Thread for Long Term Discussion About Higher priced and error/rarer stamps
GOOD Evening fellow stamp nerds! I recently inherited a fairly large stamp collection from the 1954 Discoverer's Stamp Album (3 books total one from each year of printing '54, '56,'58). My great uncle from Italy in 1888 started collecting stamps, as well as my grandfather in 1928. My grandfather inherited the Uncle's collection, and now it belongs to me. Most are not really very valuable in the Scott's Catalog, but some seem to be and some I cannot even find proof of errors for in the Catalog.....So, I'd like feedback from Pro's preferably to see if anything comes up as I go though the journey of grading and discovering what I have.....Thank you for the Discussions!!!
Comments
http://stampforgeries.com/album-weeds-buenos-aires/
For Jeri, I read pages 70 through 73 multiple times in that book several days ago, and that actually lent more credence to their Authenticity. I may have to take them to a stamp show in Sept
Just wanted to let you know that you received what you had asked for....
Keep on Stamping
Richard
The reality is, if you send those Argentina's in, and they all prove to be fake, you've just spent about $150 to be told they are not worth the paper they are printed on. So you have to consider the other side. If you're sending in for expertizing because you can't ID them, or can't determine if they are forgeries or authentic, it's the wrong reason to send them in. My philosophy is, you should ONLY send what you know is going to come back sound, and as ID-d, because 95% of the time (not an exaggeration), instead of getting back the glowing multi-hundred dollar cert, you get back a disappointment if you can't already tell what it is your certing.
So if it's just the value you want out of it, I suggest, list it. Let the buying community pay you for what it is worth. Then, even your 10,000 25c stamps may sell in small lots of 50 - 100 for $5 - $10. This is a lot of work, but it's how we dealers "get rid of the excess". (Have a look at my listings if you like, we have lots of small "unidentified" lots that give people the joy of ID'ing them, and still we get something for it, instead of just massing more and more and more accumulation of 600 copies of the same "worthless" stamp.
If you just want to sell them for best value, I suggest this approach.
If he posts good clean photos/scans of the stamps, the experts in this community WILL bid for them accordingly. (That includes their condition, authenticity, etc).
Those keen collectors out there know what they are worth, and will seek to get them. The alternative is, send fake items to expertizers, wait 4 months, get certs back that are potentially disappointing.
You can list them 2 ways: 1) start them off at $1, and let the bidding frenzy begin. 2) you can list them at Buy It Now for what you believe them to be. One of two things will happen with the later. It will either sit there for years, without an offer, OR, someone will recognize it and buy it for what it is.
Cert's should rarely be used for ID. They should be used to confirm condition (including centering, if you want to grade them). But educate yourself first on how that grading really works. We try very hard to list at real grading even for non-graded stamps. I see so many delusional listings where sellers are claiming XF, VF/XF, XF-SUP on material that isn't even VF. And those listings just sit there for months or years and never sell. People send them for certs, and pay a lot for it, and are then disappointed by what they get back. (This is why so many certs get shredded because they detract from what the seller really wants to sell it for). Lots of faults are insidious, and there are some amazing expert repairs I have seen in my day. That's fine, but you have to claim it, and put it in your listing. If your cert says that, then it should be there.
That said, a bit more research easily tells me, these are not the "real-deal". The CORREOS stamps were all printed very thighly (very close together). The margins on these stamps alone tell me that they are either reprints (which were made from the original plates, so may have all the "hallmarks" of looking real, but aren't), and it appears at least the 2nd and 3rd are forgeries (no "-" between Buenos Aires). But all of them have big wide margins, and these in their "authentic" print couldn't support margins like that.
Now just because they are reprints or forgeries doesn't mean they are worthless either. (In some cases counterfeits are worth more than their original), but often these reprints and forgeries still have $10 - $50 value. We buy a lot of them because we are writing a book that covers fakes, forgeries and counterfeits (of the US classics). I've paid as much as $100 for a forgery for some material. We have a very famous counterfeit of the C15 (blue $2.60 Zeppelin) that even Scott lists as having a higher value than a VF C15. So no need to despair just because it's not authentic. It can still be of interest/value to collectors, or people like the guy who wrote the book on the forgeries. You have to have them to study if you're going to ID the variations. But make sure you LIST them as such, and not authentic.
The thought of having something 150 years old in my hand is exhilarating! I am trying to do leg work in advance to save the trouble. I plan on having everything that maxes over 100 min used value in the scotts album authenticated, and I'm building a spreadsheet (for the cheapies as Rene and I discussed earlier).
Thank you both so far, and here, check this out.....
Darn photo upload.....
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/143946613070?hash=item2183e3014e:g:6FAAAOSw-iFgJrRZ
For stamps with non-fugitive ink and on just plain white album page or envelop, you chuck as many as will fit in a single layer in at a time. Let them sit for 15 - 30 minutes. The cold water won't hurt them so long as they are known non-fugitive color. Then, in most cases as you pull it out, the paper and hinge will already be gone. Where they aren't gently nudge it with tongs, if it doesn't come off freely, then you can just soak it again until it does. I've had this work even with some very strong adhesives (even self-adhesive stamps that is advised "Do not soak", I leave them over night, and the next day I can usually encourage them loose.
This is where the desert mountain book comes in. One, because it will dry everything in about 1 hour or less, and 2, if you have something that still has gum/adhesive on it, it will NOT stick to the slick surface of the page. (There are 2 paper types in the book, one for placing stamps on, the other for absorbing the moisture from the wet stamp, which is on the face of the stamp side).
Have done 10's of thousands if not more stamps this way. Never get a thin. If you damage a stamp, then your value will plummet, to 10% - 25% of the stamp's real value.
Thanks for the comment about expertizing. I'm in "stealth mode" at the moment but there will be more about this later.
Suffice to say, I've had a TON of experience in this area on both sides of the fence.
And to answer your question: " If you list an expensive set in your store, would you guarantee a refund if expertized and found to be fake?"
Yes, 100%. But in fairness if I knew there were fakes abound unless I was 99% certain that the material I had was authentic, I wouldn't list it. If I knew it to be something other than the original (reprint, fake, forger, altered), I would sell it as that. However, we have a strict policy that we don't sell "Faked" items even as they are. The reason for this is, the are essentially worthless anyway, but we don't want someone else getting duped by it. So when we find them in collections, we pull them out. We have a huge book just filled with page after page of fakes (especially coils of the Franklin-Washington series).
Just for clarity, a Fake is a stamp that is made from a real philatelic material, altered to look like another item. (For instance, I have seen MANY Plate Proof's (typically imperf) cut to size of a real stamp, perfs added, fake gum added and then sold to the unsuspecting (at a huge discount, but still in the 100's and 1,000's of dollars) as "Mint never hinged" stamps. This is criminal, and we've had people prosecuted over it in the past.
(See this aritcle: https://www.somersetcountygazette.co.uk/news/16952408.stamp-dealer-philip-ryle-weston-super-mare-jailed-vat-fraud/ a bit like Al Capone on the charge, but it took us 4+ years to get him off eBay from around 2013 to 2018.)
Also, our policy already is that if you buy an item, you have 6 months to get it expertized and if the cert comes back other than as we described it (for instance, we miss a tiny thin or corner crease), we will provide full refund of both the item and the cert, so long as you send both back to us. In more than 15 years, we've never gotten one back...
For all other items (that you don't send for cert) we have a 30 day return policy, so long as the material is in the same condition it was when we sent it (that's also a condition on the certed stamp).
@DCrawford9637
I understand why you believe material over $100 should be certed, but let me ask you this: Do you plan to keep or sell the items? What if your $100 item cert comes back with something like "It is a genuine with a vertical crease and thinned at top."
Now, you will have paid minimum $35 for this opinion, and now your $100 stamp will be worth about $30. If you put that cert with that stamp up for sale, you will lose money. At best, you will get $35 for it. It's very hard to break even.
I would suggest a better strategy is: Allow buyers to get items certed that they want to cert. (You need to give minimum 4 months for this, I would suggest 6). I would suggest a more fiscally useful strategy is:
1: Cert when you know you have an authentic item, and you want to get it graded because it has amazing centering. (And be realistic about what that is. Also DO YOUR HOMEWORK! It's not at all difficult to see if a stamp is damaged (and it's damaged even if it doesn't appear to be when you look at it from the front). This includes even small creases at perf corners, thins, tears, chemical alterations, perfs or margins added to stamps. It's fine to say: "This Scott #2 appears unused, but has had a cancel removed. It is sound and genuine in all other respects", in your description, but it is still a USED stamp. Don't try to sell it as unused just because you can't see the cancel removal without a black light or a microscope.
2: Cert when you have ID'd an item that despite not meeting the overall "quality" expectation, it still worth doing. Here's my example. I sat on a Scott #39 for about 5 years while I determined whether to send it for cert or not. The reason being? It was used. (Or appeared to be used). This is one of those unusual items that as a used stamp has much greater value than if its unused. (CV: Without Gum $1,000, With OG $3,000 Unused $15,000). Here was my dellima. If the cancel is fake (and I could see 2 creases and a slight thin in the stamp), and I send it for cert, I'm going to pay 5% of CV to get this stamp certed, or if damaged, $35. Now if it was a fake cancel (of course then the back was clean, no gum), it would really be a damaged 39 that is further fraudulently applied cancel (which was very suspect), and if it came back as fake cancel with all these faults, I would then be lucky to get $100 for it. I wouldn't feel good taking much more for it really. But I spent all this time (off and on) looking at other cancels, and how the 39 has authentic cancels, and then realized something about mine. The cancel was a square grid cancel. 99% of fake cancels on a 39 are enclosed round grids. So, I decided, it was worth the risk and cost to get it certed. 4 months later, it came back as Authentic cancel on a Used 39, with the faults I had already identified. Now I don't have a $15,000 stamp, but I do have one that's worth maybe $1.5k - $3k. And since the stamp was "under market value due to damage", I only paid $35 for the cert. This was a time where the cert, even on a damaged stamp, makes sense.
3: Cert when the market won't buy the item unless its certed, because it's just TOO difficult to identify. No Stamp ID (looking at image of stamps that are forgeries or counterfeits, again if you do your homework, get the right resources, you will ALWAYS be able to identify them. Or post them (like you've don here) to a discussion forum where people can help identify them (but don't rely too much on this, it starts to become a case of lazy philately, and people will stop responding, or you'll get snide remarks made... just word of caution on this point). This is more in items that can be faked easily, and not about forgeries/reprints/counterfeits), rather more about fakes. Coils and coil line pairs for US in particular (I'm sure there is some Argentina equivalent). Then, you get those certed. I recently cent 23 coil line pairs to be expertized (they haven't come back yet), I know at least 2 of them to be faked. I sent them for 2 reasons 1) I want to see how good this expertizer is (haven't used them before) and 2) I want a certed fake so that I can use it to demonstrate to others as a certed fake what they look like. And I didn't want just a single example. I did not tell the expertizing service that two known fakes are in it.
I would urge you to educate about when to expertize and when not. Otherwise, you will spend a lot of money, and be disappointed, and can't recover it. (This Rene, is what I'm barracking for.) Stop giving good cash to services for stuff that has no need to be expertized. I think they are bordering on unethical when doing so... I worked with one expertizer (my mentor) who would look at material and say "this isn't worth certing". He'd charge $5 for the ID (which would take all of about 2 - 3 slow paced seconds), and move on. His clients loved it because they didn't end up paying $35 for a stamp ID that wasn't what they thought it was to begin with. This is something I think the expertizing services SHOULD be doing responsibly. They would get more business then.
1) Insurance(if needed which sad to say, at the moment not so much)
2) Overall value for my knowledge as you described (I dont want to GIVE away all three books if I have no interest, only to never know what I had).
I typically deal in numismatics (primarily for the melt principle;regardless of COIN VALUE, there's always the base metal values at least) and grading coins is much easier, as well as counterfeit identification, so I wasn't sure what I had with stamps.
And I must say, grading stamps is much more difficult, and I am thoroughly impressed with the knowledge base on here, so bravo! I'll keep the pics coming (only of ones I'm struggling with, or I think may be unusual) but be warned....There's 3 books with I'd say about 10k stamps there!
But happy to help.