What would be the best information you can give to new collectors?

[justhavinfun]

I would say to start out and buy a Whitman Red Book and read..... read and read some more
before buying a coin.

What would you recommend?

[walmann]

Reading yes. The weakness of the Redbook is the price guide. Often times that is the only thing a new collector will look at, the price/value.

The biggest pitfalls of the hobby which discourage so many collectors and cause them to leave the hobby is what they need to be educated the most about.

Doctored coins, altered, counterfeits, cleaned and grossly overgraded coins burn so many whether buying them online or from brick and mortar location.

Scott Traver's The Coin Collectors Survial Manual, PCGS's Guide to Coin Grading and Countefeit Detection are good starters.

There are a number of others. Sometimes some individual/past issues of various monthly coin magazines are great eye openers for new collectors. In this month's issue of COINage there is an article on fakes being sold on Ebay.

Try keeping the new guy from getting burnt or at worse only slightly singed is more likely to make the hobby more enjoyable for them increasing the likelihood they will stay in the hobby.

It also is helpful to reduce the number of buyers for fakes and doctored coins. The less business they do the fewer of them there will be.

[regandon]

The best thing to do is to study up on the series of coins you want to collect. Also join the ANA, you can find many books on US coins that you can buy through the ANA. Going to a few of their classes will help you gain the needed knowledge you will need. I still to this day after 30yrs of collecting 17th to 20th century Austrian and German coins,..learn new things on the coins I collect.

[FilthyBroke]

Buy a Red Book, inform yourself, and collect how and what YOU want to collect.


P.S.  - As a new collector, information is your friend.  Even for the seasoned collector, there is always room to learn.

[leeg]

This is advice that Mark Feld passes on to Collectors:

 Here is my list of collector tips that I have posted on a few coin forums and which appears on my website:



Following, in no particular order of subject matter or importance, are my unsolicited comments and advice about coin collecting for collectors - please feel free to contact me at any time if you'd like to discuss any of these topics.

1. Buy/collect what YOU like. But keep in mind that when it comes time to sell, not everyone else will necessarily like what you did/do.

2. Examine as many coins as you can which have been certified/graded by the most highly respected grading companies. This can be done at coin shows and in auctions and is a great way to improve upon your grading skills.

3. The best way to improve your grading ability is to find someone who is highly qualified AND willing to spend time reviewing coins with you. That person can be a dealer or collector, but he needs to be more than just a friend - he needs to be a teacher. Many individuals are "qualified" OR "willing to spend the time", but few are BOTH.

4. Don't keep buying coins without ever selling any of them - learn what it's like to try to sell, too. Once in a while you should offer one or two of your coins back to the dealers you acquired them from. See how they deal with that type of situation and whether they want to re-acquire those "gems" they sold to you.

5. Don't be afraid or embarrassed to ask lots of questions. You and just about everyone else can learn a great deal that way.

6. Be aware of privacy and security concerns. It might not be fun to do so, but it's extremely important.

7. It's always good to get a second opinion. Doing so doesn't make you less knowledgeable, worthy or confident - it simply makes good sense.

8. Don't try to get bargains at the expense of quality and desirability for the coins you're buying, or you'll likely end up with sub-par coins which aren't bargains, anyway.

9. Generally, I advise against "investing" in coins. Even if you are very well informed, based upon buy/sell spreads and other factors, the odds are against your success. That said, I understand that many collectors end up spending significant sums of money on their collections and can't/shouldn't ignore the financial implications.

10. If you are going to "invest", I'd suggest diversification - not putting too much of your money into one coin or one coin type. I'd also recommend staying away from especially esoteric and/or illiquid and/or currently "hot" items.

11. While it is not a pleasant mindset to engage in, think about and plan for how your coins should be disposed of if/when something happens to you. Make your spouse and/or family and/or friends and/or an attorney aware of your wishes. If you have a particular dealer or coin/auction company that should be contacted, have that information recorded, along with costs, sources, purchase dates, etc., of your coins.

12. Eye-appeal is hard to ignore, but technical quality shouldn't be over-looked/compromised.

13. If you participate in auctions, whether over the Internet or in person, set your price/bidding limits in advance and stick to them. Auction fever hits many bidders, and almost always to their detriment.

14. Find time for other activities that don't have anything to do with coin collecting. Don't make coins your whole life - life is too short for that.

15. If you are going to stretch to buy a coin, do it for a coin which is truly special and/or virtually irreplaceable, not on an ordinary one. There are far more of the latter than of the former, and there will almost always be other opportunities.

16. Don't talk yourself into buying a coin. If something about it bothers you now, there is an excellent chance it will bother you as much or more later.

17. Don't be lulled or suckered into a false/unrealistic sense of security by the strength of many areas of the market that we have experienced for several years now. There are good markets, and, while some current participants might not have experienced them yet, there are bad markets too - I promise.

18. Do not buy rare coins on a sight-unseen basis, regardless of the seller or the images.

19. Enjoy our hobby.

20. I repeat, enjoy our hobby.

[mmarotta]

"Buy the book before you buy the coin." -- Aaron Feldman.

If that is the First Rule, then it rests on a Zeroeth Rule:
Be patient.

It is better to regret the purchase you did not make, than to regret the purchase you did make.  Few coins are so rare that they do not come around several times in several decades.  In this area of the hobby, US Coins, the so-called "King of Coins" the 1804 Dollars have appeared at auction several times in the last ten years.

On the other hand, collectors prevent themselves from being able to afford the nicer coins -- more valuable; more lasting; lovely to look at; compelling to hold -- because they squander their money on junk for instant gratification.

I venture that most collectors could buy coins as much as ten times costlier than they do now because they do not save money and read before they buy. 

The Red Book is fine, but as noted, it is more than price guide.  It is in truth a literature guide.  The Red Book has Bibliographies in the major sections.  Those are the books that the Red Book is based on and they tell the astute collector which coins are truly worth the price.

If you think you have a passion for Seated Quarters, go to the ANS Library website at www.numismatics.org and enter "Seated Quarter*" in the Library search engine.  You will find the articles and books that define and explain the series.

You can run the same kind of search (less sophisticated) at ANA Library website  (http://207.67.203.79/A94000staff/opac/index.asp).   If you are an ANA member, these books can be borrowed for the costs of shipping and insurance.  For a nominal fee, the ANA library will photocopy articles for you.  The cost is a great investment against a purchase you will later regret when you have learned more.

Patience: Read first; spend later.

[Rigos_Place]

I would say to start out and buy a Whitman Red Book and read..... read and read some more
before buying a coin.

What would you recommend?

Just what I was going to say. I started with a red book my self. Another advise would be never to clean your coins and handle them with care. And if you get into toned coins. Read, study, and learn 50 times more before you buy the coin.