I'm fairly new to this hobby and have a couple of basic questions. Is there any one price quide that is a good guide to follow? If I compare the PCGS guide to some others, I find that quite often the prices in the PCGS guide are MUCH higher than in other gudes. Also, I've been watching for what coins are going for on EBAY and quite often they go for much less than the PCGS guide. When I see a slabbed coin from PCGS for sale on EBAY, I will look it up in the PCGS guide and it may say that it is worth $300.00 in MS65 (also graded as MS65 by PCGS), however, it will sell for a third of that. This happen ALL the time. Which is off, the PCGS grading or the PCGS price guide? Thanks.
The best guide is what coins are selling for on online auctions. PCGS price guide is hyped and shouldn't be used. Speedy
Yes, I agree that recently realized auction prices are the best source to figure out what coins are going for. However, I don't think that you shouldn't use the PCGS price guide. It is what it is. From PCGS's own description, "The prices listed in the PCGS Price Guide are the average dealer asking prices for properly graded United States coins." The prices in there for the most part probably are more than what you should want to pay for a coin, but it's not completely worthless. Oh, and dealers can ASK all they want, but it doesn't mean we'll pay it.
Just remember that ALL guidlines are guidlines. Sort of like manufacturers list price on a car. Just a guess. Not like a store where the price is set and that's what you pay. Coins, stamps, beanie babies, etc are worth what someome will pay for them. If you wanted to you too could make a coin price guidline. Who's to say yours is the one or not. I go to about 2 coins shows a month and some of the dealers have printed out the PCGS price guidline to show customers what a great deal they are getting with them. Many use the grey sheet, but off to the side as if it was the only copy in existance or some secret document. Others just don't care about guidlines and want the price they have marked or just move on to another table. Myself, I just check out several back issues of the Red Book to see how the historic values of a coin has progressed. For example the 1943 Lincoln Cent just hasn't moved much in quite a while now. However, that stupid 55DD Lincoln has doubled in value in the last year or so.
The trouble with any published "price guide" is that they're attempting to set a value on objects of passion. If you want the coin bad enough, you will pay what it takes to get it regardless of what PCGS or the Greysheet say it's worth. Further, published price guides tend to be pubished by people with a stake in the pricing. You take it with a grain of salt. As has been mentioned, the only "reliable" estimate of a coin's value is recent physical records of actual sales as evidenced by places like Teletrade, Heritage and Ebay. I strongly urge you to become a (free) member at Heritage Auctions and access their huge database of prior sales results. They get a more sophisticated clientele than Ebay, and in my opinion Heritage's archives represent about as close to "actual value" as may be had in this entirely subjective hobby.
I have seen where the PCGS price guide has even been a bit behind for certain coins. The prices listed in the price guide were lower than what the coins were going for at auction. This happens occassionally for "hot" coins. So I don't think that every coin in there is overpriced all of the time as far as what certain coins are currently going for. I think it is valuable as a "Guide". If you see a coin listed for sale for $200 and you go to the PCGS price guide and see it at $125, $200 is probably too much to reasonably pay for it. I recently purchased a large cent. I was very confused when trying to figure out what to pay for the coin. It was listed for $26 in the Red Book, $125 in the current issue of Coin Values and $60 on the PCGS website. Auction prices I could find were all over the board too. In that case, I don't think that their price was necessarily off. I figured as long as I didn't pay more than $60, I was probably doing okay and would be comfortable with my purchase. So, I used all of my sources together as I guide. In my opinion, that is an acceptable use of the PCGS price guide.
