Advice wanted and needed:

I like Provident, Paradise Mint and Modern Coin Mart. Never had a problem with any of them.
Just made a major purchase on ebay with a seller in Porter Ranch, CA. Ebay seller ID. is jbmdds5749. The guy is a dentist and deals in numismatics also. Great service and very honest. Probably the best ebay transaction I've ever been involved in. He also has a website GOLDENSTATECOLLECTABLES.com

 

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I agree. eBay has such a large quantity and diversity of coins that it is staggering. However, I do not buy raw (ungraded) coins from eBay unless the seller has a 100% money back guarantee on the coin. Pictures on eBay do not always show all of the imperfections/problems on a coin and the picture may even be altered by an unscrupulous seller. Don't expect a lot of great deals though - ebay prices are generally not a steal. You may do better at a LCS or local auction where there is less competition for the same coin.

 

E-bay.... I have never bought on E-bay before. I assumed it was an auction. I made a bid for a coin and it was immediately rejected. I raised my bid and it was immediately rejected. And I got a notice that I only have one more chance to submit a bid. How does E-bay work? I thought it was an auction. I didn't see anything about the seller having a minimum reserve bid on the coin.

 

On that particular "auction" it sounds like it was a Buy It Now auction with a Make Offer option. In that case, if you make an offer, they seller may have a set price that he is willing to accept. You can make up to 3 offers.

You can limit your search to Auction only on the left side of the screen if you want to eliminate Buy it now/Make offer sellers.

 

See the option for Format type? Select Auction. (click on screen-shot below to make it larger)

 

check to see if the seller had specific payments requirements. I've seen sellers who accept PayPal only, you may need to set up a PayPal account and link it to your ebay account.

 

I buy things sporadically from e-bay, coins being the usual item. You do have to watch what you are doing or you can get stung.

 

I use e-bay, local coin shops, and friends on cointalk to purchase my coins. I have also used the Fair Market website to see how I want to approch a coin purchase.

http://www.numismedia.com/fmv/fmv.shtml

This may not work for everyone but so far I have done rather well for myself using this tool.