Has anyone had much experience of consigning coins ? I recently consigned a largish amount of good quality bronzes to a Vcoins seller who has only listed 3 of those coins in a four month period. This is the first time that I have consigned, is this what I should expect ?
I've consigned to Joe at Forvm and I've heard good things from others who have done the same. It took about a month to get them posted since he is so busy (he does mostly consignments now) but I was really happy with the results.
If he's that busy, I agree with cpm9ball and would ask for the immediate return of the coins. If they are good quality as you state, I think your best bet would be to consign them to CNG for their next eAuction.
I consign through Joe at Forvm and have done for many years. I have had mixed results elsewhere. I did approach a UK dealer who does consignments when I had a batch of coins last year that I wanted to sell and was willing to try different avenues. He informed me that my coins were too low value for him to consider consigning them but he would buy them from me. Now these coins ranged from $150 to $1500 and that is the last time I will ever have anything to do with that UK dealer as I felt that he was trying to get one over on me.
It might also depend on the consignment terms. It might say it could take however long and that they cannot be withdrawn until such and such a time.
That is way too slow. It doesn't take much time to list a few coins. I would ask for the coins back too, and consign with someone else.
Anytime a consignment dealer offers to buy outright instead of take on consignment means he/she either has a buyer already lined-up or knows it's a quick sale!
Exactly. The best thing for a dealer to do in that case is to be honest. Tell the client the value and what their intentions are. Even if the client don't want to sell it that way it at least it ends on a positive note. And not sure if dealers care but they should know that collectors talk a lot online. I would not buy from a dealer that has multiple horror stories.
I have very little experience with consignments listed at fixed price, but a lot with auctions - I process most of the groups that come into CNG's US office. The first thing I encourage everyone to realize is that THIS TAKES TIME. Speaking only for my situation, I'm usually sitting on a backlog of incoming consignments that can go back a few months at times. I wish I could through them quicker and more often, but I have to devote a lot of my time to cataloging and a myriad of other functions. I'm sure your seller is stuck with the same problem. Even if I miraculously manage to process your coins on the day they arrive, its usually two or three months before the next available auction. And its not until sixty days after the close of the sale that consignors get paid! I'd suggest you contact the seller and simply check on the status of the group. Maybe he held them back to prevent listing too many similar coins at once. Maybe he's swamped and simply hasn't been able to list them. In any case, I'm sure he'd be happy to send the coins back if he can't get them up and out the door soon enough.
What Ardy says about CNG is my experience with them, but those expectations are set up front when you consign to them. I personally think when consigning for retail sale, you would have every reason to expect a faster turnaround, but again, these expectations should be set up front. I assume the quality of the material, workload of the seller, the terms of your consignment (his/her fee% and potential profit) would all add into the mix as to how quickly they'll be listed for sale but we aren't privy to these things. Or, they might just be incompetent and you need to get your coins back.
The speed with which a consignment would sell at retail probably varies a lot. Everything has to be priced juuuuuust right - if it sells to fast, it was priced too low; if it sells too low, it was priced too high. That's why I like auctions! Slap a low estimate on it, and its sure to go away.
Thank you all for the replies. I'd like to say that this was just a 'fishing' exercise. As I've never consigned before I was interested to hear of others experiences, whether my experience was usual or not. Everything about my consignment was laid out in advance with the caveat of 'there may be delays' and I accept this, I am in no particular hurry to sell but it appears to me as a first time consignor to be a bit on the slow side. Other than this I have no criticism's to make at this time. I have already emailed them for an update, just waiting on a reply.
Hello, I do not have a bad experience with Joe, all my coins where placed soon and sold quite well.(more than 100). Uk dealer, had same as mari, not good enough and so on etc, I told him the amounts no not possible, later John Jencek placed the coins..and sold very well, no problems. So indeed it depends what you have and also dealer wilingness.
Consigning is also about trust. You are placing these things in the hands of a third party to sell on your behalf. If you don't trust them then move on elsewhere. I have a long history with Joe at Forvm. He has sold about 1,000 coins for me over the years. Sometimes they take longer to list than other times but I always go back there because I trust him with my coins.
CNG and HJB have both been very efficient and painless when I've sold off duplicates and coins which didn't fit anymore. In my opinion, it's useful to sell from time to time to gauge how you're buying and to keep coins which mean something to you, rather than coins which can become "noise" over time.
I agree. I-ve been going through this process a bit this year. I've really focused my efforts and interest on the Roman Republic, to the near exclusion of other areas. I had a nascent English hammered collection which I had not added to in about four years; so, earlier this year I decided to consign the whole thing (10 coins) with Joe at FORVM. I'll keep the books, just in case. I may start the same process soon with some parts of my Roman Imperial collection.
In organizing my coins and updating my website, I'm finding bunches of coins which really should go to new homes (mostly old group lot coins). Most are low-dollar so consigning to Forvm or Vcoins isn't a good option. Maybe I'll post some for sale on CoinTalk, although I don't really want to hassle with that. I may create a separate gallery on my website with coins I'd like to trade. Do any of you want to get rid of some Roman Egyptian coins? Trade ya!
