Your favorite numismatical quote

Look at aspiring novelists. They have
a computer already so install a word
processing program, clack out ten pages
a day for a month and your rich. Every now
and then a Clancy or Rawlings comes along.
But how many manuscripts got chucked
before Rawlings got big? A couple a
million?

That's how I view coin investing. Big hopes
and a bit of self deception as to how easy
it is. But a very few people pull it off and
then everyone gets excited thinking they
can do the same and most of us can't.

"Are you ready? Are you good enough? !"
John Kamin-back cover of How To Make
Money In Coins 1978

 

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The only problem with guides, like Red Book anyway, is the prices are pretty much outdated by the time that book is printed and on the shelves and many collectors realize this and don't accept the guide as being very helpful.

 

I think a good support to your post would be the spike in silver prices over a year ago. I had amassed quite a number of bullion strike ASEs, which I bought more for just the collecting rather than the silver content. If silver hadn't spiked to over $40 an ounce, I would still have them today, and may even still be adding to them. But right now, is not the best time to buy with silver hovering just over $30 an ounce, as the market could drop on precious metal prices and may not recover.

 

I think that because coins are money, there is the illusion that there is some type of investment or financial potential. But really coins are collectibles. Might as well be dolls, antique trains, or Tiffany lamp shades.

And maybe what you like is not what will return a profit. I like shiny new error coins but if I was investing for profit people say here, go for the old, old 1830's large cents, dimes, etc.

 

I agree with everything in your post. I don't
trust anthing that is easy to find. People have a
tendency to follow the line of least resistence
and each other. That's why marketers make it
easy to buy. It's why they build group think
around stuff. My view about investing has been
if it's easy maybe your being led to the Soylent
Green factory. Promoters don't sell rare coins.
They're not going to call a whole sale dealer and
order 10,000 NJ coppers. They're going to order
coins as common as water, make it as easy as
possible for buyers to buy, convince buyers they
are investing genius' and hope they're one toke
over the line and believe the "story."

"Soylent Green is people!"

 

Maybe I've been given some false illusion by hanging around a pawnshop all day. From what I can see the novel can be written in a day.

 

You seem to be mistaking coin investing with coin dealing. Those are very different.

 

GDJMSP, then wouldn't that mean that whoever bought your coins would make a profit. I can't see how they could lose more as you already took the hit.

 

Have you considered buying coins because
you and not groups like them? You'd be acting
as a contrarian then. Admittedly the contrarian
view hasn't done much to make me rich but the
stuff I like, such as Lincoln cent BIEs, are almost on
another planet. Maybe the Contrarian view
that's not too far from the popular stuff has a
chance?

When the Fulds were researching their book
on Civil War tokens they were buying them
for 6 cents each. Nobody cared about CWT's
then and the Fuld weren'y buying them for an
investment but that's the irony of it all --or my
imagination at work. But it seems like the ones
who can make money if they sold are the ones
who aren't trying to make money or don't
want to sell.

"To Contrarians and Libertarians everywhere.
May their numbers grow!"
Humphrey B. Neill
The Art of Contrary Thinking

 

I collect whatever I can get my hands on at about a fifth of its market value, not the price someone is asking for it, but the price that many have actually sold for in completed auctions. Than when I sell it, if I only get half of what it is worth I more than double my investment. Period. More often than not I triple, quadruple or better my initial investment. I guess I am not really a "collector" as much as a "dealer" even though I keep what I like. Collectors always lose because they are bitten by a hoarders genetically passed down gene and will purchase some thing for what it is worth or greater and than sell it only in times of need, which of course are not the "ideal time to sell", such as when it is worth more than when it was purchased. If you are a Hoarder/collector, than yes , you will probably lose (rate over time).

 

Buddy, can you spare a dime?

 

Isn't putting a hit on the previous collector needed?

 

Another Day another Dollar

 

If i has a FS Jefferson Nickel for every time I've heard that....

 

From my younger brother when he was arguing with me:

"Go talk to your coin nerds!"

 

"We have an app for that."

"The basic law of collectibles is: the knowledgeable
will exploit the novice."
Christopher S. Hyatte--The Psychopath's Bible
for the Extreme Individual

 

Dang, that is a great, and very truthful, quote.