I've been collecting gold and silver and I have a few coins that are in the PCGS older green-labeled holders. My understanding is that these coins have a chance for an upgrade if resubmitted to PCGS. I was wondering if anyone has had experience doing this and can tell me (roughly) what the success rate is or any other thoughts or secrets to this process they may have. I know that the saying is "buy the coin, not the slab." These coins a great specimins, in my opinion, and have the potential for an upgrade. Thanks.
Thanks for the advice - it may be tough for me to get pictures on the forum. Any tips on what these guys may be looking for if I try to get it upped a tick?
Ultimately it depends on the coin, but if you bought the old green holders recently, I am sorry to say that chances are they won't upgrade. That said, post pics and I'm sure you'll get lots of opinions....Mike
Sure they have a chance, so do coins that came from PCGS yesterday. The question is do they have a better chance. The answer is probably yes, but it is just a small chance.
If they've been on the market a few times in the past, the odds are that someone seeking an upgrade would have cracked them already and re-submitted.
The only advantage with a green holder, at least to me, is that you can be fairly certain they have not been dipped or otherwise messed with in quite a long time (1986-98, depending on the type, IIRC). You can also be more confident the surfaces are stable.... That said, there is always the possibility that the coins have turned in the holders. To wit, please consider the following coin: http://coins.ha.com/common/view_item.php?Sale_No=446&Lot_No=101 Do you agree or disagree with this OGH holder color designation (RB)? If you disagree do you think it is more likely this coin WAS RB and is now BN having toned in the holder or do you think PCGS cosiders this RB coin? The former sure seems much more likely to me... Again, relying on the OGH to signify that a coin is undergraded is a mistake made by those who don't really know how to grade, and sellers of OGHs are generally not ignorant of this fact and often take advantage of this -- ask yourself if the coin was such a candidate for upgrade, why didn't the seller do it themselves. The VAST majority of OGH holders I've seen have either been overgraded or correctly graded (against TPG standards), and only "fresh" coins off the market for some time stand a good chance of being candidates of upgrades. The bottom line is that everyone needs to learn how to grade BEFORE buying coins -- to buy before being able to tell the difference between grades is a sure way to get stuck with overgraded or marginal coins...Mike
Good post Mike. I do like the older holders if there are RD cents in them that are truly RD......those usually are not going to turn any more if they are stored properly, as they have been in the holder for years. However, I have seen a lot of RD designated cents in OGHs that had definitely turned RB.
Thanks I'll try to get some scans of the coins that I have accumulated over the years but I should say that when purchasing the coins, I didn't factor the green label upgrade possibilities into the price - I actually hunt for "good deals" and pick coins that have nice eye appeal and try to pay less than what the PCGS slabbed "book value" is (and ideally less than Greysheet). Thanks for the advice and I'll get some scans uploaded soon.
That is a good idea---since the PCGS price guide is almost always high and over hyped. When looking for values I would suggest looking up ended online auctions. Places such as Heritage or Teletrade will let you go back and search and see what coins have sold for in the past few days, months, years.... Speedy
