1805 Half Dollar, Opinions?

I graded it only XF-40 and saw many of those going for over $1500-1600 slabbed, so that's why it seemed like a good deal even if there are some really minor problems. I also was extremely surprised to actually win it for this and $895 was my exact max bid, since I thought it would have finished for something like $1200 or $1300.

I will post the coin when I get it to make sure there's no issues of authenticity, and yeah the TPG thing is a littttttle suspicious but then again I can understand why someone would be mad at them. I remember being pretty angry when I received an MS-61 grade on my half eagle when I was expecting a nice MS-63. And yeah, I wasn't really 100% sure it'd slab but that's more a long term thing for me, I haven't slabbed many coins and I just like keeping them raw until I really plan to do a huge sell-off of high end stuff since I can handle them and look at them in their more 'natural environment' (which means being free of plastic!). That's probably years off, not to mention that good higher end type stuff seems to appreciate over time. 15 years ago, I could have gotten something this nice for $600, right?

I'm more willing to pay at least closer to 'actual value' for higher end stuff since its more of an investment, for lower end stuff I just grab whatever cheap but I don't plan to do that much any more since I am utterly swamped with tons and tons of coins worth under $50.

It looks like a nice one, with the minor edge damage and the possible old cleaning as the only likely problems. Overall detail is excellent and it looks like an easy EF-40 in terms of wear. It looks like Overton variety O-111 which is one of the more common types for the year.

At the price you paid it seems like a real bargain!

She's a beauty!

I wasn't either, I wouldn't be too happy if I found a fingerprint on the thing...

Sorry to hear that. It seemed like it was going to be a great coin at a good price. Let us know if he gives you any trouble on the return.

One thing that would concern me about buying from him is that he has a 3-day return policy. When you combine that with his strong dislike of TPGs it creates an issue if you bought something that turned out to be counterfeit (one that you didn't detect but a TPG did). It isn't at all clear to me whether he would make good on it, or tell you tough luck. That would scare me a bit when hundreds of dollars are at stake.

That's too bad ShadowCreator. I did not see that in the photo provided on ebay either. I hope he honors the return as he/she should. Let us know what the outcome is. That is why I have always stressed a return policy when buying on ebay ;-)

rrrrrrrrgh, I forgot. Too late now.

It looks similar. The reverse is nicer than the obverse. The worst part is that it seemed problem free aside from that (and perhaps the small edge damage), as in uncleaned.

If it really is just that I don't like it, I'm cool with taking a $5 or $10 loss on a coin I guess. But most of the time that isn't the case and they really messed up, and in those cases it bothers me when they try to screw me out of $15 for all my trouble or something. If the seller makes an obvious mistake and refuses to pay return shipping, I usually give them a neutral.