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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;Hobo, post: 337213, member: 11521&quot;]Welcome to the forum, General. When we talk about you should we do it in General Discussion?</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>My recommendation is that you do not rush into coin collecting. You know the old sayings - Act in haste; regret at leisure. Haste makes waste. This applies to coin collecting, too.</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>You really need to become educated before you start laying down a lot of money for coins you know little about. If you don&#039;t know what you are doing you can overpay for your coins and later, when you realize that you have been ripped off, you may become soured on the hobby.</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>Buy the book before the coin.</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>To answer your questions:</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>1) Buy what you like. Most people gain a lot of pleasure from putting together a set of coins themselves. You will learn a LOT by buying the individual coins yourself - things like the difference between AU and MS, strike, luster, varieties, etc. It is better - especially for a beginner - to focus on a particular series or put together a type set. </p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>2) Go to your local coin club&#039;s meeting and ask members which dealers they would recommend. You could check the <a href="http://www.money.org" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="http://www.money.org" rel="nofollow">ANA web site</a> for dealer members. (ANA members and dealer members are bound by ANA&#039;s Code of Ethics and face expulsion if they break the rules. Being a dealer member of ANA is no guarantee of complete honesty but it is something.) Being a member of PNG (Professional Numismatists Guild) is another plus for a dealer. Your profile does not clue us in as to where you live but others here on CT may live in your area and know good dealers to recommend.</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>3) Good deals are where you find them. But first you must be able to spot a good deal. Cheap coins are not necessarily good deals. At a garage sale or an estate sale you might find a good deal buried among other common coins. For instance, there may be a coin board filled with common Lincoln cents but you, after educating yourself, spot a rare 1922 Plain cent in the 1922-D hole. If everyone else thinks it is just a book of common &quot;pennies&quot; (the correct term is &quot;cents&quot;) then you might be able to buy the board for a song and get a rare coin worth a few hundred dollars in the deal. </p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>At coin dealers you should expect to pay retail; you won&#039;t find many underpriced coins there BUT you will (or, rather, <i>should</i>) be dealing with an informed seller. At a coin dealer&#039;s shop you can compare coins so you can learn how coins are graded. A good dealer will also take some time to help in your education.</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>Be careful buying cons on eBay. There are some good deals there but they pale in comparison to the number of auctions with coins that are overgraded, cleaned, altered, misrepresented, etc., etc., etc., etc. After you know how to grade a coin and spot a cleaned coin and know how to cherrypick varieties then you might try buying a few coins on the Bay. Until then you are very likely to make a poor purchase.</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>4) What you collect is your personal preference. But you need to ask yourself, &quot;Am I going to be a collector or an investor?&quot; If you are planning to buy coins as an investment the answer to your question will be very different. I am a collector and I collect what I like.</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>5) Again, don&#039;t rush into coin collecting. I would recommend you halt your coin purchasing (you bought 85 coins before knowing anything about coins) and concentrate on educating yourself. Read the Red Book. In it you will learn about every US coin series and maybe one series will strike your fancy. Or maybe you will decide you would like to get a nice example of many series. A 20th Century type set might be just the ticket for you. Or you might become interested in early silver commemorative coins. Or obsolete denominations (half cent, two cent, three cent silver, three cent nickel, twenty cent, etc.). How about coins minted during WWII, WWI or the Civil War? Or maybe error coins are more your speed. Maybe you would prefer world coins. Or ancient coins. The choices are almost endless.</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>Once you decide what you want to collect buy some books on that series. There are books on practically every US coin series and there&#039;s plenty of free info on the Internet as well as here. </p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>You will also need a price guide. There are entire threads on CT on this topic. Make sure you understand how to use your price guide and its limitations before you commit yourself to a coin.</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>Good luck with your new hobby.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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