimes. I don't think these coins are an example of wonderful buyers' opportunities.
Thank you for the courtesy of a well thought-out resonse.
peacockcoins
someone who uses cdn greysheet explain what it is and how often it comes out and who uses it
I can't tell if you are kidding or really want more. As I said in my first comment, selling a bunch of non-gem Morgans for full Greysheet is pretty much the market price not a bargain.
No, we're good.
You offered your opinion in a timely and polite manner.
I can't and wouldn't ask for more.
peacockcoins
Greysheet comes out monthly. Almost all dealers use it for something. It's not necessarily good for everything. However, it does have sight unseen pricing that reflects CDN bids so it is very useful for knowing what dealers are actually buying them for if they are making markets. Like anything else, the bids need to be considered as a starting point for pricing not a final price especially where things like toners are concerned.
Like all price guides, it is far more accurate for frequently traded widgets like 99% of Morgan dollars than it is for rarely traded $100k trophy coins.
It’s also the basis of CAC cpg figures, and has an api linked table of figures on every HA listing.
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Yes. Heritage is really helpful in supplying that information to bidders. It is far more objective than the house-generated "bid estimates" that some auction houses use.
Thought I would add my perspective as I am currently building a set of O mint Morgans. I have about 10 coins left to complete the set and am looking just about every day at auctions and dealer websites, and at our local monthly show where Morgans are heavily represented. I have a list of target grades and many of your coins matched my targets. So, I was tracking several of the coins, looked at them pretty closely and had researched prior auction results. Ultimately, I decided not to bid on any of the coins.
To me, the prices realized seemed right in line with the current auction market. I am not meaning to be negative about your coins, but they were pretty much just generic Morgans with average eye appeal that would be widely available to any collector in the market for the dates. At least when I last looked at the coins I was tracking, there were not many bidders and very few trackers. I just don't think the case was compelling to reach on any of the coins. Bottom line is that I think you did fine with the auction results.
You should be comparing the price guide to the hammer price + buyers premium; not just the hammer price.
If a coin is “worth” $100, a buyer will go out of pocket a total of $100 (including any buyer’s premium), regardless if the buyers premium is 10% or 20%.
PCGS price guide is typically full retail - what you would find at a coin shop or Buy It Now. What no one hear is saying is that an auction is a liquidation. Common coins typically do not bring full retail at auction unless they are exceptional.
http://ProofCollection.Net
Those price guides, especially on stuff like this, are “full retail” and I would say most people on this board reserve paying full retail for exceptional, rare, or desperately needed coins, which your lot does not represent (no shade, most of my collection doesn’t, either).
It looks like you did well and the buyers paid a fair price, even if the hammer appears to be well below “full retail.”
I recently bought a very nice coin in a brick and mortar coin shop and didn’t come close to full retail, even with sales tax tacked on top. Most coins just don’t actually trade at that level. Morgan or otherwise.
It doesn't invalidate what you said, but the second piece was a Best Offer that actually sold for $2585. Still higher than the other piece, but not by nearly as much as the screenshot shows. Some sellers have access to a tool on eBay that shows actual sold prices for Best Offer, but anyone else is stuck seeing what the BIN price was, not the actual sale price, which is a bit disingenuous when trying to understand the market.
I don’t see your sold coins at listed prices. Does your price include buyer’s premium? All of the 1894-s ms63 sold this year were sold at $1860 or higher
Per his opening post, he listed the winning hammer price bids.
His MS63 1894-S brought $1860 (with buyer’s premium included).
Mark Feld* of Heritage Auctions*Unless otherwise noted, my posts here represent my personal opinions.
Excellent informative post; you could not have been more helpful.
I have found that the prices on the PCGS Coinfacts site to be on the high side. If you really want a lot in an auction, that number, which includes the buys’ fee, should be quit competitive most of the time. If a lot sells for a great deal more than those numbers, it’s either got something special about it (rare die variety not noted, significantly under graded, condition census for a variety) or the bidding was irrational.
Quite frequently the Coinfacts price guide will be higher than all or most of the auction results listed below it.
@MFeld
Very kind of you Mark. Great work. Many, understandable, only consider what they get from auctions, without considering fees. All auctions have fees, which vary as to %. But with the better sites, a seller will realize more possibilities with larger crowds viewing and all will be interested in coins. Good of you Mark for your time given.
I feel the op's sale did bery well to the current market. JMO
Jim
When a man who is honestly mistaken hears the truth, he will either quit being mistaken or cease to be honest....Abraham Lincoln
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@dhikewhitney and @jesbroken, thank you for your kind comments.
Mark Feld* of Heritage Auctions*Unless otherwise noted, my posts here represent my personal opinions.
If the OP got close to Price Guide with BP, he/she probably did quite well overall.
This is one of the slowest times of the year to sell; also would have had the coins submitted to cac, then put in the right auction after Labor Day.
PSGS guide is notoriously overpriced and as far as I can remember has never been an accurate indication of the true market. Realizing 10-20% under their number, I'd say you did very good. RGDS!
Mark,
I thought that somehow PCGS picks up the "feed" of auction prices from a bunch of places including Heritage, David Lawrence, Great Collections, and sometimes EBay. I would think they also have a way of filtering out the noise - auctions that are over or under say, 1-2 standard deviations from the 50 day moving average. I would hope they do that to prevent a market crash or bubble spike.
I used to do database and programming for companies that do a lot of high frequency trading of currencies. I would think that part of the value that PCGS and NGC provide is a convenient way of estimating the current prices for coins that are encapsulated by them. Ebay should probably not be in their feed,because there are all kinds of transactions that are potentially misleading.
I appreciate all you do for this forum and respect your opinion. I didn't know you worked for Heritage. Good for you, and them
Regards,
Rook
I disagree that PCGS is overpriced. I think they are doing the best they can to give an estimate of prices of coins in their holders. There's a lot of value added there, IMHO.
Regards, and happy collecting!
Thank you @rooksmith.
If you scroll down towards the bottom of this linked page https://www.pcgs.com/prices/us
here’s what PCGS says about their price guide values:
“WHAT DO PCGS PRICES MEAN?
The prices listed in the PCGS Price Guide are average dealer asking prices for PCGS-graded coins. The prices are compiled from various sources including dealer ads in trade papers, dealer fixed price lists and website offerings, significant auctions, and activity at major coin shows. Dealer specialists and expert collectors provide pricing input. Remember that the prices are just a guide, a starting point for asserting value. Some PCGS coins sell for less than the prices listed and some PCGS coins sell for more than the prices listed.”
In researching coin “values” (which is a large part of my daily work, to the tune of hundreds of coins each week) many more times than not, I’ve found that the price guide values tend to be noticeably higher than what the large majority of coins sell for at auction.
For purposes of illustration, below are examples for two different coins that trade frequently enough to be reasonably easy to price: 1881-S Morgan Dollar MS66 and 1942 Walking Liberty Half Dollar MS66.
These are the 10 most recent auction results which run from May 1st to date from Heritage and a major competitor for the 1881-S Morgan Dollar PCGS MS66 (non-CAC Examples) :
$384, $312, $264, $312, $288, $264, $384, $288, $408, $276 - average price $318.
PCGS Price guide price $385.
These are the 10 most recent auction results which run from February 5th to date from Heritage and a major competitor for the 1942 Walking Liberty Half Dollar MS66 (non-CAC examples) :
$114, $109, $124, $125, $125, $139, $125, $105, $124, $119 - average price $120.90.
PCGS pice guide $240.
I understand that auction results represent only a portion of coin sales and that many coins sell from anywhere between much closer to and much higher prices than are listed in the price guides. Edited:
Still, the large majority of coins I research typically sell for less, if not appreciably less than PCGS and NGC price guide values.
Mark Feld* of Heritage Auctions*Unless otherwise noted, my posts here represent my personal opinions.
@MFeld
"The large majority of coins don’t typically sell at price guide values."
In a world of instant information and data, in general, shouldn't they?
peacockcoins
Thank you, @braddick. Yes they shouId, and I will edit my post to “The large majority of coins I research typically sell for less, if not appreciably less than PCGS and NGC price guide values.”
Mark Feld* of Heritage Auctions*Unless otherwise noted, my posts here represent my personal opinions.
This is often but not always true, usually for very easy to obtain coins -- not so much for less common items.
Last year I got a 1943/2-S Lincoln Cent DDO FS-101 PCGS MS65 in an HA auction last year for $1020 with BP (https://coins.ha.com/itm/lincoln-cents/1943-2-s-1c-doubled-die-obverse-fs-101-ms65-pcgs-fs-0195-pcgs-population-40-57-ngc-census-3-10-cdn-1-450-whsle-bid-for/a/132431-29012.s?ic4=ListView-ShortDescription-071515#) and at that time the PCGS guide was much lower, like $600-700. I reported the sale to PCGS with a link to HA and they increased the price for all MS grades substantially within about a week, the MS65 was adjusted to 1050.
Have you tried selling a few on ebay just to get a feel for pricing? I looked up the sold prices for the same years and grades and the prices above are significantly lower than coins purchased recently on EBay.
Did you add the 20% buyer’s premium to the above listed winning hammer prices?
Mark Feld* of Heritage Auctions*Unless otherwise noted, my posts here represent my personal opinions.
ebay BIN tends to be retail, so you have to also consider if it was highest bid or BIN and whether the auction ended at 3am.
http://ProofCollection.Net
@FolsomMike62 , how about editing this thread title and your initial post?
People are seeing the thread title and the misleading prices in your initial post, and not seeing @MFeld 's post with the correct prices (including buyer's premium).
Correct prices are what the buyer paid. Not something intermediate or what the seller netted, etc.