What Would You Offer: Early Mexican Stamps

This seller has a buy it now price equal to the catalog value (OR BEST OFFER). How much would you offer? I need five of the 10 offered. Those 5 have a cat. value of about $300.

Any thoughts?
Thanks.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/vsamex1898a...em3f2c6b900f

I don't know this seller. Do you trust him to make the right i.d. on these? e.g., 284 vs. 248? Seller admits to heavy hinge remnants, and heavy hinge remnants hide a multitude of sins, as well as watermarks. He appears to have a liberal return policy, so I might risk it.

Personally, I cut the catalogue in half, and then look again to see if I'm still interested, and adjust from there (up or down...usually down).

I typed in the percentage of CV I would offer, but I deleted it. Only you can know how long you've looked and how much you want them. I would point out that a number of 10c singletons are out there right now at the usual suspects, and a few of them look fairly nice, BIN priced at 25-35% of CV. (I glanced. I didn't look closely.)

I see from his feedback that a high percentage of buyers buy through offers, but a surprising number pay the starting price. Interesting.

Let us know what you do, after it shakes out?

Thanks, Cjd ... I am not particularly thrilled with the (non) descriptions he is giving .. the whole thing is a bit out of my meager price range. I am slightly tempted, though, I think for those stamps I would rather see them in person. I don't understand his abbreviations and how am I supposed to know which one matches which stamp.

Will let you know.
Thanks.

I take the limited description to say that there are four unused, which will have disturbed gum and/or heavy hinge remnants, and the rest are used and will have heavy hinge remnants and/or paper adhesions. The 5c isn't a big part of the CV, but it is creased pretty badly.

At first, I thought the 4c might be deep orange, but after enlarging the image, I don't think so.

He appears to break up collections, so I wonder if he relies on the prior owners to have done their homework, or if he studiously rechecks their work. As you know, this is a set that can be pretty easily augmented with earlier material, at a severe hit to CV.

I'd offer $60-65, and if he took it, I'd feel good, and if he didn't, I'd feel just as good. I'd still be ruthless in evaluating it when I received it, though.

At the asking price I would have expected more photos and better descriptions of the condition of the individual stamps.

If it were me, I'd ask the seller to provide me with scans of the backs of the stamps before determiing whether or not to make an offer.