Mystic Stamp Company

Try to sell what you have. If you don't have $$$$ to keep it up it's a waste of your time and your grandchildren's.

I take exception to that comment. Stamp collecting is NOT a waste of time! You cannot look at it solely from monetary gain ... if you do, you will certainly be disappointed.

But stamp collecting provides much more than monetary profit, it profits the individual to look into history and culture and biographies of people one may not have otherwise heard of. It provides a wealth of knowledge that I still put to use today.

I posted this awhile ago, but it seems appropriate here:

Start small and see if the young ones shows any interest or you may end up with disappointed faces all round.!

Some of the comments are way too general for the initial question of tearose. I can give examples of stamps issued in the past 10 years, in fact from the past 2 years from the USA that one could have made a profit on. The real answer is knowledge. The more you learn about stamps the more potential profit down the road. Unless you are very knowledgeable about stamps, don't get in to it to make money.
Most of the new issues are not potentially profitable. But they are fun and will teach about history, geography, art and so many other subjects.
I have been collecting since 1960's and the early money I spent with the idea of a profit fizzled out. But I learned a lot and purchases I made later have made many times the investment because I bought quality, scarce stamps.
So enjoy stamp collecting. No matter what happens you have something tangible, unlike a stock certificate from a bankrupt company.

As you can tell from the responses, folks are trying to keep your expectations realistic. This hobby, like coin collecting, is perhaps too often associated with stories of financial gain while other meaningful attributes such as education and simple intrinsic value can be overlooked. Independent from the investment value is liquidity (since demand has traditionally been high for collectable stamps, liquidity followed).

And as others have suggested regarding the investment level of a collection, the future liquidity may also decline due to the 'greying' of the stamp collector demographic. It should be noted that both the emerging China middle class market and finding a way to engage new collectors have the potential to reverse this trend. In my opinion the Chinese market will have a large positive impact to future stamp values although the jury is still out as to which parts of philately will be helped and which parts will be hurt (in terms of value). I am much less sure if philately will be able to figure out how to capture the hearts and minds of the younger Western youth.

So in terms of future monetary investment, my opinion is that any decent stamp collection will have value and be fairly easy to sell. Being able to profit is possible but takes a large investment of time and work, this is not a hobby in which you can simply buy at full retail price, sit on the collection, and expect to sell it for a profit 2-3 decades later. So when people mention retail companies like Mystic folks will respond with caution since they epitomize retail cost.

Tearose,

Ask 10 people for an opinion on one subject and you'll get 10 different answers. The catalog value of my collection is, more than a thousand and less than a million. I don't know and I don't care. I collect for the enjoyment of the hobby, the opportunity to share with others and to study and learn. My children don't care about stamps nor do my grandchildren and that's just fine. I'm not collecting for them but for me. My 1st suggestion is to check out the APS, it's a good place to start and has some sound advice about making a collection, there are a lot of business that will gladly sell you stamps. Unfortunately, there is no reliable rating system for them. My 2nd suggestion is to find a dealer you can trust and work through them. Perhaps a specific dealer your late husband dealt with. Good luck with your collection. http://stamps.org/services

Art

Like Art & wt1 before him so eloquently stated it's not about the money, but rather all the fun, friends and all the wonderful history gained through the hobby. If I was you I would see what you have and see if it's something you or perhaps your Grandchildren would be interested in continuing.

There are plenty of opinions already but I'll add mine. Blanket statements such as "its not about the money", "stamps are a hobby not an investment", or "stamps are a good investment" are not terribly helpful unless qualified as an opinion. Of course they are opinions, but they are often stated as though they are fact. Like Art, the catalog value (CV) of my collection is more than a thousand and less than a million, however, I know pretty closely what that value is and I DO care. Because I care about value doesn't mean I don't also enjoy the hobby. Contrary to common opinion, I CAN do two things at once.

To whit: there is nothing wrong with enjoying a hobby and and the same time being careful about the price you pay for the collectibles. If this is how you collect, Mystic is not where you want to purchase your stamps. A corollary to this is that CV is not investment value, regardless of catalog publisher (e.g., Mystic, SG, Scott). For a true estimate of investment value, i.e., what you can expect to sell you stamps for, you need to do some work and examine the marketplace for recent sales of stamps of similar quality.

You also need to take into account the work you will need to expend to sell your collectible investment. Mystic and other similar dealers must mark up the cost of the stamps to cover overhead expenses, which include the effort to purchase collections from collectors, break them down, and present and market them. Buy from them and you are paying for their work, which is okay because you saved yourself some work in the process. But when you sell your collection, if you sell to a dealer, they will expect a discount to what you might expect, because of the effort required to prepare it for sale. If you sell it yourself, piecemeal, you will get a better price most likely, but you have spent your time (which is worth something).

(edited to correct typos)

Back when I first inherited my fathers collection, I considered selling it. I contacted Apfelbaum and a couple of other that said I should just donate it to their favorite charity and let the charity know they sent me. MALARKEY!
I looked into selling them myself and started to study the stamps, to put them together, to grade them, to identify them, etc. All those things that a seller needs to know about his stamps in order to sell them. the more I learned the more I became enthusiastically involved. I dont think a day goes by that I dont get something stamp related.

On towards today: My collection is vastly larger. I have my own postmark permit, and I still haven't sold more than a dozen stamps.

I see that mystic has a couple sets in their ads from time to time and get those.

As has been said here many times and will be said repeatedly until the end of time; It's a hobby, not an investment. It's my hobby.
You may be surprised; by starting to collect stamp with a young one that you may become an avid collector like so many here, and will eventually hand down something to that youngster that they cant put down, and continue to learn and grow in this endeavor.

Thats basically what happened to me. I helped my grandmother with her stamp collection long before I understood there was something more than postage there.

This has absolutely nothing to do with Mystic Stamp Company, but I posted on another thread a comment about the Overrun Countries Series of US Stamps and that several of the patriotic cacheted covers shown were from the cachetmaker Walter Poppinger of Akron, Ohio. In the process of identifying them, I also learned that Mr. Poppinger's daughter died in recent years (2012, I believe) at the age of 99 and it was noted in her obituary that she was an avid stamp collector right up into her 90s. Just a perfect example of how a parent (or grandparent) can hand down the hobby to their children (or grandchildren). It does happen!

"I can give examples of stamps issued in the past 10 years, in fact from the past 2 years from the USA that one could have made a profit on"

Stampcat - I know this is off subject, but other than the imperf press sheets that sold out, do tell which recent US issue that one could have made a profit on.

you're right - in the past 2 years imperf press sheets. There are many other examples of modern USA that have done very well though. some examples are 3432, 3448, 3449, 3467, 3461a, 3461b, 3461c; 3616, 3462-5,3502,3523,3683a,3786, 4074, 4263, BK299, 3894b, 3830D, BK282, BK282A, BK282C, BK282D, 3619e, 3619f. I am sure there are others as well. By the way, all listed here are within the last 10 years.

No dealer is going to even offer you face value for 3523 or 3502 or 3448 or 3449 or 3467 or 3616 (unless you have PB's of the latter two) and none of those were issued withing the last 10 years.

eyeonwall -
your comment asked me which stamps in the last 10 years were profitable. There are more ways to make a profit than just selling to a stamp dealer. I stand by what I said. My original point was that there ARE new issues that one can make a profit from. I also note you didn't comment on most of the stamps I listed in my comment. Your only valid comment was that a couple stamps were 11 years ago and not 10.

ok, lets look at some of the others - the 3461a, 3461b, 3461c, 3830D, BK282, BK282A, BK282C, BK282D, 3619e, 3619f are all varieties that weren't in every post office - you had to go out and hunt them down. Even if we take your entire list, it is a very tiny % of the stamps that were issued.