Newb with slabbed penny

[aangelcg]

Hi everyone. I picked up some slabbed pennies for a great price. After a little research I discovered the grading company INB was a joke, however these coins were never graded just slabbed. They look like they are in great condition but maybe they've been cleaned. Would something like this be worth submitting or should I just leave them as is?

[aangelcg]

Sorry, here is a picture of the back. Judging by the amount of material accumulated on the back causes me to suspect it may have been cleaned somehow. I know this guy was very crooked in some of the things he did on ebay, but normally it was just over grading.

[JKK]

Your instincts are good. It does look cleaned, mostly because the surface color looks so unnatural (especially on the obverse). 1902 is a very common date and I doubt that would grade higher than G even if it were not so very roughly cleaned, which means you'd be spending $20ish on a coin that is worth in the area of $1. The black crud on the back is not so much the problem; the problem is that there is a way that a heavily worn IHP should look in its natural state (typically a rich chocolate brown when well worn), and this one has the dingy orange color of cleaned copper. For an interesting education, you might aim some magnification at it and see whether the cleaning is abrasive (look for a lot of tiny scratches, either circular or side to side).

The only slabs I recognize are NGC, PCGS, and ANACS. Anything else, I mentally treat as raw.

[Mohawk]

Agreed with everything stated by JKK.  A cleaned, G-4 1902 Indian Cent wouldn't be worth grading and you'd definitely be taking a loss if you did so.  It'd be a losing proposition even with an uncleaned G-4 1902 Indian Cent.  And as far as slabs go, NGC, ANACS and PCGS will keep you out of trouble with U.S. Coins.  Avoid all others and you'll be good to go.

~Tom