Many of you have far better research tools than I do at the moment, blue sheets and so on. Do you have a general rule of thumb for what percent you would discount a coin's http://www.pcgs.com/prices/ price? I'm talking about a general comfortability level for a coin you see with no problems, that you have a manageable amount of desire for. If it's 20% below, do you go ahead and snag it? Must it be 30% for you? How do your bluesheets (or other favored sheet) compare %-wise to this link? Yeah, everything depends, so let's make gross generalizations. Oh, I'm referring to buying pcgs slabbed coins. :stooge:
It depends on the series of coin, there isn't any general rule of thumb that'll work for everything in PCGS's price guide. I generally look at what a common date coin in a series fetches in the market versus what the common date coins are priced at in the guide to get a feel for how much I should be scaling PCGS's prices. Works pretty well for the circulated grades which is what I'm more interested in, probably won't work for the higher MS grades.
As stated, there is no set percentage you can use. The PCGS prices can be anwhere from 10% - 70% too high. It all depends on the coin and grade.
I don't suppose it would help if I refined the scope of the question to pcgs ms63-66 early commemoratives? Maybe going farther and saying Connecticut, Gettysburg, Pan-Pac, Roanoke? I'm buying as a collector, but the "decent price" concept goes a long way..
Being a collector myself, the PCGS price guide may be close to the real price of a coin if it is a highly desired coin like a 1914-D cent, ect. If it is a highly sought after coin then the PCGS guide may be low. For more common dates/mint marks it is app. 30% higher than the auction market, IMHO. In the recent past I have noticed that NGC is commanding simular and sometimes higher prices than PCGS for the coins I collect that are mainly the San Francisco mint. I am a firm believer about only buying NGC or PCGS but do not fall in the "PCGS is the best" rut. Look at the coin because many times I have seen NGC coins graded at the same level as PCGS but the NGC is the better looking coin, and of course visa versa. The type of coin I desire is full mint luster with minimum or no bag marks or colorul but not artificial toning that circles either side of the face of the coin.
The next question would be, are you looking at buying these coins raw or certified by PCGS? If you are looking certified, the PCGS price is going to be closer to the market than for raw coins. Hopefully someone else can chime in too, as I admittedly know little about the early commeratives.
Definitely pcgs/ngc slabs. Part of my rationale to support real spending on my hobby is the ability to stave off wifely tsk-tsks with the "liquidity" angle of slabbed coins. :whistle:
In the case of the modern eagles, I see the PCGS price typically 30% high on average, but at the same time there are many rare and high demand eagles that will trade 50% above the PCGS price. My advice is to look at the going or market price. eBay and Teletrade move a lot of modern coins so watching trends there is a good way to keep up on where your eagles are price wise. The reality is that the only price that truly matters is what someone is willing to pay. :whistle:
PCGS Price guide converted to real life: PCGS divided by the square root. Most of their values are just to hype their slabs.
Ignore the pcgs prices and head to numismedia.com, and compare that with the listing in the back of Coins, or any other numismatic periodical
I would use Numismedia or the prices realized from ebay, Teletrade or Heritage (you need to sign up for a free account to access these). The PCGS price guide can be way too high, and even too low at times. They are often 50-75% too high on modern coins and can sometimes be a little too low on some older US pieces.
