Starting My Collection/Negotiating Prices

You are approaching collecting in the right order. First you are learning facts and LISTENING to the answers.

I'm a terrible person to talk with about Morgan dollars. I primarily collect by date (all the coins minted in one year) and so I do have a number of Morgan's but I buy them to fit into date sets rather than as a Morgan set. But, as you've surmised, Morgan's are available and in the top ten most popular series. Probably even the top 5.

One thing you need to keep in mind when it comes to pricing.

Technical grade + Eye Appeal = Value

If you go to Heritage sold listings for any date you are interested in, you will see hundreds of coins sold in any specific grade.

Be sure and filter for MOST RECENT sales, and you get a much better idea of what is happening at the moment.

The grade given to the coin by PCGS & NGC is right 99 percent of the time. That grade is the technical grade. You will hear a LOT of blah blah about one of them being better than another (not true today), and if you want to actually CHECK that list the last 10 coins prices achieved by each TPG and compare. It will only take you a few such comparisons to see that neither has the upper hand.

The second part is the eye appeal. To a certain extent that is subjective, while grading is mostly objective.

Eye appeal includes strike, toning, special properties such as proof like, and other factors that make the coin attractive or NOT attractive. As an example, Peace dollars are really tough to find with nice toning. Even though toning DOES NOT influence technical grade it makes it very hard to find nicely toned Peace dollars. That's why most Peace dollar collectors vie for bright white, as they are much easier to find for completing a set.

By contrast, beautifully toned Peace are a real challenge and someone putting that type of set together would have to have extreme patience.

Your choice of Morgan's has the great advantage of lots of nicely toned dollars. If I were putting a set together myself, I'd choose a set with the "bulls eye" peripheral toning. With Morgan's you can choose what you are looking for.

With those comparisons I suggested with Heritage you will see many instances where exactly the same grade of the same TPG sold near the same time might range from $100 - $300, os even more of a difference on higher end examples. That fluctuation is ALL because of the eye appeal, if the same technical grade is correct.

So please don't think you are going to get a single dollar price on your want list EASILY. It can be done, but you have to take the time to LEARN the dates, how they compare, how well they are attended in registry sets, and their census.

Last, you will find what I call the CLIFF of pricing, which you should be aware of. Cliff pricing is when there is a HUGE percentage jump on the technical grade from one lower to the next higher.

In other words, according any one of the ten different price lists (all listed together on every Heritage lot) you will see that HUGE jump in price.

That is mostly because of the census listing showing the next highest grade to be quite scarce. So you might see a coin in 63 at $100, 64 at $175, 65 at $300, and 66 and $2500.

66 is rare. 65 in more plentiful and at the bottom of the cliff (the cliff goes UP). If you can afford to buy at the bottom of the cliff, you will always be happiest in the long run.

It is far better to wait until you find a coin you LOVE as opposed to one that is satisfactory.

Some excellent advice given already! There are pros and cons to every collectible coin type, and Morgans are no exception:

Pros:
- They are popular.
- They are perhaps the most exhaustively studied and well-understood coin series of any country and any century. That knowledge is available for free or very little cost, unlike literature about "fringe" areas of numismatics
- For hefty old silver coins, they are mostly very cheap.
- They are very plentiful; any coin dealer or show worth their salt will have between dozens and hundreds of Morgans at any given time. ebay has dozens of auctions closing every hour.
- They come in a wide date range from a total of five different mints, not to mention countless varieties.

Cons:
- Mintage slumped off sharply during the 1890s; these key dates are extremely expensive, up to 5 or 6 figures.
- Popularity means that you will never get a good deal because the dealer didn't consult his greysheet, or because the auction ends at 4:15 AM on Christmas morning.
- Popularity has attracted professional counterfeiters who machine-strike coins on 90% silver planchets. Even $25 Morgans are counterfeited if they only cost $15 to make.

In short, Morgans are a great first series for a serious collector of at least modest means, but are not one I would recommend to an OCD collector who would not rest until they had dumped hundreds of thousands to get a complete set.

Thank you very much for confirming my approach on both the starting steps and buying methods. Rest assured to all that my first step was to purchase the 2018 latest edition of the big Red Book of American Coins. I cleared through that in a few days.

I guess my next questions are -

Can I start another collection in parallel or focus on one at a time? I would love to get into colonial coins, simply based on the historical implications.

And, the ultimate goal is to complete my set. But, in terms of increasing its value/appeal, is it worth it to spend the premium on the NGC/PCGS? Or, should I learn to grade and take the chance on ungraded coins?

What factors should I hit to make my collection be the most appealing? MS-64 and above? All PCGS? All NGC graded?

Yes.

You can collect however you want. Almost everyone has multiple sets, or just gets what they like/want. It's whatever you enjoy the most, there is no right way to be interested in coins it's a very individualized process in that regard.




For the most part yes. PCGS/NGC dominate the market and with nicer coins there is generally the feeling on higher values that if it is still raw it's still raw for a reason. The feeling exists for very good reasons and raw coins with significant numismatic premiums on them are a mine field especially with new collectors.

Some of it depends on what you're getting as well. Many of the common dates in common grades would likely be fine raw, but you can also get them for about the same price slabbed so I would take the extra liquidity every time there. Key dates and higher value/graded ones you have to know what you're doing as that is where it can get very tricky.

Your tastes will likely change the longer you collect. So my advice would be to buy 1 attractive coin in the different series you are interested in. Morgan's are a gateway coin. Meaning many new collectors start out collecting them but move on to other more scarce series that they may find more enjoyable. If you have an interest in colonials buy one and see how you enjoy it for a few weeks. As you continue building your numismatic library, the coins you take out and look at the most will guide you to the series you will most enjoy. You may find that you enjoy larger coins rather than smalls ones, or vice versa. So my advice would be to take your time and don't rush into one series at the get go. And most of all, enjoy the ride.

Edit: Also it will take you some time to develop an eye. So before you pull the trigger on any new purchases make sure you post pictures of the coin in the grading section to hear other CCF member's opinions. Consider that section to be your training wheels. We will coach you in the right direction.

The main auction sites are Heritage, Stacks-bowers, Great Collections and David Lawrence. Most of the price guides are based off of auction results from these sites. As Mox pointed out though, eye appeal reigns supreme when determining price. That's why you will see such large price fluctuations of sold listings. It takes time to understand what makes a coin appealing. That's why I suggested that you post coins you are interested in buying in the grading section before you pull the trigger.



Absolutely not unless you are buying raw coins. Which you absolutely do NOT want to do starting out. Don't even be tempted. You will most likely get burned.

So Mike I get the reason why you would say not to buy raw coins. However, if there was an opportunity to purchase coins at the ms60 price, and the photos show coins that seem close to or above the MS63 quality - would you make that move?