Hi everyone, I wanted to get your opinion on collecting coins for an investment. I am 25 and don't have thousands to spend on coins. I started buying commemoritave coins because of low mintages but it seems like they do not appreciate like older coins do. I know they say to invest in a single, great grade coin but I like to have a variety of good coins. Is it a smart idea to invest in commemoritve coins and good insted of great coins?
Collecting and investment should never be use in the same sentence imho! If you want to collect, collect to enjoy it. The modern coin MS70 and PR70 is mostly hype.
Since hopefully, you have a long collecting/investing time ahead of you, here is what I would do if I could find the space/time wrinkle again. It is easy for collectors to see the difference between collecting and investing, but for some reason, not the reverse. Collecting builds expertise, and along with that, one makes smart moves and understands the coinmarket, so collecting will benefit investing. In my opinion, investing will not aid collecting. If feasible, consider a plan where you buy a few coins you like and then go for a great coin. One that is within price range and yet, will probably remain in the same population numbers or decrease in the future. One such reasonable coin in my opinion is the 1970-S small date MS66 red Lincoln cent. Not the proof. Heritage has sold a couple in the last 6 months for around $200, PCGS and NGC slabbed. Shows and internet dealers may be more/less. You could of course find other candidates, but there is no reason you can't buy inexpensive coins and significant coins alternatively. Jim
Moose, I take 10% of what you plan to invest and buy gold or silver bullion. The rest in gold and silver futures and mining stocks.
OK in my opinion coins are usually a lousy investment, but a great hobby. If you collect with a discerning eye, over the long term you have a good chance of your collection growing in value at a rate sufficient to keep up with inflation. But probably not at a rate to be considered a good investment. If you are just interested in monitary return rates you would actually probably do better with speculating and flipping than with collecting. The problem is to get your product early and flip it while the prices are still high. If you get it too late you miss the peak and may even be stuck with a loss. A ggod example being the recent ATB hockey pucks. If you were able to be one of the first to get them you could buy them at $900 and immediately flip them for $3000 - $4000. Now they are something like $975 from the distributors and the flip price is down to around $1300 and dropping. At this rate soon they won't be worth fooling with. And of course sometimes the price never does go up on the secondary market and you may find yourself holding a bunch of "stuff" with no aftermarket. Do that a couple of time and you will wipe out all your gains from the good flips.
You may already know this but just in case you don't know - - - DO NOT buy coins advertised on an infomercial. DO NOT buy coins advertised in a full-page ad in your newspaper. DO NOT buy coins that are geared to the non-collecting market (e.g., colorized State Quarters, gold-plated State Quarters, etc.), coins in meaningless packaging (e.g., "ballistic rolls"), common coins that come with an overpriced safe, etc.
