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WHAT'S NEW (Updated 11/12/2008) We just acquired some great new coins! Highlights:
Other Coins - - a high-grade 1814 Large cent, a nice Matte Proof Lincoln cent, an Unc. 1955 Doubled Die cent, some tough and high-grade Barber halves,
A comment on the Greysheet: I have been busy buying scarce and rare coins that people are looking for, and I've tried to price them at reasonable levels. As all of you know, currently, many scarce and rare Bust and Seated coins sell at levels well over Greysheet, and often more than retail price guides such as Coin Values. In order to obtain great coins such as the coins listed above, I usually must pay and did pay significantly more than Greysheet. Accordingly, the scarce and rare coins are priced fairly, but they aren't priced at Greysheet.
Scarce and Rare Dates still in strong demand, common dates are suffering with weaker demand and weaker prices. Check results of the major auction houses if you don't believe this statement.
HOT TOPICS
Are Attributions Important?
An 1805 Small 5 half cent, an 1864 Small Motto 2c piece, an 1873/2 nickel, an 1883/2 Shield nickel, a 1936-D 3 1/2 leg nickel, an 1848 Large Date half dime, an 1820 STATESOFAMERICA dime, an 1839-O rev. of 38-O dime, an 1825/2 quarter, an 1828 25/50 quarter, an 1842-O Small Date quarter, an 1866 business strike quarter, an 1888 business strike quarter, an 1807 Small Stars half, an 1812/1 Large 8 half, an 1830 Large Letters half, an 1842 Small Date half, and a 1964 Accented Hair half. Could this be someone's want list, or Rich's shopping list for his next show? No. This is a partial list of coins that I have seen misattributed at some time during 2007. That is, all of these coins were advertised as something they weren't, and if you had bought them based on that representation, you lost money. For example, if you purchased the 1812/1 Large 8 half in Fine for over $2,000, but then found out it was really an 1812/1 Small 8 half worth $60, you would have been out over $1,900! So, how do you prevent this kind of loss? You either have to know your attributions, or deal with someone who knows their attributions. At Rich Uhrich Rare U. S. Coins Inc., we guarantee that all of our attributions are correct! If you buy an 1830 Large Letters half from us, it will be an 1830 Large Letters half and will match the diagnostics in Overton's Early Half Dollar Varieties book. So the answer to the question, "Are attributions important?" is an unequivocal "Yes!" FAKE ANACS SLABS HIT THE MARKET! The latest scam to hit the market, specifically online auction sites, is counterfeit ANACS slabs, apparently from Asia. The coins contained in the slabs could be counterfeit, or genuine coins that have been vastly overgraded. You need to be very careful buying in online auctions, especially from sellers in areas outside the U. S., where obtaining a refund might be difficult or impossible. GEORGE WASHINGTON DOLLARS - PLENTY OF SCAMS! The George Washington dollars were issued starting February 15, 2007 as the first in a series called the Presidential dollar coins. Four presidents will be honored with coins each year for ten years, subject to the provision that each president will be honored only at least two years after his death. The coins are identical in composition to the Sacagawea dollars first issued in 2000, but there is an important difference: the date and mintmark, “IN GOD WE TRUST”, and “E PLURIBUS UNUM” are on the edge of the coin. The blank planchets are inscribed on the edges first, then randomly fed into the presses to be struck into coins. Therefore, the edge inscriptions can be right-side up or upside down with respect to the obverse of the coin (Mr. Washington). The online auction sites are cluttered with thousands of supposedly rare upside-down lettering dollars. We recommend that you DO NOT PAY A PREMIUM PRICE FOR UPSIDE-DOWN LETTERING dollars because these coins will be approximately 50% of the mintage and will NOT be rare coins! There is also a Mint error with the new coins, as somewhere near one bin of coins (up to 300,000 coins) were made at the Philadelphia Mint without the edge lettering. These coins are currently being hyped on the online auction sites as great rarities, but with up to 300,000 being made, that statement is very questionable. Prices of these have ranged anywhere from $50 to several hundred dollars. There is a scam afoot with these coins, also. Some crooks have machined off the edge lettering of ordinary George Washington dollars and are selling them as error coins that are missing the edge lettering. We recommend if you are interested in buying one, get a coin that has already been certified by a reputable certification service. (See "Third World Slabs" below if you need a recommendation on which grading service to use.) And another scam - - one online seller is selling "No Edge Lettering 2007 Golden Dollar coins" at around $50 each or ten for $500. What he isn't saying is these are 2007 Sacagawea dollar coins (not Washington dollars) that all come with no lettering on the edges, and that they are worth about $1.50 each! Buyer beware! A lot of people buy or attempt to buy
coins via online auction sites. The following are some problem areas you
should be aware of if you go this route. Third-world slabs: The most reputable coin certification companies are PCGS, NGC (the top two according to most experts), ANACS, ICG, SEGS, and sometimes PCI. I will not sell coins slabbed by any other company other than these. There are many, many other companies who slab coins who do not have experts to verify authenticity, nor do their grading standards approach those of the best companies. Some people might believe that one company's MS-65 coin is equal in quality to another company's. They often are not, and the market value can vary widely. How widely? A coin in a third world slabs might be worth only 1% to 5%, or even less, of what the same grade PCGS slabbed coin would bring in the marketplace. Coin dealers throughout the country report people asking them to pay $160,000 for their 1886-O Morgan dollar in a "third-world" slab marked as MS-65, but if the coin is a cleaned AU it is worth only $50. Cleaned and repaired coins: There are reputable coin sellers online, but there are also sellers who will not disclose that a coin has been cleaned and/or repaired, or even holed and plugged. These coins are worth much less than catalogue values. Mystery lots: Some online sellers appear to have a great deal, they have put a whole bunch of great coins together in a huge bin, haven't searched them and they sell them by the weight or scoop. They have seemingly credible reports of customers finding 1909-SVDB cents in their so-called "mystery lots" or "unsearched lots". To us, it is a mystery why anyone thinks that any coins have not been searched for 1909-SVDB cents, which have been famous and high valued since their issuance in 1909. Also, some people think a pound of coins contains a lot more coins than it really does. A pound of circulated wheat cents has about 153 coins, at current market value, it's worth $3 to $6. Don't pay more! Bogus auctions: There are many coin photos all over the internet. What's to prevent someone from stealing a photo, and then pretending to auction that coin, to make off with the high bidder's money? Well, this does happen. Be careful, know your seller, and if you don't know your seller, check out your seller. Proof sets in sealed envelopes: From 1955 (some sets) through 1964, proof sets were sold in manila envelopes. Occasionally, some seller wants a premium price for proof sets in sealed envelopes. What's wrong with that? There could be some rare cameo proof coins in there or maybe some varieties. The problem is that replica envelopes are available online for less than $1 each. Most proof sets in "sealed envelopes" have been opened, inspected, and resealed. During the 1970's and 1980's, I was buying proof sets from the 1955 - 1964 era, and I never saw a proof set in a sealed envelope. Now they're all over the place. My recommendation is that you believe it is mint-sealed ONLY if you really trust the seller and/or know the history of the proof set from the day it left the mint over 40 years ago. Shill bidding: Some disreputable sellers engage in an illegal practice called shill bidding, which means that using another ID, they bid up the price of their items to raise the price to the winning bidder. One large online auction venue has recently hidden bidder's ID's which therefore has made shill bidding easier to do and harder to catch. There are a variety of ways to check for this practice which I will not disclose here, but if you suspect that someone is using shill bidding, contact the online auction venue. Beware especially "private auctions", many are legitimate, but some are perfect for hiding shill bidding. "Estate sales": If a seller wants to encourage bidding, often he/she calls their sale an "estate sale". This apparently leads bidders to believe they are bidding on Howard Hughes' or a similar billionaire's holdings. But estate sales are often bulk coins of no special significance. There is one online seller of coins for which every coin he attempts to sell is "from an estate". I sell coins too, and I buy them from a lot of places, including but not just estates. Does it really matter where the coin comes from? Beware: the term "estate sale" often means "seller's junk pile he couldn't get rid of anywhere else". VARIETY - A variation in the die(s) which will cause all coins struck by that die pair to appear different than the normal coinage. Often called a die variety. ERROR - A variation in the planchet and/or striking that causes a non-repeatable error. Examples: clipped planchet, off-center, broadstrike, brockage, wrong planchet, multiple strike. VALUE - The value of a coin can be significantly different depending on the variety. An ordinary 1888 Indian cent is valued at $2 in Good, while an 1888/7 S-2 variety is valued at $120 and an 1888/7 S-1 variety is valued at $1,200. VARIETIES include:
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| ©2008 Rich Uhrich Rare U.S. Coins Inc. All Rights Reserved |
