Who's the buyer ?

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Interesting scenarios but my answer isn't that cut and dry.

Scenario one: If the dealer actually believes that whatever PCGS says is gospel then I wouldn't walk out immediatly. I would be checking his inventory for coins that were undergraded and see if he still feel the same. Possible profit to be made off his ignorance.

Scenario two: If he was looking to rip you off the real money would be in trying to undergrade the 65, which he didn't try. I would ask him to point out why he feels the others were overgraded. I may find out that I agree with his assessment in which case this may be a dealer I could do business with. An honest price is better in a long term business relationship than a "good" price

Buy the coin not the holder, SELL the coin not the holder.

Richard

 

Hahahahaha. We'll see if your point sinks in. Having haggled with dealers over price often, I'm not insulted when they do the same back to me. Everybody wants to get the best deal possible. No matter what side of the counter you're on.

 

In scenerio 2 since the dealer is offering MS65 money for the MS65, maybe it's a MS66 in MS65 slab

 

I have two comments to make for this post and both are related to what I have put in bold.

The first comment is that when one offers coins for sale that the seller should put the offer price out first, not the potential buyer. The seller should know what the coins are worth to him/her and should not give up the strategic advantage of placing the first offer out for negotiation. Think of it this way, when you walk up to a dealer's table or go into a shop, do you ask how much a coin is or do you expect to tell the dealer what the coin is worth? If you ask for a price when you are a potential buyer, then when you are the seller you should extend the first offer of price.

The second comment is that in neither case did the potential buyer reject the coins. Rather, in both instances the potential buyer gave an estimation of grade that either agreed with or was lower than the certified grade. This, however, is not the same as rejecting the coins outright since it might have been quite likely that each buyer would have bought the coins if they were priced more attractively. As written, the seller is rejecting to continue negotiations.

 

Over the years I have gave up on trying to agree on the grade with a buyer or seller.
I'm only looking at what the coin is worth to me and not the numbers on the slab.
I don't care to argue the grade. Even if both agree on the grade the price is still up in the air.

 

In both cases, you the collector are trying to maximize your money - spend less on the coin in the case, get more for the coin you are selling. These are self-consistent.

The key is - in both cases, the dealer is doing the same thing! A trade cannot happen until both parties agree, which is going to involve someone paying more than they originally wanted, and someone not getting as much as they originally wanted.

 

Since grades are opinions and not science I guess these scenarios will play out till the end of time. Rarely do two people agree 100% on a coin's grade.

On a side note, Doug, I like this excersise in perspective and hope to see more.
Guy~

 

My first thought was that if you did #1 right(buying the coin and not the slab), knowing your grading, etc. - then #2 would not be an issue. It would not be an issue because you know the coins grade what is on the slab. Now if the dealer offers less than those grade prices, you can just move on. At the same time I think the seller needs to be aware of the market - some coins just don't move as well or are very common.

Now where this really gets interesting - toss in the varieties, bust halves or cents. You have an R-4 coin, but they might just offer greysheet prices. Now they might or might not attribute them before they put them out for sale.

 

in mhop the dealer is only trying to make profit in both cases . in the first he did try to be
honest with the last coin just to be fair. the buyer in the second case did not look at it dis way. and thought he was been done. not the case he is a dealer after all.
and hes taken a chance after all. how long is he going to have to keep them before he turns them around or flips them. thats something the seller should take in to account.
as for grade its in the eyes of the beholder . again just mop.
what did i get my self into lol . nice one

 

If the seller is an authorized PCGS dealer, the the seller is obligated pledge wise to respect the assigned grade on the slab, no if's, ands or buts about it. The buyer on the other hand is not buying sight unseen, so an experienced collector should have the upper hand...the dealer must sell something to stay in business, the collector is under no stress or obligation to purchase.

The coin should sell it's self, no matter what type of plastic it is resting in...used to be a TPG function was to authenticate coins, but it soon found out that grading moderns is where the money was located, so be it.

I know this did not directly answer your question, everyone is different and so is just about every coin out there. Seems there is no correct answer, it's a gut feeling you get if you know your being railroaded or not.

The internet can put you, the collector at even odds with most coin dealers...do your leg work, learn and listen.

Happy Collecting

 

Collectors are good and Dealers are always bad.

Isn't that what they taught me in Numismatics 101?



The reality is both parties are simply trying to drive to the best deal they can -- nobody is necessarily good or bad or ripping anyone off.

That said, I try not to badmouth a person's coin when buying or selling -- it's just poor form (and lousy negotiating technique), IMO.

 

At some point, everyone is going to disagree with an assigned grade of a TPG. There is nothing inherently wrong with that and neither dealers or collectors should be criticized for doing so. This question reminds me of the AT/NT debate and really boils down to intent. If either the collector or dealer is insincerely disagreeing with the assigned grade simply to gain a financial advantage, that would be wrong. However, one or two coins is not going to reveal that sort of information. I would be willing to bet that there are a fair number of collectors and dealers who engage in this practice. Having said that, I believe that the dealers who employ that strategy have a higher success rate than their collector counterparts due to the knowledge gap.

 

Excellent scenario Doug

If the seller had bought them correctly, with disregard for the slab grade, then it would be an easy 20-30% back.......of the COINS grade. That is an acceptable price for an over the counter sale. As a dealer, one would be glad to get retail, maybe 10% back, just to move inventory and cash up on some newps....

Or, we can trade plastic here and trade on bluesheet generic terms.

If we have " rare coins " and the buyer has a wantlist backed up, again, we will ignore the plastic and offer a real world price, knowing we can flip this quickly, our offer may be a much better percentage of a sheet or guide, if it is a monster coin, skys the limit.

Plastic tends to sell like plastic, generic and unseen coins get generic money. PCGS has blurred the market, we need to trade coins, not slabs.

 

TPG grades aside id just like to say that scenario 1 would be the potential for getting ripped off and scenario 2 would be getting taken advantage of.

now scenarios aside theres alot of good dealers. theres also some bad dealers. either way the dealer gets the people that dont know anything about the coins they have. random people are not going to start calling or coming to my house just because i know something about them. theyll goto someone well known that is buying or has knowledge of them. also slabs cant protect everyone. this is the only way i thought i could answer your questions.

 

Forget about the grade or which TPG graded the coin! It doesn't matter! A coin is only worth what someone is willing to pay for it. Everyone has the ability to walk away from either end of a transaction and look for a better deal. You may end up waiting the rest of your life, but that is your choice.

Chris

 

I don't think that he is trying to rip you off when he does that. (usually)
And I think it's human nature to try to get the best deal you can (within reason)

 

Isn't that the purpose of 3rd party certification -- to establish a respected independent evaluation that both buyer and seller can agree to? If one party happens to feel the evaluation (grade) is incorrect, it is unreasonable for him to expect the other party to agree.

It happens all the time between buyers and sellers, as in used car sales. As a seller I'm selling on a car's positives; as a buyer, I'm buying on the negatives. As the seller, he can always pass on the deal and wait for the next person through the door who agrees with him on the positives and doesn't know/care about the negatives.