Message:

<p>[QUOTE=&quot;The_Cave_Troll, post: 68002, member: 1674&quot;]Extreme caution is called for when buying on eBay, There&#039;s sharks in them waters!</p><p><br /></p><p>1) if it looks too good to be true, IT IS!</p><p><br /></p><p>2) no matter how many times the seller says this coin trends for (or books for, or lists for) $750 (or whatever outrageous price they state) if they are willing to sell it for $30 you can be certain that it is worth $30 or less, or else they would be asking more for it.</p><p><br /></p><p>3) ALWAYS use a sniping program.&nbsp; This saves big money!&nbsp; I know it&#039;s not as much fun as staying up until 1:45 AM to personally bid on that coin you really thought you might kinda be interested in owning, but I guarantee that waiting until the last 3 seconds to place your true maximun bid will save you money.&nbsp; There are 3 main reasons for this.&nbsp; First, it eliminates people bidding you up to your maximun to &quot;see what it is&quot; (i.e. shill bidding), second it gives the person with the high bid when the acution gets down to the final minutes a false sense of security, so he won&#039;t raise his bid at the last minute meaning that you won&#039;t have to bid as high to get it, and finally, it keeps you from getting caught up in a bidding war that you will regret the next morning.</p><p><br /></p><p>4) Never bid on a coin unless the seller is a known entity (to you) or they have immaculate feedback (at LEAST a 99.8% rating over at LEAST 500 transactions).</p><p><br /></p><p>5)Don&#039;t buy US coins from overseas.&nbsp; There are some honest sellers, but you will be burned more often than it&#039;s worth.</p><p><br /></p><p>6) Never buy if they list the auction as Unsearched!&nbsp; Someone along the way has searched the coins, guaranteed.</p><p><br /></p><p>7) Demand that the seller accept Paypal.&nbsp; This protects you from fraud, since Paypal is pretty good about getting a buyer their money back if the seller can&#039;t prove delivery.&nbsp; Don&#039;t buy from unknown sellers that won&#039;t accept Paypal.&nbsp; You will never get your money back if the seller cashes your Money Order and doesn&#039;t send your coin.</p><p><br /></p><p>8) Don&#039;t buy coins that are being sold with poor photos.&nbsp; Digital photography is simple enough that anyone selling coins ought to be able to take good enough close-up pics for you to see all the fine surface details of any coin.&nbsp; Anyone who claims otherwise is ignorant or a liar.</p><p><br /></p><p>9) Ask for different photos of coins that you are uncertain of (or ANY key date coin).&nbsp; this is one way to find out if the coin looks the way it does in the picture always or just in that one photo, also it helps to prove that the seller actually posesses the coin they are trying to sell.</p><p><br /></p><p>10) Only trust the grades on slabs from NGC, ANACS, PCGS, and ICG (MS67 and lower only for ICG).&nbsp; All others consistantly overgrade or worse.</p><p><br /></p><p>11) Never buy a key date coin that isn&#039;t in one of the big 4 slabs (maybe PCI and SEGS too).&nbsp; There are just too many fakes and problem coins out there.&nbsp; If it is a key date and it&#039;s not in a slab, the obvious question is &quot;Why not?!&quot;&nbsp; The reason is USUALLY that is can&#039;t get into a slab for one reason or another.</p><p><br /></p><p>12) Buy the book before the coin.&nbsp; If you don&#039;t know at least as much as the guy selling you the coin about that specific coin, you are likely to be cheated.&nbsp; Know the coins you are buying well.</p><p><br /></p><p>13) Get good advice.&nbsp; If you are interested in something that you aren&#039;t an expert on find an expert and ask their opinion on a coin.</p><p><br /></p><p>14) Buy the coin and not the slab.&nbsp; If the coin has heavy balck toning it is ugly and it doesn&#039;t matter what the number on the slab says, it will always be ugly (or cleaned).&nbsp; Also, the graders are human and they occasionally make mistakes (even at the reputable companies), so don&#039;t take the number on the slab as gospel, it may not be.</p><p><br /></p><p>15) Know the shipping price before bidding.&nbsp; If the seller is dishonest enough to try to cheat ebay out of their fees by charging too high a shipping cost, they are dishonest enough to try to cheat you.</p><p><br /></p><p>16) Ask questions!&nbsp; Good sellers are more than willing to discuss their coins with you.&nbsp; They understand that promptly answering your questions builds trust and that it can lead to a future repeat buyer.&nbsp; Any seller that ignores your questions isn&#039;t worth your time.</p><p><br /></p><p>17) Never buy from a seller unless they have a good return policy.&nbsp; (preferably one where even shipping is refunded).&nbsp; If they are unwilling to buy back a coin if you are dissatisfied, then there is usually a good reason.&nbsp; That reason is that they know that they are selling inferior products and they want no part of ever seeing them again.</p><p><br /></p><p>18) have fun and collect what you like!&nbsp; I thouroughly enjoy eBay, but part of that comes from knowing how to keep myself out of trouble out there.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>edited since I forgot #17 in the original list...and because I can&#039;t spell[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

Your name or email address:

Do you already have an account?

• No, create an account now.
• Yes, my password is:
• Forgot your password?

Stay logged in