What Deals Have You Scored, Because A Seller Misidentified A Stamp?

Kollectorkurt, if you ever want to double your money, I'll happily give you a dime for that $5 Colombian.

Oh a whole bunch...

On ebay alone: several covers that were poorly described, 3 New York Union Solder's Head cancels on #78s, 2 78cs, probably half a dozen 70bs, 1 70c, 1 70d, etc...

Sometimes you can't blame the dealer because the catalogue did not have any information or the right information in it. Thus, the person knowing the information has an advantage. However, even if it is pointed out to the dealer, some will say, "Who cares? It is not in the stamp catalogue and I didn't pay much for it anyways to resell."

Two come to mind. A 6c large banknote that I and the seller thought to be a 148 - turned out to have a grill, no faults, with XF-SUP centering.

The other was a 1c 1851 imperforate that was supposedly a scott 9 type 4 stamp with large margins all around and no faults. Turned out to be position 4R1L, the only position on the plate 1L to be type 2, scott 7.

Matt

It wasn't misidentified so much as, not identified. I was happy to buy this poor little cover, because I was able to see the stamp is a cracked plate position. Cost was $2.99

I scored a newfie #3 mis-identified as 11a, a considerable difference in CV. MNH for $22.00 CDN. I knew it as soon as I saw it! Just shows, know your paper!

I recently scored two amazing lots.

The first one was a 4 Centavos, First ESCUELAS Series, Eight Printing with a beautiful TOVAR cancellation. I paid $3 for it. I'd happily paid 400$ for it. Maybe more.


The second was a lot of 5 or 6 stamps, including a 2C, First ESCUELAS Series, Ninth Printing AND not one but TWO 5 Centavos, Third Printing. Every one can easily get to anything between $1200 to $1600... Got the lot for $6.

The image was terrible so I wasn't really sure. I was sure about the 2C, so I was fine. I wife thought I was crazy when I got the lot and saw it was the real deal.

Back in the 1990's , I was selling U.S. mixture lots thru a ad in Linn's Stamp News . Sold many mixtures and was happy with the results because I was purchasing Worldwide Mixture lots thru various stamp auction and many of these bulk lots came with U.S. material included .
I received a thank you note from a collector around Seattle ,Washington . who found a U.S. Revenue stamp worth $2500 .

It was a couple of years ago when I purchased this little gem on ebay. The seller wasn't sure what he had and the photo wasn't the best, but I took a chance. I picked it up for the grand price of $4.92. It even came with an article which accurately described it. It is Scott listed and catalogues $400.00.

Here's the two cent stamp, as issued, and the five cent stamp, as issued, for comparison.

Recently, I purchased a France mint SG no. 229 from the "Peace & Commerce" 1876 issue, catalogued at 23 pds. Stamp that arrived was its twin, SG 215 - 1,000 pds. Thought I might advise the dealer but the last time something like this happened, the dealer simply said, "my mistake; you're lucky."

I once purchased a nice US # 275 that turned out to be a #260, and I have picked an uncounted amount of reverse printings of the Overrun Countries issue of 1943-44 from dealers stock. I knew a collector who found 2 U220 entire envelopes at a stamp show back in the late 70's, both were marked as U218's and came from 2 separate dealers. He eventually sold both covers and cleared over $50,000. His motto was "knowledge is power".

I bought a collection of nearly 300 plate number coil strips of 5 several years ago for $600 from a dealer in another state online. The Scott album had an amazing array of valuable PNCs such as the 20¢ Fire Pumper #2 ($575), 5.9¢ Bicycle precancels 5 & 6 ($100 each), 10.9¢ Hansom Cab precancels 3 & 4 ($175 each), but the kicker was a 32¢ Flag Over Porch 89878 die cut 10 x 10 with a bullet hole valued at $2000. They definitely didn't know it was in the collection and probably mistook it for the more common 11 x 10 die cut. I am a firm believer in "knowledge is power".

Loves me some cherries!

This year's big score for me is the following: this is but one page of a Scott BOB and revenue album that also included airmail, officials, and envelopes. The auction lot had many (30 - 40) scans of different pages. Can you spot the mis-ID'd gem?:



I won the lot and paid less than the cat value for this one stamp (which has joined my album) and now I have an entire album of bonus material to do something with

As a US 1851-57 3-cent stamp specialist, I have gotten countless good deals because even dealers with decades of experience in classic US stamps can't distinguish between a #11A ($15) and a #10A ($150).

This beautiful, four-margin, sound #10A was acquired in a large bulk lot of #11/11A with a per-stamp average price of $3.90. There were a total of five #10A in the lot.