1802/0 1800 Reverse?

It's in horrible condition and it's not a very well-known variety, so it doesn't jump out at the typical ebay browser. I guess no Half Cent specialists saw it. You should have someone who is very familiar with Half Cent die varieties to look at it.

Yep. I was suspicious too but I figured I'd go for it for $500. I thought it ridiculous that this did not garner more bids and was not better presented, but hey, with $79 for a top bid I can't go wrong. Even a reverse of 1802 should be worth about $100+ in this condition, right?

I'd risk $80 on that, 10 times out of ten.

This is a very good point. Further, I just read the auction in detail:




Frankly, that changes my opinion of the whole thing.

Frankly this would be a tempting piece just as a hole filler. At first look I was convinced that it was an 1802 C-1. Bu in looking it over closer I now think it is probabl an altered 1800. The key thing I see is the distance from the top of the 1 to the hair wave above it. On the 1802 the 1 is right up to the hair wave. On the 1800 it is significantly lower. To me the spacing on this coin seems to match the 1800.

If you are asking about this particular coin I'd say you should suck it up & pay what you bid.....it's not the sellers fault you missed the part about the suspect attribution. If you are asking in general I'd say you should take a few more minutes with the descriptions before you bid.

I looked at a couple of the sellers other auctions. The 2 I looked at had the exact same format : a brief description of his policies in black, followed by a description of the coin in blue, followed by other paragraphs I didn't bother to read.

If I was the seller I wouldn't have used the same title, but you can bet your bottom dollar as a buyer I would have read the entire auction before I bid. In this case you didn't have to read past the first line of the coin description.

I'm not trying to be offensive, but it appears to me that in your haste to get what appeared to be a great deal you didn't bother to do what I would consider basic due diligence, and are now looking for a reason to get out of paying.

There are lots of people that troll ebay, coin shops, antique malls, thrift shops, auctions, etc looking to use their hard won knowledge to buy something for a lot less than it's worth. I don't see anything wrong with that. In fact, that's how I make most of my living. The flip side of that is sometimes your knowledge wasn't enough, or that picture didn't really show what you thought it did, or whatever......IMO in those instances you take your lumps & move on.

Normally I'd say just pay up and eat it - there's nothing wrong with the auction listing that justifies cancelling your bid, but he does have it listed with a 7 day return despite the description saying AS IS. I'd message him with your intention to return it if it's altered and see if he agrees to cancel the winning bid to avoid the hassle.