Interesting Ebay Auction For Ww Collection

I was watching this auction and wondered what other folks thought?

http://www.ebay.com/itm/38121197837...RK:MEBIDX:IT

There is an earlier thread regarding this dealer's offerings of large Worldwide and US collections probably the last few weeks. I don't know if you've checked out their other listings but they actually do an amazing job of providing photos, especially single stamps. Front view, back view, backlit views of the front and back and a view after being dipped in fluid. Quite alot of time spent putting the postings together, have to give them credit for the detailed photos.

I confess I scrolled through quickly but I did not see Canada, France, GB or USA. Now I could be wrong in missing them - but if they are not included it says the collection has been cherry picked. Regardless - because I am not made of money I would never spend that much on an on-line purchase. I'd want to see it.

Nice collection and one I'd like to have. I'd have been the high bidder if they would have accepted $1 a week for 6600 weeks. I'm not familiar enough with the stamps in the collection to know their value, however.

Re:


Agreed, light years better than nystamps. I have to scratch my head on how the arrange their listings sometimes, though. I remember a recent auction they had for a Germany collection. As is usual for one of their auctions of a large collection, there were many, many (and many more) pictures. The first couple hundred or so pictures they had of this particular collection were of mostly common DDR stamps on cover. After scrolling and scrolling and scrolling (and scrolling some more) there were countless more photos of classic German area stamps with a total CV that had to be several thousand dollars. I would have loved to have it, but I figured the price would go way out of my budget. I checked on it later after it closed and I think it went for around a couple hundred bucks. My guess is that a lot of prospective buyers never bothered to scroll past the endless wallpaper issues on cover. If that was one that was consigned to them, the consigner should have been livid.

Agreed, the listings for collections end up having a "Let's just dump the two thousand images in". Maybe show the highlights first (and nothing else) to grab instant interest in the lot. As you say, 20 - 30 images of commons and one's eyes glaze over. I can only image consigners, who in this case may be family members who inherited a collection and not know what they are really worth, seeing it listed as $500,000 and then it sells for only $1,236. Hope they didn't put a down payment on a house expecting a big payday...

NY Stamps - On the one hand, there's no "Post Office Fresh!", "Pristine!", "Quite possibly the greatest stamp ever!" hyperbole but come on, can't you afford a simple flatbed scanner? Are they using the first smartphone that was equipped with a camera? Probably on purpose, blurry, dark pictures hide more.

exactly , they blur some on purpose

Not to divert the thread further, but the lack of high-res pictures has to backfire on nystamps in a lot of cases. For example, classic German States are rife with forgeries, most of which require a clear, closeup picture or a good scan in order to weed out fakes. In a lot of cases I won't bid more than what I would pay for a known forgery, i.e. $5 or $10 at the most. I can't be the only one who thinks like that and their auction realizations for that type of material often shows it. I do applaud noblespirit for their generous use of closeups. Though I do chuckle sometimes when the auction is for an album full of basically nothing but common stamps (of course described as "stunning" or "exciting") and they really zero in and do super-closeups of $2 and $3 CV stamps.

The sales price for this auction was quite a bit higher than I would have bid. I looked at the pictures and thought it might be worth $2500-3000 at most. Of course this was not taking into account the stated catalog value of $125,000. I don't like to bid on auctions where an estimated catalog value is part of the description because I think sometimes people bid a % of catalog without regard to the stamps shown or consideration that estimated catalog can be inflated by a handful of German and Italian States stamps that are questionable at best.

As to their picture practice I agree, good pictures but I've often thought the many close ups of common US 3c commemoratives might mislead the less informed into thinking these stamps were worth more than 3c..

This seller does an amazing job with his pictures, and his trick of backlighting some stamps is brillant and out to be taught to every seller and compulsory for stamps over a specific value.

According to the article I linked to below, they employ 18 photographers.

http://www.concordmonitor.com/commu...y-powerhouse

When I posted the question my intention was not to be critical of Noblespirit, in fact I give them a lot of credit for having the gumption to sell a very nice collection on ebay without reserve.

I have a theory that good collections, say $2000 and up will sell for more money on ebay than they will in an auction house. I often see auction houses describe an expensive collection in a paragraph and estimate it's value at $6000 with no pictures. If you can't travel to see it all you have to bid on is faith in the auction house's estimate and I think this drastically limits the pool of bidders.

On the other hand single stamps and covers that are pictured in auction house catalogs usually beat the ebay price by a large margin.

Just my opinion.

Ken

Check out lot 3490, up for live auction in about 2 weeks.

http://www.rumseyauctions.com/aucti...apter/60/228

The quality of their images may be good, but as others have pointed out, they don't do a good job of presenting their images.

"On the other hand single stamps and covers that are pictured in auction house catalogs usually beat the ebay price by a large margin."

I only have my one example, but that's not always true.

Last year, I found out the hard way. I consigned a cover with Regency which sold at auction at the APS show. I made about half of what I could get on ebay if I had only relisted it.

I don't feel that most advanced philatelists who are seeking rare and exotic material shop on ebay. They shop at private auctions where they will pay high prices, a buyer's commission and (normally) high S/H. But in their minds they are buying a solid product from a "trusted seller." Comments anyone?

Depends what you call rare and exotic. I do buy higher cataloging (CV $100+) on ebay simply because I find better bargains for those items on ebay than through dealers. I do agree that buying from a reputable dealer is probably a better guarantee of quality, if that's a major concern. But in my case, for those high-cat items, I simply have to be willing to make some sacrifices if I'm ever to own a copy of them at all. No, I don't buy really ugly or really beat up stamps at any price, but I will settle for less than perfect in most cases, as long as the stamp looks nice in my album.

Edited to add that there are certain high-cat items in areas that I collect that I won't buy on ebay, simply because there are too many forgeries that are too good to try and figure them out myself. For those items I figure I'll have to bite the bullet and get a certified copy and/or buy from a long-time, reputable dealer. But by and large, for items where there aren't known forgeries or I can tell the difference with my reference materials, I don't have a problem buying just about anything within my budget range on ebay.

Truly rare and exotic items - those you just can't find or that are very expensive (retail of $1000's) - almost always have to be purchased at a public auction because that's they only place you can find them. Even if I had the budget for these types of items and they were available there, I probably wouldn't buy them on ebay, or would at least insist on a grace period for certification, etc.