What Is It Actually Worth ?

oregonnative · July 4, 2005 4:10AM

Being a newbie I am a little confused when it comes to figuring a coins value, whether its buying or selling. I can choose from the Red ,Blue,or Black Book, A Greysheet, Coin Worlds CoinValue or from past Ebay items. HELP.
What reference do you use and do you take it at face value given or do you subtract a fixed percentage.

Thanks in advance for your input.

Russ · July 4, 2005 4:14AM

Auction archives are your best source of real world values; Heritage, Teletrade, eBay to name a few. Price guides are just that - "guides". They are static and the market is dynamic, thus they tend to be somewhat inaccurate.

Russ, NCNE

RYK · July 4, 2005 4:15AM

Very difficult question that requires a longer answer than I can give right now. I would say that I generally look to buy coins in my area of interest at about 75-80% Coin Values and expect wholesale to be about 60-65% Coin Values. I also check the Heritage auction archives. I occasionally use Greysheet and never look at the Redbook or Bluebook for pricing info. It really depends on what kinds of coins you are talking about.

TorinoCobra71 · July 4, 2005 4:21AM

<< <i>Auction archives are your best source of real world values; Heritage, Teletrade, eBay to name a few. Price guides are just that - "guides". They are static and the market is dynamic, thus they tend to be somewhat inaccurate.

Russ, NCNE >>

IN RUSS WE TRUST !

TorinoCobra71

2bits · July 4, 2005 4:23AM

If I could sell my coins for the values listed in the major price guides That would be great, but the real world says that aint gonna happen!

I use the same auction resources that Russ mentioned, But really the only time I do that is every year or so to keep an accurate accounting for Insurance of the coins presently in my collection ,, or on coins that I intend to purchase,( I follow fairly closely the trends on those particular coins .)

Rick

kranky · July 4, 2005 4:35AM

It would be helpful to know what types of coins and the grades you are interested in. As Russ said, auction archives are good indicators for coins graded by the major services, but plenty of coins don't appear at auction. I would use the Redbook only as a very rough indicator, and ignore the Bluebook and Blackbook altogether.

It also matters how you buy or sell. You might find that buying at a show can be more advantageous than buying from a retail store that has little competition - or you might find that the retail store offers very good prices! And on the selling side, if you offer coins to a dealer that aren't the types he/she usually carries, you probably aren't going to get the best offer. Some dealers have no interest at all in dateless Buffalo nickels, while others will pay 15 cents or more each, just for one example.

michael · July 4, 2005 3:35PM

well i do not know but show me in hand sight seen coins that i like to study and are in my specialities and i can tell you exactly and the how what where and why to sell them for the best price right now

What Is It Actually Worth ?

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