This is true..... however a problem free coin may increase at some point in value.....but a coin with issues will always be just that a coin with issues . The probability of selling it at par or even below par is the ability to sell your problem to another who's willing to buy it.
Another opportunity to share this magnificent collection. My favorite is cent with the big hole in the center.
My uncle has been building a complete Morgan collection for decades. He's now on fixed income, so he's searching for any and every problem coin for the rare dates to keep costs down. He gets my "hand-me-downs" at cost when I can help. This is right up his alley. I don't know if he's got any holed coins, but when I told him what I paid for a VG-8 Details 1889-CC - he about fainted. When he told me that about half of his collection came from buying dollar coins at face value from the bank - I about fainted. He's down to about 7 or 8 left - I believe all are rare dates and elusives.
What did you pay for the vg8 details out of curiosoty? Snagged my vf-30/35 details for $600 raw and sent her to pcgs. Highest offer I received is $1000 by an ebay reseller last year when I was thinking of letting it go.
There are no rare Morgan dates. The 1893-S is the most expensive and one of the least available dates yet is estimated to have 10,000 survivors and is available in some grade at any point in time. No coin which can be bought on demand is remotely scarce, much less rare. Morgan dollars are only "grade rare" or rare by VAM variety. Even among the proofs, only branch mint coins are rare. The mintages for the "P" mint proofs are relatively low but when I have checked the Heritage archives, every date seems to come up for sale between 10 and 12 times per year just from this one source, not hard to buy either.
I will gladly trade you all of my 1881-S MS64 for your 1889-CC MS64's. Because I'm a nice guy, I'll give you 2 for every one 89-CC. And the reason you won't take that offer is because - the 1889-CC MS64 is rare. It is a rare date in comparison to the others minted (1889-CC at 350k vs 1881-S at 12.7mil), and there is also a premium because of the number of coins that were held back by the treasury - vs put into circulation. Mintage of any circulation business strike under 1mil is considered a rare date in my book.
Too much, but I wanted one and it was the least ugly coin I found for my budget of under $400. I sent it into ANACS last month and it came back as expected - VG details. I really wanted someone to authenticate it since I bought it raw - after quite a bit of examination and second-guessing myself. It was an impulse buy, but they're only getting harder to find.
That's condition rarity and is something altogether different. Same with "comparison rarity"... a 2009 LP4-P Lincoln with a mintage of 129 million is "rare" compared to an 82-P with 10.7 BILLION, but are either, as a date/mint/type rare? Of course not... Any coin, as a date/mint/type, that can be had at any moment of the day with very little effort doesn't deserve the "rare" moniker, and the 89-CC easily falls into this category. Same with the S VDB and 16-D Merc; they're popular, in demand, and keys of their type, but certainly not rare or really even scarce for that matter. Only when certain attributes come into play can they reasonably enter into that realm.
Well, he_did disclaim condition rarity. Otherwise, he's right - there are no Morgans which meet any reasonable numismatic definition of "rarity" without factoring grade or variety. Even Proofs are relatively accessible.
Rarity is relative to a given population. By any definition - the 1889-CC at a mintage of 350k is rare compared to the 1881-S at 12.7million. Given the population of mints and dates - the 1889-CC is rare. Semantics and hair splitting aside - there are rare date and mint marks within the Morgan realm. Morgans as a type coin are quite plentiful, but there are rare dates.
Yes, the 1889-CC in MS-64 is "rare" but NGC and PCGS have still graded over 100 as a 64 or a higher grade, though I presume there are many duplicates due to its market value. I don't own a single Morgan dollar but if I did, the reason I would not take your offer is because the trade isn't for comparable value. The point I was making is that anyone with the money can literally go out and buy the complete set in one day, except in the highest grades. With the 1889-CC, it would probably take a few months at most to find a 64 and a 63 which looks essentially the same, even sooner. The reason you and others think otherwise is because you have never attempted to buy and do not collect coins that are actually hard to find. The Morgan dollar is popular and some are expensive due to demand, not scarcity. Coins which are actually hard to buy become available at most every few years and sometimes not for decades.
If you want true rarity, go to the ancients section. They will be happy to show you coins that will take months or YEARS to find a single example for sale. I have a few of these. They are, in my opinion, truly rewarding to hunt, buy, and own. But you guys go ahead and keep plugging the holes in your albums. I don't care as I am not the one in charge of what you collect. I'll collect what I like, and you collect what you like. It just aggravates me when someone calls a 1909 S VDB a "rare" coin when it is just a relative rarity.
We're all sorry that we offend you by using a different set of relative criteria - that puts you so far above us for not collecting what you like. Rarity is relative to population, condition and variety. There is no set standard - if there was - we could all happily flag thousands of ads on Ebay for selling "rare" coins. I feel like we're at the bike racks after school claiming that so-and-so's coin collection can beat up someone else's coin collection. You like what you like, and we like what we like - but don't bag (mark) on ours maybe is the better way to say it. If that is representative of Ancients collectors - I want no part.
Are we really fighting over a highly subjective term with a plethora of variations in its definition?! Everyone's answer is correct. This is hilarious
