My main interest is in putting together an example of each of the denominations of Liberty U.S. gold coins...The later Coronet Liberty design in most cases. Needless to say, I haven't gotten far yet. As far as eye appeal goes, I often think that a high AU graded coin (like a 58) looks nicer than a low MS coin (such as a 60, sometimes a 61). What do you all think about this? I guess the main reason is that even though an MS coin has no wear, it often has lots of marks in the lowest grades. Whereas a high AU coin may have just the slightest of wear, but relatively few other marks.
The key point is, just get what you like!!! I honestly doubt if AU is much "better" in terems of scratches or so, or it might be that you like slightly worned coins. But again, it's not a very fair question. AU coins could have little wears but because of these wears, they could have some hidden problems whereas a MS would reveal every single scratch. But again, because of the pricing madness these few years, an AU would be significantly cheaper if I am not wrong...
A lot of people prefer AU-58 coins to MS-60-62 coins. It all depends on your preferences though. If you buy raw coins, then you need to study a lot on detecting counterfeits. I heard of one guy who had a gold type set. He sent it in to be certified and all but one of the coins were counterfeit. Charlie
For whatever it's worth tcore - your line of thinking is similar to mine. I'll go with eye appeal every time
Thanks for the responses guys. I'm not real worried about my coins being counterfeit. Since I'm fairly new to serious coin collecting, I don't trust my skills yet, so I've chosen to buy only certified coins for my gold collection. I am trying to further educate myself though. Like I said though, it just seems that I often find AU-58 coins more appealing than MS-60 or MS-61. Thanks for your thoughts though. And yes, I definitely stick to the "collect what you like" mentality. If I don't like it, it's not worth having.
Besides being a pleasure to look at, choice AU coins are much less expensive than Mint State coins, so you can buy more!!!
