Ridiculous Coin Appraisal Story

And in order for you to find gems, the dealers have to pay way low on the coins.

A friend of mine works on appraisals and research for an upscale auctioneer.

They ran across a pocket watch, and sent pix to both Sotheby's and Christies. Both declined it, saying they didn't feel it would bring their $5000 lot minimum. I looked at the pix for about ten seconds and asked if they'd sell it for $5000.

They ended up selling it through a watch specialist, for just under a half million.

Does that make Sotheby's and Christies crooks? No, just ignorant.

First, I'm a collector.

It's frustrating when I see collectors that don't understand that dealers are in business to make money.

In the case of a pawn shop, unless you happen to know they're experts, of course they're going to make ridiculous offers.

But honestly, any collector that takes a coin into a dealer's shop and expects Red Book (when most of their coins are often below Red Book when you ask them) or even gray sheet doesn't understand business.

People are in business to make money. You can't make any money buying a coin for $10 when a collector will pay $9 for it. Furthermore, you can't make any money buying a coin for $9 when a collector will pay $9 for it.

Dealers are often seen as "a necessary evil", which is frustrating to see. They are often experts that have the ability to get what we want when we can't get it. That's why there are so few dealers, and certainly far fewer that do the volume of business to support a brick 'n' mortar shop.

These dealers have to pay rent, pay the light bill, and eat. They can't do that by paying collectors Red Book values for coins. It's common sense. If you don't like it, don't sell to dealers.

Generally speaking, the retail business is such that there is about a 50%-100% mark-up. That's on EVERYTHING you see on Amazon or your corner store. That's how business works. Just because Whitman doesn't publish a Red Book values list of wholesale toothbrush prices doesn't mean you're not paying 300% what the retailer paid for it, you just don't see that - so Target isn't demonized as out to steal your money.

That's what businesses are - they are experts in their field and we know them and trust them, we know we can work with them dealing in fair prices.

Business is business. Gotta respect that - and if you can't respect a particular business, don't deal with them.

For years, one large B+M dealer paid 3¢ each for forn coins and dumped them in 5 gallon buckets. When they finlly paid someone to go through them, they found stuff like Russian platinum coins.

New Guy, first post....

Here's one I thought a bit odd, I went into a shop about 50 miles from me. I hadn't been there in years and it's apparently changed hands since my last visit. I was a bit taken aback when I went into the shop, the owner had a few signs located on just about every counter that he would perform an appraisal on your coins for free, but if you chose not to sell him the coin you then owed him a 12.00 appraisal fee!
Yes, that's correct... Sell it to him at the price he quotes or he will charge you a fee.
Kinda hard to lose money on that deal if you own the shop!

to the Community!

A lot of service companies use this trick with diagnostic fees, but they do not last long. The better ones advertise as biggfredd has stated, "Fee waived if you let us fix your problem!"

As delaner mentioned. Dealers, pawn shops, coin stores, etc are in buisness to make money, not freinds. You could go to the same one every day but that doesn't help him pay the bills knowing you. For any type of store you need to pay for many things out of the profits. Morthgage or rent, gas, phone, electric, water, etc. Also, those same profits must cover store requirements such as a fax, copier, copier or printer cartridges, Lamp replacements, cleaning equipment and on and on and on with just STUFF for a buisness. And too most forget that that same person running such a buisness may also have a family to support. Again, wherever he or she lives, that has similar bills to pay as with the store. And too, there are auto bills, school items, etc.
Now remember this since it all comes out of the profits from the sale of coins and coin related items.

There is a huge difference between an "appraisal" and what a dealer (or pawn shop owner) is actually willing to pay you.

I occasionally watch "Pawn Stars" on cable and, while I hate the way the owners make extremely low-ball offers all the time, I do have to give them credit for their willingness to call in experts and give a fair and honest appraisal before making their low-ball offers.

A typical episode goes like this:

Owner: I have this rare widget that I'd like to sell for $3000.
Rick: Before we agree on a price, let me have an expert friend of mine to look at it."
Expert: "This widget is extremely rare and in good condition. In my opinion, it would probably sell at auction for around $10,000-12,000."
Rick (to owner): "OK, so how much would you like for this widget?"
Owner: "$12,000"
Rick: "Not gonna happen. I'll give you $5000 for it."
Owner: "$5000? But you heard the expert -- it's worth $12000!"
Rick: "That's at auction, not retail. Plus, I have to make a profit and there's no guarantee how long it will take me to sell this widget because there is such a limited number of collectors, etc., etc., etc."

Again, you can argue whether Rick's offer of $5000 was a fair one or not, but at least he didn't just pretend to be an expert and give an "appraisal" of $500 when the owner wanted to sell it for $3000. The problem with most pawn shops (and many coin shops, I'm sure), is that they probably either don't have the necessary expertise to make a real appraisal in the first place or else they have the expertise and are just going to lie in order to get a better deal.