Adventures Selling Sterling

A regular coin auction that I keep track of had a hallmarked silver sugar bowl, weighing 4 1/2 ounces. As an antique, it was bought with a bid of $450, and a 16 1/2% buyer's premium added to that.

I think you could have done much better selling them as antiques rather than as bullion. At a weight of 50 ounces, you had a very significant set of antique silver and I feel would have commanded a successful bid of well over $2,000 at an antique auction, even if they had no hallmarks.

It is very possible that these pieces are not going to be melted, and will find their way to an antique auction, where a very substantial profit can be made.

He has his own display case with items for sale. If they were good he would have placed them in there. Maybe these pieces were just worth silver.

Exactly. Every piece I buy is researched. Anything with antique/unique value is sold through the appropriate venue. This particular set is fairly common & had recent sales on ebay. Actual completed auctions were not enough over melt to cover fees, packing materials & hassle.

The guy I sell to has several antique silver dealers that go through what he has collected. He sells to them for slightly over melt. Many times one of them will be in the shop looking over recently acquired items when I stop by. They generally perk up whenever someone comes in to sell. The ones that know me don't even bother looking at what I bring in.

I will say this. In a high end retail shop this set would have been priced considerably higher than melt. Eventually someone that doesn't know how to shop on ebay would have bought it at that price. However, I don't own a high end retail shop, & I'm not interested in waiting a year or more for an item to sell. It's also possible that in the excitement of an auction it MAY have brought more. The downside is it MAY have sold for less, & fees on the sellers side for antique auctions run between 10-30%.

There's no doubt that some sterling items are worth much more than silver value. I run across these every once in a while. One thing I came across last year was a Taxco sterling pin in the shape of a dragon made by Spratling. It weighed right at an ounce & I sold it for many times that. Sitting in my safe deposit box is a Native American piece crafted by Beyuka. It weighs in at 6 ounces but if sold through the right venue could bring $800-1200. Those kinds of items are few & far between.

Many more sterling items can be sold on ebay for 10-20% over melt. You then have to take into account ebay & paypal fees that run between 11-13% combined. Add to that the expense of packaging the item, gas to take it to the post office & the time involved in listing an item & it's seldom worth going that route.

The reality is that sterling items that were mass produced(especially if they are monogrammed) are the equivalent of "junk" silver coins. There is little or no premium over silver value.

I'm glad you didn't sell a Spratling for melt. I would've had to YELL at you.

I still have to disagree. While most sterling chains are machine-made, if you take the time to learn how certain object are made you would not be selling them at melt. Educate yourself and then educate your customer. The more you know the more your customer knows and the more they will be willing to pay more because it's not an item that gets plopped onto a scale the way drugs are pushed. Conserve the past and relish the hand-made because the makers are dead and they are one of a kind items. If you know for sure that it's machine-made then have at it, but don't destroy the past.

I agree with 007 an take the best you can get now. Hugh end retail sales of one year plus wreak of one word, stagnant.....

Sometimes you got to get the most you can get when you operate in short positions like 007 and keep things moving.....

Atleast I do on ebay anyway but you can only go so low til your into neg money via fees and such....

Reason I put start bid where I need to be as I am way to small to list 24-7 starting low like Scottsdale silver for example.....

Wish I could.....

Silver is so high now most pieces are worth more to melt than actual collector item.

Yes, there is a lot of sterling hollowware that is worth more than silver spot. Premiums come from certain makers, where it was made and the demand for the product. You can have a sugar bowl made in England circa 1790 and depending on who made it and what it looks like you may only get spot or a small pinch above. But that same size creamer made by a US Colonial silversmith, this creamer could bring 10 times or 100 times silver value. Then there are the more recent but desirable items made by Tiffany & Company, Cartier, Roy-croft and many, many more.

Just like what happened with common Morgans. Silver goes up, they go up. You have a low grade, high mintage common Morgan and it will only bring silver value. At a good auction it could sell for 40 dollars but by time you pay your auction fees you could wind up getting less than silver value. Auction houses take anywhere from 10 percent (usually over 5k items) to as much as 50 percent (usually items under 50 dollars). Let's say you have a tea set that scraps at 1000 dollars and it was made by S.Kirk & Sons but is not the most sought after pattern. I'd be willing to bet 99 percent of bidders will be using scrap value as a bidding barometer. And in the event the set brings 1300 dollars, after sellers fees you're looking at 1040 dollars (at a 20 percent premium). Then you may have to wait as much as 30 days for your money. In the state of Virginia the law gives the seller 30 days to pay a consignor. Now look at it from the buyers view. If there is a buyers premium (15 - 22 percent) this has to be factored into the final hammer price. So if the bidder paid 1300 he may have to add another 195 dollars. And if the bidder doesn't have a tax ID that'll cost another 5 percent of more. Final price = about 1520 dollars. Who's gonna pay that for 1000 dollars scrap value? Not many.

Nothing is etched in stone and there is always the one or two people who overpay. But like most cash cows, they only have so much money to burn through.

What it boils down to is as a seller, if you are happy with what you got, you got a good deal. Same goes with the buyer. If you are happy with your purchase, you got a good deal. Life's too short to get BUYERS REMORSE or SELLERS REMORSE.