Why Is This US 701 Going For $1999.99??

Came across this auction (http://www.ebay.com/itm/momen-US-St...m2c4323349a) while looking for a 701. 2 grand??? he must be kidding. There is a nearly as nice one going for 18 bucks!

Dave.

Welcome to the new realm of overpriced graded stamps. Another thread went into alot about the same issues with a different stamp. Boils down to there must be buyers wanting this graded 98+++++ material and paying. List for $2k offers 90% discount sells for $200 still wayyyy ahead.

SMQ lists 701 NH SUP-98 at $550 which I feel is outragous but trying to sell for almost 4 times that is insane.

Remember, that ebay listing is merely suggesting a "Buy It Now Price". This same approach is used for any number of items on ebay (not just stamps).

As stated earlier, someone who may really be interested in paying a premium for the item could easily offer a fraction of that "Buy It Now" price and still win it at a much lower cost.

It comes down to do you want the item bad enough to "Buy It Now" and not go through the auction process which allows it to go to the highest bidder.

As for the stamp in question, I could be a millionaire and not have any interest in purchasing that particular stamp, superb or not. I have copies that may not be as "superb" but still more than adequate for my collection. The stamp isn't particularly rare, either.

BTW, a MNH Scott 701 in "superb" condition is currently listed in the 2011 Scott Specialized at $475. Not sure if the quoted value by Russ suggesting that SMQ is now valuing it at $550 may be a later reference, or is that is the value now referenced in the 2012 catalog, in which case the stamp has appreciated about 16% in a year. However, it would need to appreciate at that rate for the next 20 years to come close to a 320% increase in value, which is what the ebay seller is asking for the item.

SMQ must have been started by some investment collectors over at PSE that dumped tons of money into their collections and after the initial market crash of the 1980's & again in the 1990's must be trying to generate a way to recoup their investments. The pricing for that piece is beyond ridiculous and just plain absurd. I won't get into the seller as I used to have a big beef with their pricing but I recently made an offer to them which they accepted and I was satisfied with the purchase and overall service.

Mustafa Momen is what you would call a "market maker" in that rather than simply obeying existing catalog values as gospel, he pushes the envelope in an attempt to establish new pricing levels, especially at the high end of quality. He's not the first and won't be the last (Jay Parrino comes to mind).

His prices are crazy high, but some of the material he carries (not all of it) justifies pricing beyond the norm. While Eric, Richard, Stanley, and other national dealers I've worked with are "aggressive" in their pricing, Momen is at an even higher level.

That said, I have bought from him in the past, although not recently. He will normally discount 20% down... which in most cases is STILL very high for the merchandise in question.

NOTE: Momen is completely different from Langs, who is the dealer discussed in the other thread. Langs is a scammer trying to get over by misdescribing material. Momen truly is confident in his material and is almost exclusively high-end; he is NOT overpricing for the sole purpose of hoping to attract suckers into making lowball offers that are still twice what the material is worth. He firmly believes (right or wrong) that high quality should go for high prices. He will not discount below 80% of the Buy price.

Now regarding the piece in question: no way in Hell. The bubble on high-grade common 20th century material burst quite a while ago; only a few dealers are still trying to push ultrahigh premiums for them (e.g., Steve Crippe @ gradedstamps.com). The problem, in my opinion, with paying 10x, 100x, or 1000x Scott for modern material just because somebody decided to call it a 98J or 100J, is that with the mountain of this material that has been packed away over the years, the population levels at those grades could increase at any time, thus reducing your "investment" by an order of magnitude. It's a false market.

High-grade 19th-century and/or specialized/esoteric material is a different matter...