Hey everyone! It's been like 7 months since I've been on CT and CU. What have I missed??? LOL! Had a busy year. Bought a truck. Father-In-Law passed away (my wife and I had to take care of all of the estate stuff (including selling his coin collection - that was one of my jobs, naturally) since she's the oldest and the others just "let" her do it). My daughter bought his condo, so we had to help with all of that (including hiring painter and carpet install). Had two bigger vacations: Croatia and Alaska. Bought a new Travel Trailer Camper. Still played volleyball (2 leagues in summer, 1 league in fall and 1 league right now). We're in process of booking two more vacations: Mexico (already booked) and Australia (about 1/2 way planned/booked). Planning on doing a lot of camping this year with our new camper. Unfortunately for me, my coin collection and my participation in coin forums has been put on pause and I suffered for it. As for my collection - I'm finally getting back into dealing with the mess I call more of a hoard rather than a focused collection. I have hit it pretty hard in the past few weeks, and am working on a solid plan to reduce what I have and create a much more focused collection. I'm excited! I already sold a bunch of "junk" silver (when it was $88/oz), proof sets, IHCs, duplicates, etc. to a local dealer. Yes, I know I could have gotten probably 20% - 30% more if I would have sold to collectors (and, if I would have foreseen the jump to $115/oz!), but I didn't want to spend the time. And, since I was selling my FIL's coins, I sold mine at the same time and possibly got a slightly better price (since, combined, I had over $250 face of silver plus a lot of other stuff). I offloaded about 40% of my hoard. I still have probably another 40% to offload. The last 20% will remain in my collection. So, what's my new focus, you ask? Well, it's not totally focused, but I'll have two Primary focuses and one Secondary. 1. Dansco 7070 Type Set - I started my Dansco 7070 Type Set years ago with the coins I had. Some of my coins look beautiful in the set, and some look just sad. My goal is to organize and work toward completing the album, and upgrading the sad ones as I go along. Right now, I'm thinking: Pre-1820 = G-4 to VG-8. Mid-19th Century = VF-20 to AU-58. 20th Century = EF-40 to MS-65. Of course, there will be exceptions, especially cost-prohibitive exceptions. 2. Morgan Dollars - My favorite US coin. I plan to study the raw Morgans that I have, attribute VAMs, and get some into TPG slabs. I will sell the ones I don't "need" in my collection and keep/add only coins that really keep my interest. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, right? 3. Secondary - I'll still have a small binder of coins that I still like. Some might be duplicates of what's in my Type Set. Some might be there just because I really like the way they look and don't want to get rid of them. Some might be Key/Semi-Key dates or tougher-to-get dates. I'll also have some Ancients (and/or Non-US coins) - just because I already have some, and I do like them. I miss all of you (well, MOST of you! ) and the great discussions here! I hope I can prioritize my time and stick around more consistently!
Welcome back. It's great to shed coins that you don't really value in your "collection" and focus on what is fun !!
