What kind of dealer you need
"Coin dealer" covers four different businesses, and sending your material to the wrong one costs you money. A bullion dealer buys metal by weight and is the right choice for common silver and gold with no collector premium. A general coin shop buys and sells across series and is the right choice for mixed inherited holdings. A specialist deals in one area in depth and is the right choice for anything scarce. A pawn shop is not a coin dealer, although many buy coins.
The practical test is what they ask you. A buyer who weighs everything and quotes one number is treating your holding as metal. A buyer who sorts by date and mint mark before quoting is looking for collector value. For a mixed box, you want the second kind, and you want to know which you are dealing with before the box is opened.
Questions worth asking
- Do you buy outright, on consignment, or both? The answer tells you whose risk the unsold material is.
- What percentage of spot do you pay on common silver? A dealer who will not answer this in percentage terms is making the comparison deliberately difficult.
- Will you look at the whole holding before quoting? Cherry picking the three good coins and offering metal price for the rest is a legitimate strategy, and you should know it is happening.
- Are you a member of a trade body, and which? Membership is not a guarantee, but it means there is somewhere to complain.
- Can I have the offer in writing, itemised? A serious buyer will do this; it also lets you compare two offers properly.
Before you walk in
Four preparations change the outcome. Do not clean anything: cleaning is visible to any experienced eye and it reduces value, often severely. Do not split sets, runs or original packaging, because assembled sets carry a premium that disappears the moment they are broken up. Make a rough inventory, even a photograph of each tray, so that you know what you handed over. And learn the one distinction that matters most for American material, which is the 1964 silver cutoff.
That cutoff is worth stating plainly. United States dimes, quarters and half dollars dated 1964 and earlier are 90 per cent silver. The clad coins struck afterwards are copper and nickel: a modern quarter is 91.67 per cent copper and 8.33 per cent nickel and weighs 5.67 grams (50 State quarters, specifications). The two look almost identical in a jar, and the difference between them is the difference between metal value and face value.
Getting more than one opinion
One offer is not a market. The cheapest way to get several is a coin show, where a dozen buyers sit in one room and you can ask each the same question within an hour; the fall show page explains how to work a room for exactly this purpose. The second cheapest is a club meeting, where you get opinions from people with no stake in the outcome; see the meetings page.
For anything that might be scarce, an auction house valuation is worth having even if you then sell to a dealer, because it gives you a documented second number. The auctions section covers what that route costs and how long it takes.
Warning signs
Pressure to decide today is the clearest one: coins have been around for centuries and will keep until tomorrow. Refusal to itemise is the second. Valuation offered for a fee by the same party who then offers to buy is a conflict of interest, and should be treated as one. An offer that depends on you not taking the material elsewhere first is not an offer, it is a tactic.
One more, specific to inherited holdings: be careful with anyone who offers to "take the rest off your hands" after buying the good pieces. The remainder of a collection often contains the sets and original packaging that carry their own premium, and it is worth keeping until someone has looked at it properly.
Buying rather than selling
The same shops look different from the buying side. A good local dealer for a collector is one who knows what you collect, puts material aside, and tells you when something is not for you. Building that relationship takes several small purchases and a clear statement of what you are after, and it is worth considerably more than a few dollars saved on any single coin.
