Emotional purchase = not so smart?

Hey guys, been a while since I bought an ancient, but I happened to stumble across a coin from Constans on ebay that was identical to my first Roman coin -- except this one was a MS * 5/5 in an NGC holder.

This is the "Hut" reverse, issued from Trier - first officina - from the Bridgnorth Hoard. Ordinarily, I'm not into famous hoards - whether modern (Binion) or ancient, but since this is the same as the first coin I ever scrubbed dirt off of, I had an emotional reaction and had to have it.

I was pleased to see that there were only 8 such coins in the Bridgnorth Hoard. Since other (less scarce) Bridgnorth coins have been selling in AU or MS in the $300-400 range, so I guess $430 wasn't too far out of family for a MS*. I sure wish that last guy hadn't popped in with 3 seconds left, otherwise I would have had it for $230.

Have any of you had such an emotional purchase? Did you end up with buyer's remorse? Hoping not..

Out of curiosity, are there any studies out of NGC that show if the "star" rating on MS ancients coins is generally around 10%? More or less?

Thanks,
Scott

 

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That is an outstanding coin. Great detail showing no wear. But, wow man. That is a hunk of change for a coin I consider at least somewhat common. Sure the detail and lack of wear should bring a premium, but perhaps too much here. Here are a couple of mine which I paid less than 30 bucks each. Of course they are not in the class of your coin, but you can see why I think the markup is outrageous. Maybe someone with more knowledge will come along and tell me why the disparity.

 

Oh, and to answer your question, yes. I have had buyers remorse many times. But I get over it fairly quickly.

 

What a fabulous coin! If I had any buyer's remorse after purchasing that coin, I'd get over it quickly knowing it's a top example of the type.

Congrats and no worries!

 

Dang thats sharp!
I wouldn't have any regrets about buying it, unless I sold a kidney to raise the money.
Congrats, hopefully you will soon come down with a case of Ancient Fever!

 

Its a very nice coin but I'm with Bing on this one, it is not worth hundreds of dollars to me, hoard or no hoard, slabbed or not slabbed.

 

As I spend more time in this hobby, I find I have fewer and fewer emotional purchases. Sure, there are still coins that pop up and get me all fired up and thinking "Good lord, this coin!! I can't let this one get away!!", but 99% of the time, I'm fairly disciplined about coins I'm targeting, mainly because I know that 99% of the time, even if I were to lose out on a coin, there'll be more coming up in the future to help relieve me of my money.

I won't comment on the price you paid for your coin beyond pointing out that there was another guy willing to pay just one increment lower than you. If you're not feeling buyer's remorse now, I wouldn't worry about it. If at some point in the future you no longer like the coin, just sell it and hope the fellow who lost to you in this auction is still around for your sale.

Excellent coin, btw .

 

Sorry, I just can't be as genteel as my colleagues. You got taken to the cleaners. It's a nice coin to be sure, but the grade is bogus. Hard-core collectors of ancients never use the grade MS. How can a coin that's been buried in a pot for 1700 years and then cleaned be considered Mint State, by any stretch of the imagination? And yes, it's been thoroughly cleaned, both mechanically and chemically. This is what hoard finds in pots look like when they come out of the ground...



Forget about the grade, forget about the star. They mean nothing. Also, it's a bit of selling sliminess to say there were only 8 examples in the Bridgnorth Hoard. There were only 8 examples from the Trier mint. The full disposition shows 30 examples of the FEL TEMP hut types from all mints. Now, the hoard contained 2,839 coins, so you might think 30 huts still makes them rare, but it doesn't. These are some of the most common folles of the 4th-century. The Romans churned them out by the millions, and they can be had in this condition for a fraction of what you paid. Here is one of mine, from the Antioch mint, for which I paid $50...



The Bridgnorth Hoard was significant for collectors, not because it was a hoard - many ancient coins come from documented hoards. That's nothing special. But this hoard contained many high-grade coins. I have one coin from the Bridgnorth Hoard for which I paid $65...



What happens with British hoard finds is that the antiquity authorities eventually release the coins and they get put up for auction, and most of the coins are bought by European dealers who are not obsessed with slabbing to the extent that US dealers are. But then some US dealers buy the coins for under $100 apiece, get them into NGC slabs with silly grades, and charge $400.

This is a marketing tactic whose sole purpose is to prey on uninformed collectors of modern coins. Collectors of US coins are accustomed to paying high prices for "old" coins in slabs with high grades. A truly old Roman coin in such a high grade must surely be worth $400, yes?? No. You paid about $350 for a piece of plastic.

I'm sorry if any of this sounds like a personal scolding. I honestly don't mean it as such. If you have a chance to return this coin, do it, and use the money to buy yourself a handful of equally lovely raw coins.

 

I'm not terribly familiar with market values of LRBs in general, but after John's post, I decided to take a look at what the highest grade examples of this type fetched at auction... relevant, I thought, since the OP coin was purchased in an auction scenario rather than off a fixed price list or store.

The pictures of the OP coin are a little low resolution, so I can't really say if it compares favourably with some of the more outstanding examples I saw, but I did see many excellent coins in Extremely Fine go for between $100 - $200. There were, however, a few outliers that went for significantly more. These two are from CNG auctions (unslabbed, no special provenance).

$575 after fees:


$500 after fees:


I agree with the points that John makes about how graded slabs and hoard provenances are used as marketing tools, but would add that when it comes to very high grade coins in an auction scenario, anything goes!

Edited to add:
Useful links to check for price comparisons of coins you're considering purchasing to others of the same type that were sold at auction -
http://www.acsearch.info/
http://cngcoins.com/Coins_sold.aspx

 

Very nice looking coin but I think you overpaid, a lot.

 

Here's a somewhat better view of the OP coin, edited from NGC's cert lookup.



As usual, the prongs annoyingly obscure certain details. The reverse is very nice. The obverse is less nice. The legends are not particularly well rendered and are partially off flan. I hope that isn't bronze disease I see at 2:00-3:00 on the reverse.

Both of the unslabbed examples posted by Zumbly are far nicer. Both were called "EF" by the auction cataloger. The first coin posted by Zumbly was estimated at $150 and is closer to what coins of that type and condition sell for. In this instance, there must've been two bidders who for whatever reason, really wanted this coin. As Z said, the hammer price was an anomaly, an outlier.

Snewman, if you love the coin and are happy with it, that is the most important thing. You paid what you had to pay to win this particular coin on that particular day.

However, I agree with others in that you paid a huge premium for the slab and for marketing words. I disagree with NGC's assessment of just about everything on the label. "Mint state"? Not really. Star-worthy? No. Strike 5/5? No. Surfaces 5/5? perhaps.

I don't know from whom you bought the coin, but the slab and price are typical for sites like GreatCollections and (increasingly and sadly) Heritage. GC has increased the number of ancient coin offerings and almost all are slabbed, with starting prices and estimates which exceed prices for comparable coins. They seem to be courting the modern collector crowd, hoping to expand their market by offering slabbed coins with "lofty" labels. The percentage of unsold coins in every round is quite high.

 

Others have pointed out the price matter. That is your choice. I chose these 9 ugly huts which are not slabbed and not Bridgnorth hoard and were about the same price total as what you paid. Trier is a better than average mint. It would not have been my first coin of the type.

 

I have had more 'not buyer's remorse' than buyer's remorse.

 

Thanks for the detailed thoughts/assessment, guys! You have never let me down before.

I saw a couple of spots on there that "might" be bronze disease -- and will return it if it turns out to be so.

I had some questions about detail, due to the smaller image, but I see so few MS *'s from NGC, I figured that there must be something nicer about it in hand. If this particular coin hadn't been the same one as the first ancient I cleaned 20+ years ago, I might have passed at prices beyond $200.

It should arrive within a few days -- will let you know.

 

I'll be blunt, if your go into ancients, do your homework. I think it's silly stupid to pay that much for a super common coin. Eye appeal can be important for ancients, but not like it is for U.S coins. Nearly all ancients have faults of some sort. And now you pay that much, in a slab no less and it may have bronze disease? All I can to is just shake my head.

Great Collections is grossly overpriced, if you want reassurance on ancients and have that kind of money to play with. Buy of CNG or Harlan J. Berk. They have some wonder coins in amazing condition and can be bought cheaper then what you paid for this Costans.

Mine was $14 in several years ago.

 

Here is a hut, bought long ago so the price at the time is probably not relevant, but it shows that nice ones are available. For me, the strike of the original coin of this thread is not super because the reverse legend is partially off the flan.

 

A beauty, Warren!

 

As others have said that seems like too much money for the OP coin. To put this in context, that is more than I paid for my denarius of Claudius.

 

It's understandably easy to become caught up in the excitement and frenzy of an auction that's closing soon. The above advice and links are your best defense against letting your emotions overwhelm your intellect when making a decision -- plus a little patience to take the time necessary to research similar coins.

One final comment, echoing TIF's observation ("As usual, the prongs annoyingly obscure certain details."). If possible, NEVER buy a slabbed ancient. Your coin has a double-strike obverse that's not mentioned by NGC (but should have been) and the impact of the double-strike on the obverse legends make this coin far from the condition implied by NGC's rating. Without the slab, these shortcomings would have been more evident. In addition, while there's little doubt of this particular coin's authenticity, NGC's slab and rating are NOT a guarantee of authenticity so there's no real added value from the slabbing process. You're better protected buying from a known dealer who will provide a guarantee of authenticity in writing, as most of the dealers on VCoins do.

 

A couple nice examples Bing. I wouldn't be comfy paying big bux for stuff that COULD be from Chairman Mao's coinshop!