I thought I read in this forum the other day, but I can't seem to find it now, that coins lose 30-40% of there value when cleaned. Is this a good rule of thumb?
The higher the value of a non-cleaned coin, the greater the difference vs. a cleaned coin. A $10 coin might get knocked back to $3, where as a $3000 coin could get knocked back to $300 or even less. Are you looking to sell or buy?
I cut it back at 50% at the most...if a coin has finger prints I cut it 50%...if a coin had any problem I cut the value down as low as I can. Today I saw a CC Morgan that had been cleaned and had a nice size mark...it was listed at $35---if it hadn't...it would have graded F maybe VF. Speedy
The higher the grade of the cleaned coin, the greater the loss of value. A cleaned MS65 can lose 90% or more of its value, where a VF or XF coin that is cleaned may only lose 25-50%.
While regualr coinage loses considerable value from cleaning, tokens and other exonumia typically do not. Cleaning often has little if any impact on the selling price of exonumia, IMO likely due to the relative rarity of most pieces. In Fuld's book on Civil War tokens, even something as severe as holing a piece is indicated as only dropping the value about 15%. Recently on ebay, I have seen Civil War token slabs indicating improper cleaning, and those pieces all sold for 10-20% over catalog value.
I saw an interesting interview with an antique dealer on TV awhile back discussing sterling silver tea sets. When asked about cleaning them, he indicated that they should be cleaned on a regular basis to preserve their value, but he warned not to use the stuff coin collectors use because it would ruin them. It's interesting that cleaning is recommended in that case and prohibited in numismatics. And does anyone know what the antique dealer might be using that is considered harmless in the case of sterling and what it would do to silver coins?
