What Do You Consider Rare?(In Your Stamp Termonology)

If there is 100 of them left ,or if rare to you. No dictionary info in your own words.

Rarity is not the same as cost. There are quite a number of stamps that are quite expensive, but can be purchased easily with ready money.

There are a number of stamps that even if you were to offer full catalog value or more, would be a challenge to acquire. That is rare.

Rare to me is anything I cannot afford!

The reason why I put this out to the SCF family .it's because many people view things differently when a U.S merchant considers something common ,someone else in the world looks and views it differently ,it may mean it's new to their eyes. it amazing to know that 10 yrs from now that your 20c stamp would have evolved into a rarity do to the fact of active it's fewer and the demands is greater or there is just no one to buy them , I always wondered about the years of a stamp being over a 100yrs old carry's a value of 99c ,yes it has still increase ,so what do you do next?

After going through a whole massive lot of used Canadian stamps, a whole readable postmark seemed to be quite rare to me at the moment. It's not easy. Same can be said of modern U.S. stamps. The only forever stamps I've seen with a handstamped CDS SON are some of those on the covers I've sent from my post office. To me rare is the elusive.

Thank you for your input and feedback ,you have carved your way into the history books or even better as a stamp legend, the world is your audience , if I want to know then they want to know also.

I think this definition is related to the dictionary one... but it has got to be related to demand. I have got several completely unique stamps... but unless somebody else knows about them or wants them they may be "scarce" but are not "rare". Something that has rarity must be difficult to find... EVEN if one has lavish funds available. If it's available on ebay or other auction sites regularly, then it is NOT rare... no matter what the price being asked. Something "rare" would be that holy grail that you search and search for years and perhaps never find... or perhaps you get lucky.

oh! yes the holy grail, remarkable insight of being a rare find indeed.

With many ebay sellers rare is anything that you can no longer get at the post office.

IMHO, it is about the ability to manipulate the supply and demand ratio through monetary stimulation. In all collectable there are some items where the demand vastly exceeds the supply. If a significant increase in the buy offer prices brings the supply very close to demand then the item is scarce, if this same action does not bring the supply close to demand then it is rare.

There's scarcity, and then there is demand.

Zeppelins and dollar-value Columbians and Trans-Missippi stamps are NOT rare. You can find them every day of the week at any stamp bourse in the country... it is demand that props them up.

Conversely, I have quite a few items in my collection that number less than 10 known to exist, but only cost in the hundreds of dollars, because the demand is not as high. Revenue stamps are not sought by as many collectors, so the prices do not escalate as quickly.

Even within the revenue field, there are items, such as the large and small persian rugs, which catalog $8,250 and $16,000 respectively, yet many are offered on the market every year... but some of the bisects and double impressions I have only come on the market once every several years or so, catalog $1,000 or less (sometimes much less).

It's all about demand.

Rare doesn't mean valuable, and expensive doesn't mean rare.

Rare to me is the one value I need to complete a set. It's amazing how it's usually a middle value of the set that proves elusive!

That's why feedback is so very important in this stock market it is very vital to have this response to inform readers and merchants alike of the importance of stamp stock.

Dan brought up "scarcity" and I'm glad he did.

The way I understand it is, rare equates more with demand, and means not enough to go around-- I would suggest that a $5 Columbian IS rare, and valuable, but not scarce.

Scarce, the way I understand it, you can't even find it, or it's seldom offered for sale. So scarce means "rare" on steroids. Valuable and scarce would be US 613, 482A. Can't go to a large national stamp show and find one, and rarely offered in auction.

And as he mentioned, neither must have a correlation to value.

As for scarce-- another good example would be the collector who is trying to build a calendar of cancels on one stamp, but can't find the stamp with a December 25 cancel on it, or a February 29th cancel. Might be a cheap stamp, but those dates would be really scarce, and not necessarily worth a fortune.

For the revenues, many of the stamps out there are highly undervalued-- at APS last year I tried to find a few not high-priced "dated reds" documentaries. No matter what dealer I went to, they weren't there. Also on the 1st Issue Revs, it's getting difficult to find some of the cheaper silk papers-- lots of demand, and they sell quickly.

Great topic, btw....thanks, Ray

Feb. 29th is much tougher than Dec 25 or Jan 1, depending on the revenue issue one is using for the calendar. There were only 2 leap years for the first issue, and none for the battleships. There are always some people working on Christmas and New Year's however, usually because of religious differences or having a different set of social customs.

No doubt another example of differences in transPacific English usage, but I'd define 'rare' simply as rarer than 'scarce'.

There were 400 printed of this Barwani State 2 Anna stamp:



It is scarce. Demand exceeds supply: this pair sold at auction at more than full current Gibbons catalogue value.

There are perhaps three copies known of this Jammu & Kashmir stamp:



It is rare. Goodness knows how far over catalogue it would go if I was willing to sell it.

My own private definitions of 'scarce' and 'rare' though are: If I have it, and the other bloke doesn't, it's rare. If the other block has it, and I don't, it's just scarce.

I suggest that this thread should be transferred to the "Main" area as, having nothing to do with cinderellas, can lead to confusion. Thank you.