Any News On 25th Anniversary ASE Set?

In my opinion, if you are not planning to sell any of your coins, there is no reason to have them graded. In the very long term, like when our children own our collections, graded and slabbed coins may have faded from favor. Raw coins will always maintain their appeal and are far more enjoyable. If you are planning to sell some or all of your sets in the relatively near term, than you have three choices. Sell sealed, unopened mint shipping boxes to people interested in putting together graded sets or reselling, sell sets from opened mint shipping boxes to people looking to get what they missed on the 27th and add to their collection, and get the coins graded before selling them. Sealed boxes will probably, on average, bring higher prices than opened ones both because of the ability to get special labeling and because the buyer has confidence that you did not cherry pick. There are serious collectors out there that like to collect full sets with special labels and there is another group that collects "perfect 70" sets, perhaps for bragging rights. Many of the set collectors want all of the coins to be labeled alike, perhaps to give the impression that they shipped from the mint together. Are the coins really worth any more? No. Will people pay more for them? Yes.

Some are saying that they think that the 2011-S coin will be the key because it is more unique than the 2011-P but I don't buy the argument because the 2011-S differs from the 2011-W only by the one letter mint mark. The 2011-P differs from the 2006-P in two numerals and the die have been manufactured using a different process than what was used five years ago. I have said and continue to believe that the 2011-(S) coin will be the key for set collectors, especially those who collect perfect sets. The bullion coin will almost certainly have the lowest percentage of coins that grade 70 of any coin in the set. Over half of the 2011-W (PR), 2011-W (MS), and 2011-S (MS) coins will grade as 70s and I think the 2011-P (reverse R) will be close to that level. If you get your sets graded unopened and pay for First Strike labels and are lucky enough to get one or even two 2011-(S) MS70 coins, you will hit a home run and reap very nice profits. It is a risk, grading five sets runs around $400 and FS labels double that cost. Getting five sets graded at PCGS with FS labels will cost over $850 when you include the cost of shipping them to the grader. My original intent was to put five sets into my family collection, one for each kid, one for my wife, and one for me but I ordered them one at a time at an extra cost of $19.80 to have total flexibility. I will keep all five sets sealed until I decide what I am going to do and that decision will depend considerably on how I see the market developing.I want to see if my idea about the bullion coin becoming a key to building MS/PR70 sets comes true and if it does, I will probably attempt to build such a set.

Tartop, 15+ pounds is the shipping weight of a box of five sets. If the package you get really weighs that much and it was not just a mis-entry of the weight then you have a serious decision to make. If it truly is a five set box, leave it unopened long enough to carefully consider your course of action. I will not try to advise you unless you request it, except to say that you should make a considered decision and not a haphazard one. Let us know what you get and if you need any advice.

didn't get a chance to get in on this. My Wife's Grandfather has stage four cancer. If anyone is looking to sell theirs or get out from under the extra they bought please PM me.

All right, here are the pics. I photographed the packaging next to my keyboard so you can get a sense of just how big these are. I photographed the individual coins within their capsules, so ignore any stray scratches or scuff marks. I have not photographed the obverse reverse [Sorry, typo] of the coins yet.

I just received two single set boxes from UPS. Even though the UPS info on the internet says the boxes weigh 4.3 & 4.5 pounds, the boxes both say "3 LBS" on them. My scales confirm the internet numbers and the lighter one clearly has less packing material as the contents slide around in the box quite drastically. The heavier box has the contents held much more tightly. I will now hope that my next three boxes weigh at least 4.5 pounds as the 4.3 pound box clearly does not have a proper amount of packing for a $300 coin purchase. Both boxes are 14" x 11" x 8". My third and fourth sets will ship today (38335XXX, 1:03 and 38339XXX, 1:26).

oih82w8: if they ship today via UPS, you will get them tomorrow. If you called and had them sent out via FedEx/USPS you are not likely to get them until maybe Tuesday unless you are very near Indianapolis.

Is there any recourse for damaged coins in this set, giving the limited mintage? Is it a choice between having a damaged set and having a refund with no set at all?

AWesome just got mine. Now I'm staring at a brown box...what to do? what to do?

Here's my dilemma though - OK, I have a damaged 2011 proof and a 2011-S that are probably only worth a shade over melt. But I have 3 probably nice coins. I send it back to the mint for a replacement, they'll give me a different set with a damaged reverse proof. I don't want to accept damaged coins, but I don't have any confidence that sending the set back, at my expense, is going to leave me any better off.