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 Replies: 37 / Views: 4,430 |
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Valued Member
Belgium
464 Posts |
Hello all
just wanted to vent a bit because I feel realy overwhelmed at this point and I want to share why.
first off I'm very fortunate ,I'm far from rich but I tend to work hard when I have a job and its not always work that people like to do (cleaning/moving houses)so tru that way I do have lucky episodes
a little more then a year ago I found an extensive cach of old coins in a cellar and that drove me to this as a hobby and it was so extensve I had to buy Kraus books untill 1600 but now almost 1 1/2 years later I finally have done the most beautyfull pre 1950's coins in 2x2 flips in 13 maps wich are full
but I still have lots more to do like early russian scale money ,ancient greek and roman coins, I also have more then a few kilo of modern coins I still have lying around.
Nway, I'm not complaining, far from. but last week I was working and I found quite a big post stamp collection
2 huge old books and a square cookiecase full of old stamps
and a 2001 cataloge to boot.
so I was exited,and took it home ,there I was looking at stamps and prices in this book and I just feel I can't give this away for free
most of them are stamped but there a few old ones that are postfresh
but there are realy realy lots of'm.
so now I don't know what to do with them,and I'm so overwhelmed right now that I don't have the energie to do stamps or coins ATM.
any advise is apreciated
Nway thanks for reading my rant guys Edited by dohcollector
06/24/2016 6:27 pm
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Pillar of the Community
United States
1436 Posts |
Put them away until you have more time to research & enjoy them...
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Pillar of the Community
United States
5825 Posts |
Basic observations about stamps and selling them:
-- stamp collecting is virtually dead in the water.
-- look up value in the catalog and then list at about 10-20% of that value.
If you "don't have the energie to do stamps" then take the collection to a dealer and hope for the best.
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Pillar of the Community
Norway
1358 Posts |
Just let it rest until you have enough goesting.  I'm not a philatelist, but for the stamps: - make sure that you keep the ones with postage stamps on them! Stamps with stamps are nowadays also very much valued by the philatelist community. Especially rare postage stamps are of interest. - make sure that you put any stamp albums upright. If you let them stand, there will be a bit of oxygen between the pages, preventing them to get 'rusty'. As soon as that's happening (you'll see due to brown marks), the stamps instantly lose all value. Anyway, if you're not interested in / able to collecting both coins and stamps, then I suggest that you either sell your total stamp collection or to sell the valuable stamps individually, so that you can invest more time in this great hobby of ours.  |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
1191 Posts |
I had the very same problem, erm, situation. I was given boxes loaded with stamps 4 or 5 big, strong stamp albums. Thankfully, I have my mom who was going through the stamps with me, otherwise, I would of driven myself nuts. After a couple months work of digging around, I finally managed to work out a organizing system. If the mods would allow me to post a couple pictures of the albums, I will happily do so. Now I have some stamps that I have to it them into the appropriate album but I just can't get around to doing it. Coins get in the way!
I decided to focus on WW2 German, USSR, and old USA stamps to narrow it down a lot; I wanted to focus on flora and fauna of all countries, but was advised against it (thankfully).
So that's my little story. Let me know if pics are ok.
Also, try joining stampcommunity.org I did but I'm not very active.
Edited by Hello There
06/24/2016 7:43 pm
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Pillar of the Community
United States
4963 Posts |
I'm in the same situation. My great-grandmother bought a ton of world stamps back in the forties and fifties that she cut up and used in collages. When she died six years ago, I ended up with a box full of world stamps in little wax paper envelopes, many of which are in great condition. They are all date from the early 20th century to 1955 with a few outside those boundaries on both ends. I've tried cataloging them, but haven't done much work. I did find a website called Stampworld with a lot of helpful information.
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Rest in Peace
United States
7075 Posts |
Hello There, you can post about your other hobbies in General Discussion. People post about their cars and gardens there so I'm sure that stamps would be fine.
dohcollector, do you love the stamps or just recognize that they probably have some value if you can find the right buyer? I would like to think that old collections DO get rescued and passed on to the next generation -- but there comes a point where having too much stuff and too much to do becomes stressful.
Maybe you can find and appraiser or an auction house that can help. They already know everything you would have to learn about the value of the collection. If you are planning on selling them, don't fret too much about getting top dollar. Most of us will never get that for our collections.
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Rest in Peace
United States
2668 Posts |
I have a FULL album of golden stamp replicas I just bought. I have thousands of FDCs that I bought, just cause I like to look at them. I probably didn't go too far at the IRS because of all of the stamps I snagged off of envelopes. It's a FEDERAL CRIME? Sue me. Yeah, not fully mature. I would open mail for eight hours at the 'tingle' tables and then dream about it at night. If there were big wigs around I only got manila envelopes to open.  Stamps are mostly just pretties, like hot wheels. Some are worth a lot of bucks, right? |
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Moderator
 United States
189222 Posts |
For what it is worth, there we have a forum for Stamp collectors... http://www.stampcommunity.org/(Separate registration required) Quote:
Put them away until you have more time to research & enjoy them... I agree. There will be a time when you are looking for something to do. It happens to all of us. Save them for that time. |
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Valued Member
 Belgium
464 Posts |
thank you all for the ideas and ecouraging words. i already visited stampcommunity to give it a look but did not register. after some sleep and all your answers my overwhelming feeling is down a little ,but not realy gone so after this thread last night I'm going to make the conclusion I do not want to invest time in stamps. its just not my 'thing' for a weird reason. and the idea of putting them asidee for later realy does not appeal. so today I prolly will listen to buddy and ultrarant and go to a stampshop to c what they will offer for it... i'll try and make some pics later on to sweeten the thread a bit I'mm keep you informed as to what happens ,nway thanks again for pepping me up :)  @ parklane.... |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
1191 Posts |
If you are willing to sell them internationally, and if you have any ww2 German or USSR stamps, I might be interested in buying.
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Valued Member
Belgium
464 Posts |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
1314 Posts |
Last week I started giving away some stamps that I put away in the '60s. One was an unopened first day of issue 1965. My older brother is getting married (for the first time) and his fiancee is a stamp collector.
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Pillar of the Community
Poland
3201 Posts |
I know the feeling. You sort them by theme or country/period, prepare sets, place them properly so that everything is visible, and select the best photos out of several you took. Then, you list them with a starting price of 50c per page... and nothing sells.  It of course depends on what you have but certainly a lot of stamps are not worth the time and effort it takes to sell them, unless in bulk. The quickest way would be to ask a dealer. Even if he doesn't want to buy them, he can at least provide you with information whether it's worth to list them as singles or small lots. Even though in a vast majority of cases a "postfrisch" stamp is priced higher than a used one, the fact that the stamps are old and not cancelled does not automatically make them valuable. What I know is that there is a market for recent* cancelled stamps: with the mail volumes going down and common usage of various other methods of specifying the postage paid (pre-paid handstamps, meters, printed labels, stickers, or sometimes handwritten postage costs with a datestamp) and many of the stamps that are still used not being cancelled at all in some countries, properly cancelled stamps are less and less frequently encountered. * recent would usually mean 2000 or newer. |
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Valued Member
Slovenia
459 Posts |
I collected stamps when I was a kid. I still have 5 albums I rarely look at. I do however think that maybe someday I'll return to them. I just need to find a topic and stick to it. But right now I'll stick with coins.
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Pillar of the Community
Canada
849 Posts |
As a teenager I collected world stamps and Canadian coins. In my twenties I stopped with the stamps but kept my collection. I kept on with my coins. Close to 20 years ago I got interested in Canadian stamps. Over a two year period I bought lots and then lost interest and sold the more valuable ones. I kept my albums and the cheaper non valuable stamps.
My interest in coins has varied too but I never dumped my childhood collection. I am glad I didn't has I have been very active in coin collecting these last four years - more so than ever before in my life.
Just saying interests and hobbies come and go and that is okay.
If it turns out the stamps are not valuable or you cannot sell them, maybe keep a few that appeal to you and set them aside in case you get interested later and give the rest away to family members or friends who collect or have kids that collect.
Kids often get interested when in a Scout or Cub group and want to work on a collectors badge.
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Replies: 37 / Views: 4,430 |
Posted 06/24/2016 6:37 pm
