I've had a long dry spell around here - which has led to numerous purchases of sterling silverwear, jewelry and weird stuff - but today the local auction house had COINS! Lots of Kennedy and Franklin halfs, a few WL's, lots of Mercury and Roosies, a monster toned Washington quarter (yeah I said monster toned - deal with it!), a bunch of Ikes and silver certificates and one Morgan (that I paid a bit too much for -$30 but oh well) Lots of Hong Kong silver from the late 1800's / early 1900's, some Japanese pesos, Filipina centavos and... The best buy of the day was a British sovereign for $225 (score!) which was one of the first lots and I think everyone was asleep at the wheel - since the others went over $325. I also scored an incredible amount of gold jewelry and sterling silverware at ~70% of melt on average!
As usual, excuse my photography. Mine never comes out - especially for capturing the finer points of coins.
Cool brett. Remember that huge coin lot score I got last year? I've been to every auction there since (monthly) and not a single coin. Nice score and even though nothing major it must have felt like the first gulp of water after bring stranded in the desert
In deed! Actually the big scores were on jewelry and stamps. I got an 18k gold and diamond ring that weighs over 9 grams (size 5, it's HEAVY) and it's got a 1+ karat round solitaire in it. I got a 10k white gold and diamond ring with a ~.6 karat diamond I scored over $400 in postage value for $40 in 2 stamp books which will easily sell on Ebay for ~60% of postage value. It was a GOOD day! So far no rare date coins, but nice quality common stuff, a few worth grading.
Wait, so the single solitaire is OVER 1ct? You do know how relativly rare a diamond over 1ct is than sub 1ct right? What did you pick that up for? Who cares about the amount of gold! unless it has a chip or bad color or bad clarity with inclusions you scored!
Yes, which is why I bought it! Retail potential for the ring is a couple thousand and up depending on quality of the diamond. Just under $500 with auction premium. Hey now, that's blasphemy in my house! I'm not a professional gemologist - but the ring goes to one next week. I'm an amateur and know enough to roughly evaluate diamonds. It's about a g-h color, and my guess is VS2/SI1 clarity.
Not coin related, but I did a quick flip to my jeweler today. Couldn't resist. The stone measured out at 1.08 carat and was an SI/1. I tripled my money on it - and he knows he got a screaming deal too. I could have made more holding and selling myself - but it's a hassle. I took bird in hand. Building up my war chest for Long Beach! Now to sort out all the COINS! Which is why I went in the first place! Great weekend!
Nice! Gotta love those birds that hangout in bushes. They're easy pickins Taking the trip down south huh. Not sure I'll make the next one but if so we should get together brett
You did well and came out on top on the deal BUT After the deal was done, I would have asked what the selling price would be for future reference. (You were probably looking around $5000 a carat)
Retail on the diamond was probably 2500. It was an old diamond - was told "mine cut" and it was in a modern setting. So to maximize value it would mean moving to an older setting, some work, etc... In the end he'll get about $4k for a ring, but he's a jeweler. I know I could have gotten more - but it was a lot of effort - and I took the easy route. I kept the other 3 diamond rings.