Hello CT, I have been reading many treads over the past several weeks with questions about where do you find your coin prices. I am sure that there are several other similar threads that might address this issue, but I would like anybody who is interested to post where they find their coin prices to help the novice and amateur collector. Over and over again I read “buy the red book”, keep in mind that the new 2010 red book was published when gold was around $800 an ounce. I personally cannot trust the red book and I do not use it to price my coins. Grey sheet, Grey sheet, for a reasonable fee it offers weekly, monthly and quarterly prices on almost all US coins and commemoratives. PCGS and NGC pop reports and price guides are also a great place to find prices on coins, and for a $10 a month you can get all current prices for coins, but you can also view “ballpark” prices for several grades for free. How about past auctions prices realized for auctions houses like Heritage, Bowers and Merena, Stacks, ect., and these prices are available for free you just need to sign up for an account. Let’s not forget about eBay, which will give you the going price for just about anything, I was reading that over half a billion people have and account with eBay. Checking websites from reputable numismatic companies can help give the collector an idea of retail prices, or perhaps simply marking down prices from your local coin shop. Coin World and their Coin Values is another resource, and of course we can always go back to the Red book and blue book. Where do you find your coin prices? Hopefully this tread might help out the novice and amateur collector. :thumb:
You can buy the gray sheet on wholesale coins prices or get a subscription to Numismatic News on retail coins prices. Numismatic has a supplement (Coin Market) once a month on update on the coins prices. The retail prices can very up to 40% from the gray sheet. You can go on line and see copies of both. Now if you are into currency, then you have the green sheet, and the Bank Note Reporter and it has a supplement called Paper Money Market. I hope this will be of help to you. -O)
Oh wow you are opening up a whole other bag of worms when it comes to paper and currency. Greensheet is great, there are books and price guides on US and foreign notes, banknote reporter as you said, and I personally love Lyn Knight Currency Auctions and the prices realized from past auctions.
The best way i have found is take atleast 3 good sources and use The average, Using one or the other doesnt work as well as prices Can differ substantially!!
I like to read the Redbook for information, but their price guide is a tad high, especially now that prices have come down on many higher end coins recently. The PCGS website has a great price sheet, but may be a bit high, because their prices are based on slabbed coins if I'm not mistaken. But I use them as a reference quite often when I don't have current prices on a particular coin or series.
Good point Jeff. Just becuase it might be thier asking prices doesnt mean that is what they will get for it, like you said "gettin prices" Over and over again I hear of people who want redbook prices and wont sell for less, but if they are buying they sure want a deal.. I feel that many people think that red book prices are set in stone from the numismatic gods, but in my opinion the information in the redbook is more valuable then the prices.
The only thing I use is Heritage past auctions. That is what the coins actually sold for and not what someone thinks they should sell for.
eBay completed listings, Heritage Auction Archives, Redbook (for a relative reference) and Numismedia retail/wholesale.
