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You bought a true rarity that has not traded for 15 years, paid dearly. Now you want to sell it
TahoeDale
Posts: 1,785 ✭✭✭
This could apply to many coins and collectors.
While there may be many variables, here is the one I will describe:
The coin in question was sold at auction in 1993, when prices were not crazy, but really down from 1989. It brought $55,000. It was and remains the top pop for the date-MS68. And is the key for the series.
10 years later, you paid $150,000, and the coin had not appeared at auction since 1993. It had traded privately one time in the interim.
There are no relevant price guides, and the only record of sale is the auction in 1993( no previous auction appearance).
Before you put it in auction, you want a better feel for the likely price to be realized.
Suggestions?
While there may be many variables, here is the one I will describe:
The coin in question was sold at auction in 1993, when prices were not crazy, but really down from 1989. It brought $55,000. It was and remains the top pop for the date-MS68. And is the key for the series.
10 years later, you paid $150,000, and the coin had not appeared at auction since 1993. It had traded privately one time in the interim.
There are no relevant price guides, and the only record of sale is the auction in 1993( no previous auction appearance).
Before you put it in auction, you want a better feel for the likely price to be realized.
Suggestions?
TahoeDale
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It doesn't matter what the coin is, somewhere there is a comp that can serve as a proxy for the value of this piece.
By the way, we run across this issue frequently in the colonial world where many coins are extremely rare (R-8, R-7, etc.), very infrequently trade, where there are no price guides and there is little choice but to make estimates based on sales (private or public) of similar (or even roughly similar) items.
I give away money. I collect money.
I don’t love money . I do love the Lord God.
For a buyer, when something like this happens............double what you expect to pay and then add some more.
Like the big money venture capitalist who funded HP said, never sell unless there are two buyers.
I was at a car auction a couple of years ago in Scottsdale. Up for auction was a GM autorama bus from the late 30's. I had been given a tour of that bus several years previous to the auction by the owner who confided in me that he was buried in the bus for a quarter mil and was so far under water that he was drowning.At the auction, two drunk bididiots got into a bidding war and the bus hammered for FOUR mil.
Maybe 4 times what you think it's worth might not be a bad idea.
Notify all the major coin magazines, get them to do an article on the coin. Have PCGS or some big house display it at FUN. Then put it up for auction.
And BTW, if I didn't know enough in 2003, then it's too late to be doing the homework. Again, I'd just let the coin fly.
Doggedly collecting coins of the Central American Republic.
Visit the Society of US Pattern Collectors at USPatterns.com.
<< <i>I'd just let the coin fly. >>
I hope we're not paying a lot for this advice.
Ask one of your trusted dealers who handle such material what they think the coin would bring.
Think about what selling price would thrill you to tears, then offer it to a top dealer or two for that price. If you can get your price and skip the auction delays, so much the better. If they don't take the coin, they might counter which would be informative.
Try to think of other coins with similar characteristics in other series and research how they have sold at auction recently.
Look at how other top coins in that same series sold in 1993-ish compared to today.
New collectors, please educate yourself before spending money on coins; there are people who believe that using numismatic knowledge to rip the naïve is what this hobby is all about.
<< I'd just let the coin fly. >>
<I hope we're not paying a lot for this advice.>
Hey, you get what you pay for!
Doggedly collecting coins of the Central American Republic.
Visit the Society of US Pattern Collectors at USPatterns.com.
1. The coin won't sell, and then it may be considered "tired" by the dealers and collectors who buy and sell six figure items.
2. The coin won't sell, and knowledgeable buyers might be wary of a seller who has a too inflated view of their coin.
Dale asked a very tough question. Think of examples in real estate in the neighborhood you live in. Near where I live, there is a house that is on a corner of two fairly busy streets. It looks like a nice house from the outside. But, it has been for sale with different brokers for several years, even though houses were (and still are) in high demand in our area. Why? Because they initially set too high a price. Now, years later, the house is for sale at a discount to market and it is languishing because every potential buyer thinks there is something wrong with the house because it has been on the market for so long.
So it can be with big ticket coins.
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