What's The Grade And What's It Worth

It is absolute foolhardiness to attempt to purchase an unslabbed St. Gaudens unless you're completely comfortable grading the series by eye, and can hold the coin in your hand before you decide to purchase. I wouldn't endorse your idea of buying either of these by attempting a grade, which is impossible from pics this size, given the nature of gold grading anyways. These could be AU50 or MS66, depending on factors which simply don't show up in the photographs.

I hope you do not take offense at my words, because I mean none, but what you're proposing is monetary suicide for a beginning collector. You have no way of determining grade/value yourself, and it's not possible to post something here which will enable even the experts among us to advise you.

If you wish to acquire an expensive coin, buy it in a slab from a respected TPG - PCGS, NGC or ANACS, and nobody else. Even at that, you should know what the current market value of the coin is, and how to tell between "good" and "poor" examples of the grade.

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Originally posted by JeffMo

Am I correct to understand that I can send it out to one of these grading services to be graded? Would that take less than 30 days and how much would it cost?

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Yes, you could. Both PCGS and NGC require membership in one of their "clubs" at about $100/yr to submit at all; ANACS does not require this membership but, frankly, my confidence in them is waning as they seem to have let circumstances get out of their control. Using PCGS as an example, their Express Special service guarantees a 5 business day turnaround at a cost of $50 per coin. That's $50 you're out of pocket if you choose to return the coin.

Then there's the eroded goodwill you'll have with your dealer, should he make a certain claim and be repudiated by a TPG. He'll be less likely to want to deal with you, or you with him.

Of your two, Coin B is the rarer (assuming that's not a mintmark I see over the first 1 of the date), but the less likely to reach Mint State judging from the flat area on the eagle's breast. Coin A is not worth $1000 until MS65, and I guarantee it'd be in a slab if it were MS65. Not knowing what type of money you want to spend, I'll arbitrarily select MS63 as the starting point. In that grade, Coin A can be had for $800-ish, and coin B, closer to $1500.

NGC prices is 30 dollars a coin and should be back well within the 30 day period also for 1-4 coins and if you send 5 or more coins the cost is 15.00 a coin (I think) but they may not make it within the 30 day period, but they also may make it also just according to how busy they are. Now from the pictures the only thing that I can tell is the "coin B" looks like it has seen more circulation than "Coin A" but Gold is alot different from what I collect, I have seen coins I was positive were atleast MS-64 and the top TPG grade it a AU coin so I am definately no expert on Gold coins at all, I am just going by the detail on the eagle on the Reverse, the Coin A seems to have more feathers than coin B

The pictures are too low quality to even determine any kind of grading.