Buying A Coin Collection Question

For one you can start with the famous Red Book by Whitman Publishing. Available at most book stores and at most coin shows. It is off the wall with prices but a good idea anyway. The Grey sheet also can be purchased on line and is what most dealers use. Coin prices can also be obtained on the PCGS web site or Coin World Magazine web site. Some dealers have links to coin prices such as jmscoins. His web site has a reverence link to coin shows and coin prices. Best bet is go to any coin show and try to buy a few books and/or magazines on coins. If a decent show they should be there. Walmart on line book store has the best prices for most books but naturally there is that famous S&H added to any on line purchases.
Hopefully since it is your boss with the coins it doesn't lead to your dismissal now having come into MILLIONS from those coins.

yes we do look at the coins, sometimes we buy them and then spend time going over the collection at a later date... I know many times I have sent "additional" payment checks after finding something that we missed in the first buy.... you may also want to get an apprasial for the value from someone who is certified to do such!

Collections that come in for purchase are handled much differently than those that come in for appraisal. There are different types of appraisals and appraisers as well. If you want a realistic and fair appraisal, you're going to have to pay for it. You should WANT to pay for a fair appraisal, since you are not planning on compensating the appraiser by giving them an opportunity to purchase the coins.

You can ask the appraiser to provide whatever kind of appraisal you want. If the appraisal is for insurance purposes, it is prudent to expect full retail values for the coins as accurately graded plus at least 10% to cover acquisition costs. Especially rare coins will have a higher cost of acquisition associated with them if they do not come up for sale very often. A retail or auction appraisal should cover a range of value and a description of condition--for example: 1822 Capped Bust Dime VG details/cleaned/small rim dent 2:00 obverse ($275-400).

A 'free' dealer estimate of value is completely different from an appraisal and can be based in whole or in part on the 'sight-unseen' prices like you would find in the dealer greysheet. Expect a significant discount even from wholesale bid prices depending on the dealer and their ability to market and sell the coins/paper in question. Since Greysheets are available online, get yourself one and bring it (and the Red Book) with you if you bring the coins to a dealer. Make notes. Tell them you'll think about their offer.

A dealer will often take the time to look at all the coins in the collection, but their offer will be lower than you might expect for a number of factors. A quick look at each coin is often not enough for even the most experienced numismatist to observe every flaw or positive feature of a given coin. Honest dealers will not offer 70% of silver melt for all silver coins. A good dealer should look at each of your coins unless you are specifically telling him that the coins are bullion only, and you are only selling them as such.

Dealers are going to try to pay as little as possible for your collection while keeping you happy. For example, a dealer might only glance at your tokens and exonumia and say, 'Nobody really wants those, I pay X cents each for them." They can point you to trays of tokens each selling for a buck or less, so it seems reasonable. If there's something valuable in them a truly honest dealer might pay you more later, but most will just be happy to use the value there to make up for offering a little more for the rarities.

Common date wheats will get you 2 cents each.

Rolls of common date memorial Lincolns won't carry much of a premium if any, even if the coins are BU.

Common date 90% silver (dimes to halves) in my area will get you 8-9X face value. Morgans and Peace will get you 9.50 for junk and higher for better dates/conditions. Silver rounds will get you 80-90% of spot depending on whether there are buyers with orders in or not.

As for the early coinage, expect the offer you get to be about 50% of what it would be expected to sell for, with one caveat: a dealer might (mentally or vocally) knock the coin down a grade for purchase and then up for selling. It's called 'kicking the tires,' and I see it all the time.

With all that said, I don't think you should take it to a dealer unless you are planning to pay for an appraisal. If it were my friend and I wanted to stay friends, I would pay for an appraisal and request that the appraisal reflect dealer buy prices. With that information and your own research you can decide on a fair offer.

Even after knowing someone for 25 years, I wouldn't rely singly on my own opinion. If you do make a mistake and end up paying $200 for a coin that turns out to be worth $20,000, I think the paper trail provided by an independent appraisal would be more than worth it's weight in rare coins.

Hope to see more of the collection as your work progresses--keep us posted!

That seems like a good plan Shappa. One suggestion, if any of the coins seem to have a lot of value, consider getting added thoughts on it. You sure don't want to over pay for a coin and have missed something. Hey, post them here.

Jim

What I would do if I was presented with this collection is

Price out the bust material
Allow about a dollar apiece for the cent rolls. (I don't care if they look like "original rolls" because the only way to know if they truly are is to bust them open and then they aren't. If I truly feel convinced that they are, then I may allow more.)
Do a quick scan of the dimes for keys, semi-keys, or unusually high grade pieces, other than that melt value.
Melt on the silver rounds.
I'd try and come up with an average value on the tokens and broken bank notes and allow that per piece and hope I find a good one in there. Why? because I don't know that much about them and getting accurate values will require attribution and specialized references that I don't have. This means a lot more time for potentially little or no return. So figure the average price and hope something shows up to cover my research time.

this way some of us can help you grade&price them

I would try to find a certified appraiser. any key dates or high dollar coins send in for grading. You could take the coins to 5 diffrent dealers at a coin show and get 5 diffrent grades. The bullion coins depends on the market price.