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First purchase from Heritage!

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Today has been an awesome day! It started with an email notifying me that one of my most recent manuscripts had been accepted for publication in its current form. This was super exciting because it meant that I only needed to double check the typeset proofs sent by the editor and sign the contract before it could be published. Plus, it is always nice to know that my colleagues find enough value in my line of research to justify the publication of my findings.

Although that alone would have been plenty to be excited about, another little treat came soon after I got home. My first purchase from Heritage came in! Up to this point most of my purchases were from online stores and eBay. This was my first attempt to purchase anything from a large auction house. I found a few coins that I liked and placed bids that would allow me to stay within my budget, but this was the coin I wanted the most and I bid accordingly. The live bidding portion of the auction unfortunately occurred when my wife and I were making the 3-hour drive back home through an area with virtually no cell service, so I was unable to check the live updates. I was anxious to see how I did on the 5 or so coins I bid on. We finally made it back home and I looked over the auction results. I had lost 5 auctions, but somehow managed to win the coin I really wanted. I needed a proof restrike halfpenny for my SOHO collection and I figured I might as well pick up an odd one to fill the spot. This one is odd enough and fit within my budget!

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Congratulations on being published, and especially on the coin auction win! :) We've just gotten to know Heritage in the past 9 months. Not only is it fun to "win" coins there, the site has such a wealth of knowledge (a couple decades worth) to glean about the prices that folks have paid for coins you're interested in -- so you can really get good ideas about how much you might have to pay to obtain the coin, not only through Heritage auctions but other places you could purchase as well.

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I would recommend Great Collections, Ian is an extremely fair man and his fees are the lowest both ways anywhere...the material in high end had increased dramatically....that is a sign of a growing average coin base and anytime I have a question they will get to you soon...in all my experience they are the best and have been for many years....well, there was Stacks years ago...but....no comment.....peace 

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Nice!  I love the Heritage archives and watch them regularly.  Knowing nothing about the series of coin you just posted (and a scant knowledge of errors), how do they know it is the obverse that is rotated and not the reverse?  Is there an edge lettering on that coin?  Just curious.  My few rotated coins I've never even thought about it--just orient the coin so the obverse is correct and line up the reverse in relation.

I also like Great Collections as well, fabulous service.  They also seem to be getting some higher end stuff on the US side for sure.  I don't look at them often though as there is not a useful archive and I find their basic world coin search function and organization difficult, plus a lack of my core material.  (Please note it's been at least 4 months since I last checked them out so grain of salt here). 

I saw them at Baltimore and gave a little gentle feedback.  If they could get their sorting/searching interface more useful it would be great.  That said I've bought/sold from them numerous times...kept it to modern bullionesque type material and was reasonably satisfied with results (selling) and their customer service was top notch.  They are always improving too (so who knows, my complaints about searching might be off...in fact I'll go check them out later today just to see).

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A banner day for sure, I have personally never bought anything from a firm like Heritage, seems like I would be competing with too many heavyweights and my collection budget is more featherweight.  (:

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Thanks for the positive responses! Heritage has quickly become one of my go-to places to do research on past auction prices. They really do have an impressive archive. It also helps put into perspective how rare certain pieces are in relation to others. Peck is a great resource, but I have realized that certain pieces he has marked as “scarce” are actually much harder to come by than pieces marked “extremely rare”.  Of course, there are a lot of factors to consider, but it is nice to have such a well-documented and easily searchable archive at my disposal.

5 hours ago, Star City Homer said:

Nice!  I love the Heritage archives and watch them regularly.  Knowing nothing about the series of coin you just posted (and a scant knowledge of errors), how do they know it is the obverse that is rotated and not the reverse?  Is there an edge lettering on that coin?  Just curious.  My few rotated coins I've never even thought about it--just orient the coin so the obverse is correct and line up the reverse in relation.

Great question! I am honestly not sure. I usually do not collect errors so I do not know how they would determine that. I am sure some of the more knowledgeable people like Conder101 will be able to provide an answer (I wish there was a way to tag people in posts so it would bring their attention to it). I see where you were going with the edge lettering, but this coin has a plain edge. This may be something I can research a bit further.

I have an account with Great Collections, and I check it regularly. I have heard so many great things about them from both the buying and the selling perspective. I am eager to give them a try, but they usually do not have the type of material that I am looking for. If I still collected US coins, I would likely purchase quite a bit from them as they have a decent selection.

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