Advice, Best Way To Sell?

Welcome to Coin Community. The answers to your questions are easy, the right thing to do...not so much.

First, the amount of money you're going to realize from selling these coins is directly proportional to the amount of time and work you want to put into selling them. Selling them to a dealer is quick, easy and convenient, and guarantees you won't get much more than half of what they're worth if you maximize their exposure in the proper venue.

Second, the value of these gold pieces varies greatly by grade. None of the three are particularly rare; if heavily circulated, you'll only realize a hundred or two apiece. If they're Uncirculated (Mint State), values could range into the thousands of dollars each, depending on the grade. Coins are graded on the Sheldon Scale of 1-70, ranging from Poor 01 (are you sure it's a coin?) to MS70 (flawless under significant magnification). Mint State coins start at MS-60. With any of these three coins, once you get past MS-62 or so, you're getting into serious money territory. Using the 1914 as an example - in MS-62, value (in the real world, not some published price list) is something around $1200 (in a reputable TPG's slab). One grade up, MS-63, and you're looking at $8000-9000 for the same coin.

Like I say, value varies greatly by grade.

So, one of the things you're going to need to get your best price for these coins is to have them graded. This is optional, but most prospective buyers would want to see them encapsulated by one of the three major Third-Party Grading Services - PCGS, NGC or ANACS. More on this later.

Third, you're obviously going to get the best price for these by exposing them to the largest audience of potential buyers. This means ebay, for all but the very most valuable of coins. Are you an experienced ebay seller, with good Feedback? This could count against you if not - people won't risk a large sum of money on a new seller offering gold coins. That screams, "scam!"

Take stock of things. Are you an experienced ebay seller? Can you take quality, gradable pictures of these coins? By that, I mean this:



...or something fairly close. Do you have some time to invest into maximizing your return? It'll cost you between $25-100 per coin (depending on speed and vendor) to have one of the TPG's grade these coins, and the turnaround ranges from a few days to a few weeks (time costs money - how fast do you want to go?).

If these coins are truly excellent, a higher-level venue such as Heritage Auctions, the largest in the business, is in order. Another possibility is a consignment with an established ebay seller - look no further than CCF's owners, who sell on ebay as "Bobby131313," for this possibility. They won't do you wrong.

It's most important for you to now answer the question you asked,




We stand ready to help you answer that question.

Depending on where you live, the only way you're going to get this done would be to attend a pretty large show, AND know that one of the top three TPG's will have a booth doing grading, AND that they would do gold during that time.

Dave pretty much hit the nail on the head with everything he posted. I think before we can make more conclusions, we would need the pics. If you are sitting on high grade examples, we can help make the case for you towards sending them in..

When we see the coins the point may be moot, but I would think that if she doesn't want to send them away for grading, then you would only have a few choices. One would be to try to increase her understanding of the grading process and the fact that her items would be insured along the way. Hard, especially if the combination of age, need for quick money/sale, and emotional or psychological issues are in play. I have been in a similar situation, in which I sell for other people and I find they are happiest when I can get them to agree on disclosing their financial expectations. I use this as a basis for all of my actions. If they really don't care and are aware of what can happen--their item sells for less than they think it's "worth"--I sell the item at auction and never look back. If they say they need to get X amount, I try at X amount or higher with the Buy It Now/Best Offer option. I have also made purchases that met or exceeded their expectations, so that I wouldn't be pressured to sell for less than I thought I could get for something. I don't know what I would do in your situation, except maybe find out what her expectations were, and if I could satisfy them and still have the opportunity to have the coins reach their full potential value.

AND realize that you will be paying $100 to $200 per coin for the grading instead of the $20 to $30 you would pay if you sent them in. And if you do the "While you wait" method and they DON'T come back with high grades, you will have spent almost as much on having them graded as they will sell for and you come out with little or nothing.