Coin Buying
and Selling - Sale in
Internet Auction
You should carefully consider the available options and their advantages and
disadvantages before proceeding.
This method of selling coins is increasing in
popularity rapidly. The leading Internet auction company for collectibles
is eBay (www.ebay.com), although there are
others such as Yahoo that you may also want to consider.
Advantages
 |
Potential for good prices realized without paying large commissions. |
|
Access to a large and growing audience of collectors that use the Internet. |
|
Buyers can rapidly search for items of interest out of millions of items for sale. |
|
"Feedback" mechanism keeps most buyers and sellers honest. |
|
Payment is becoming more secure and convenient thanks to services such as PayPal. |
Disadvantages
|
You must handle all arrangements for payment and shipment of items sold, and be on alert for possible fraud and dishonesty. |
|
Your chances of success are reduced if you don't have the experience and knowledge to properly describe and grade your numismatic items, or if you don't have positive "feedback" from prior transactions. Good photographs or scans are essential! |
|
May not work well or may be too time consuming for large quantities of common items. |
|
You may need to obtain a business license, collect sales taxes, etc. |
Advice
|
Consider building up some positive "feedback" from buying before you try selling. |
|
Limit the number of items you sell on-line, concentrating mostly on interesting, unusual or rare items that may be difficult to sell locally for a good price. |
|
Get help from experienced collectors in describing and grading your coins, or use a third-party grading service for valuable items. You may also want to consider consigning your items to persons who sell online as a business. |
|
Consider using a P.O. Box or Private Mail Box for your business activities. |
