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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;Andrew McCabe, post: 3325665, member: 90666&quot;]1. What metrics do you choose to add coins?</p><p><br /></p><p>1a. Balance and completeness. I want my collection to look at first glance like an essentially complete and balanced collection of Roman Republican coins. All metals, gold, silver, struck bronze, cast bronze. All relevant eras. All key types. All denominations including the weird ones. And paradoxically I want to achieve that using the fewest number of coins. I don&#039;t think one can have a complete-looking collection of RR coins numbering less than about 500 pieces. There would be too many gaps. So that helps the next question.</p><p><br /></p><p>2. Do you have a rough size of a collection in mind (10, 100, 5000, 1000, 50,000 coins?)</p><p><br /></p><p>2a. RBW had about 2000 types and at its max I had about 1400 types. Currently I&#039;m at about 800 but my 800 are a far better cross section than my 1400 were. This is because I&#039;ve swapped out relatively repetitive types such as &quot;bigati&quot; or full runs of prow bronze series for more key types that are more expensive such Imperatorial or full runs of aes grave. I recently completed the wheel series of aes grave from as to sextans and that&#039;s gonna have much more visual impact than completing eg the OPEI series of struck bronzes. My ideal target collection size would be about 1000 but I&#039;m not sure I&#039;ll ever climb to that again due resources (and resources another are a key metric, whether time, or means to get coins)</p><p><br /></p><p>3. Do you work off of a &quot;wantlist&quot;? How has your wantlist changed over time? How rigid are you with following your wantlist and plans?</p><p><br /></p><p>3a. When in my initial collection build from 1990 to about 2010 I worked off a strict want list per an Excel spreadsheet that had all Crawford varieties listed. I then hit a wall. Adding varieties became impossible due to rarity - I was adding by then maybe 30 a year, a tiny number in a collection of 1400. So I completely changed direction and went towards my current metric of balance and quality, which requires fewer coins but more money for key types. I permitted myself to sell less key varieties to enhance how my collection looks and that&#039;s how I&#039;ve moved from 1400 pieces of rare debris to 800 quality.</p><p><br /></p><p>4. What&#039;s the longest you&#039;ve waited to find a coin you&#039;ve wanted? How long have you been waiting for your current target?</p><p><br /></p><p>4a. By this point in my life there&#039;s no rarity that I haven&#039;t owned and thus nothing I&#039;m especially targeting. I wouldn&#039;t mind getting a damaged and holed ex jewelry oath scene gold. I&#039;d really like a solid silver Cornuficius (I had a plated one but recently traded it with a friend). There a struck bronze I want - the 42 gram first struck semis issue from Luceria. And I&#039;d like a second EID MAR (I sold my previous one in 1999). Aside from these I think I&#039;ve most key types already.</p><p><br /></p><p>5. What portion of purchases do you make privately vs from auctions?</p><p><br /></p><p>5a. 50%/50%. Retail/private are consistently better and cheaper for me than auctions because I really know my stuff so I can grab or negotiate bargains without competition. Two days ago I bought a very rare Roman Republican denarius type. (Mark Antony Cr.496/3) from a jewelry shop in Hamilton, Bermuda. There was a couple of mounted coins in the window display and through dogged determination I made contact with the goldsmith, and raided his workng metals box where I found this denarius. You have to be absolutely dedicated to finding stuff. At auctions I have no special advantage hence many of my best coins are private finds.[ATTACH=full]881290[/ATTACH]</p><p><br /></p><p>6. How often do you handle your coins or look at your pictures?</p><p><br /></p><p>6a. Daily, handle. Hourly (when awake), pictures.</p><p><br /></p><p>7. How much time do you spend searching for lost pedigrees?</p><p><br /></p><p>7a. Average 10 hours / week but with spurts eg when I visit the Fitzwilliam. Between 500 and 1000 hours per year.</p><p><br /></p><p>8. How many books/catalogs do you own or have easy access to?</p><p><br /></p><p>8a. About 1000 at home. Don&#039;t know exact number but my library has over 100 feet of shelves full of coin books. Ah that probably means 2000 as most of my catalogues are 1/2 inch thick</p><p><br /></p><p>9. (unasked). Resources?</p><p><br /></p><p>9a. I devote about my local minimum wage in new money on my collection each year. Not much, but within capacity. Recycled resources from coin sales account for 80% or more of my collection improvement resources. Books are a heavy drain because unlike coins they don&#039;t generate duplicates to sell. Time, probably I devote 1000-1500 hours per year on collecting of which about 50% is provenance time, 25% hunting for coins and 25% collection management including planning disposals. That doesn&#039;t include web browsing or messaging friends.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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