How to buy gold coins on ebay
The value of Gold continues to rise. A lot of investors are looking for ways to invest and one of the easiest and cheapest ways of buying Gold coins is via eBay. You can find thousands of Gold coins for sale on eBay at any one time (see
below).
You need to know how you can buy a gold coin for a fair price without being cheated. This short guide and the tools on this site will hopefully make this process easier.
Intrinsic value versus collectability value
Gold coins have intrinsic value rather then just value based on their collectibility
or rarity. This can give these coins significantly more value. However If you are a novice collector you should purchase a gold coin for its gold value before collecting
them for their numismatic or rarity value. There are two reasons for
this. Understanding
the numismatic value of a coin involves knowledge of numismatics
and expertise that may go beyond your current level. You will therefore
be taking a greater risk purchasing something this expensive. Secondly estimating its
value will be subjective, probably more so during times of crisis when your gold
investments are so important.
Professional Coin Grading Services
A way to avoid buying fake gold coins is to buy only professionally graded or "slabbed" coins. Those are coins in plastic capsules (slabs) that have been graded and authenticated by such services as PCGS or NGC or some others. They usually cost a bit more than not slabbed ones, but they guarantee authentication and that's worth it
If you are a novice stay away from less reputable coin grading services and use the following graders listed below:
NGC
ICG
PCGS
ANACS
It helps when buying and selling coins for them to be in good condition (not cleaned or modified in any way). For a novice, I realize, it is difficult to determine via pictures alone if the coin was cleaned or not.
Which denomination should I purchase?
The denomination of the coin can alter the price significantly. As a rough guide
most 20th Centry US $20 gold coins will cost you over $1,000 each, $10 gold coins
about half that, $5 Gold coins $300 or so and $2.5 roughly half that. It is a good idea to start slow and select some $5 Gold coins to bid on first. But if your goal is to invest in Gold, try to move on to the $10 and $20 coins soon since the $5's and $2.5's are more difficult to get good deals on.
How Do I Know If The Asking Price Is Reasonable?
Before you bid you need to have a reasonable idea of what the price of Gold is.
kitco.com provides a historic graph for the price of gold.
Use PCGS to find out the collectable value for
the coin you want to bid on. PCGS has an online price guide for all US Gold coins.
Scroll down and under the Gold Coins category, select the correct denomination and date range link. PCGS lists the current pricing for coins they have graded, which means they may be on the higher side, but the list is a good starting point for figuring out how much to bid.
This is where you make or lose money on your investment. Once you find a coin that looks in good condition use websites mentioned above. Determine if the current auction price is a good value. Ideally you don't want to pay more than 30% or so above the Gold value of the coin. At the time of writing this it is $1140/ounce; a $5 pre-1933 US Gold coin would be $285). Thus, a $5 pre-1933 US Gold coin with a premium of 30% would run around $370
Here are a few approved or verified sellers on ebay right now.
You are viewing page 1 of 831