Building Our Stamp Collection

How do we go about building a fairly complete stamp collection ? Most of us are not like the worlds greatest stamp collectors of yesteryear to whom money was not an issue..if we are young and have a seemingly infinite amount of time..its good to be patient..almost everything comes on the market in time...while I love stamp collecting ..stamps are not a major budget item..i may purchase one prize item and say thats my yearly gift to myself...most of us do not go to extremes or overboard on spending..perhaps I should only speak for myself....my wife just caught a buy it now on ebay and won luxembourg 318-320 mnh 2008 catalog $475.00 for $99.00..Merry Christmas !!

A good question and one that I can say I have a lot of patience with. My USA collection was started when I was 12 and it has taken 30 years to complete the years between 1928 and 1970. Well lets say about 90% for both the MNH and used.

The over all cost has been pretty low and the fun has been finding the used ones by trading, buying kilos and searching attics.

I do have a cap that I am willing to spend so filling the classics up to 1928 has been tempered with what I am willing to spend for a stamp.

I accept damage stamps to fill the more expensive ones. This trade off lets me get position of stamps that fall outside my cap.

I trade as much as I can with hopes of filling the used stamps below 1928 and above 1970. I buy as many low priced lots of used as I can and Phil has added stamps to those holes with his great deals.

It has been a interesting and amazing journey to fill the empty spaces. You never know when you will find the bargain of the century along this trip.

MKfarm I will take a good trading partner anytime over a stamp show..collectors rarely have the same tastes..David Giles and Bobgggg are just a couple of the longer term swap partners I have had over the last 30 years..we kind of know what the others are looking for and look out for them...

Though I am considered a "rookie" in the collecting world I have learned a couple of lessons along the way.

The first being what looks like a good deal may not always be. When I first started bidding on ebay I was pretty lucky in winning some large lots of world wide stamps. I did however end up with some lots that had a good many duplicates of the same stamps (I'm talking a couple hundred of each) so for about $9.00 I only had 20 stamps in the end. Needless to say I read descriptions a lot more carefully these days. The one good thing about this is I ended up with some good trading material.

The second thing I've learned is that you can get great stamps by trading and buying spares from fellow collectors on forums like this as well as make great freinds along the way.

I'm to the point now that I need to sort and organize what I have and start buying stamps to fill holes.

Dianne

Phil & Bobgggg are two of the three top traders I have. My buddy, Bob Walsh, in Minot, NDak. and I have been trading for over twenty years! All of us knows what each other collects and we trade accordingly.

I'm glad Phil collects modern Canada. I can always send a copy of The Canadian Philatelist or Canadian Stamp News. He likes to read, as do I, and there is then enough mass to the packet to warrent puting on a new Canada Post souvenir sheet. This alone keeps Phil in the style of used recent Canada to which he is accustomed.

I send Bobggg all the recent German, and all the weird stuff I come across.

David

Wierd stuff and the Bob of many g's go together well.

Anyone, who collects stamps with holes in them, is wierd

Touche!

OttawaMike... Have you finished that box of perfins, that Meostamps gave you
at the Mega Show, a year ago ?

No - they're in my "rainy day" pile.

(And it was one year ago!)

Thats what I said...a year ago...The power of the edit function.