Originally Posted by Agathon Originally Posted by

These are some lessons Ive learned over the last couple years, mostly selling on Ebay, but also to large online dealers and private transactions. If you disagree with my conclusions, please chime in.



1) Only offer free shipping on things that are cheap to ship, i.e. one or two coins. If you have to fork over $5-10 for shipping make the seller pay for it. The difference in your final auction price offering free shipping verses charging actual shipping costs is neglibile.



2) Regarding pandas: only acquire and sell slabbed pandas. They go for 3x spot on average, whereas the provenance of loose pandas is always viewed as questionable.



3) Things that sell like hotcakes, even if spot price is dropping: SAEs, large Mexican silver, US halves, US silver dollars, Perth Kookaburras and Lunars, anything that says Engelhard or Johnson Matthey.



4) Things that sell for less than youd like: US silver dimes and quarters, Canadian 80% silver, Philharmonics, Perth Koalas, US Mint proof quarter sets (state, ATB), US Mint commemoratives



5) Generics sell just as well as Austrian Philharmonics. What does that tell you about Philharmonics?



6) Milk spots on silver (Im looking at you Canada) and strawberries on gold adversely affect sales price. For me, milk spots come off with a little Wrights silver cream, and the soft sponge that comes in the jar does not scratch the coins. Cant fix red spots on gold, so try to avoid.



7) If you are planning on selling the item, leave it in the mint wrapper, capsule, box, etc. It will sell for more. If you are just planning on owning it, ogling it, fondling it, etc, then bust it out of the wrapper.



8) Dont try to sell anything worth more than a couple hundred dollars: too much risk and worry. Therefore, nothing larger than 1/10 oz gold or 5 oz silver bars. If you have to unload ½ or 1 oz gold coins or 10-100 oz silver bars, just pick up the phone and call Kitco, Provident or APMEX and its done. (Why not do this with every sale? Because people are willing to pay crazy premiums on Ebay for small purchasesinstead of selling an SAE for spot plus $1 to a large dealer, youll be selling it for spot+ $10 on the bay).



9) [For US sellers] And of course, keep your sales below the Ebay/Paypal IRS reporting limit: 200 sales a year AND $20,000 in sales a year (must breach both levels for them to rat you out to Big Brother).



If I had to do it all over again (for investment purposes) I wouldve bought only:

SAEs

5 oz silver bars

Morgan and Peace dollars

90% Franklin and Kennedy halves

A few numismatic Perth products



And regarding gold: I would've probably only bought 1/4, 1/2 and 1 oz GAEs and Krugs and sold those to big dealers as needed. IMO, the rest is fluff and hype.