Best Place To Sell Classic Stamps?

People often tell me to go on ebay sold listings to get a good determination of what people are willing to pay nowadays, but the discrepancy I see between the CV and what is recently sold on ebay (they only let you go back so many days) is huge.
However, the sold prices on usphila.com (which shows various auctions) are much closer to the CV.

Scott#90 pieces shown in usphila are around the $150-$500 mark, but ebay shows auctions closing at $20! And I've compared many of the 1800s pieces and found the same data.
Do you guys have any advice on selling classic stamps and not getting ripped off?

You aren't being "ripped off" by an ebay selling price. Your item has simply attracted a particular bid on a particular day. And it's difficult to compare a selection of material sold on ebay, which will cover the range of condition, to that sold by, say, a high-end auction house with high quality material. And most auction houses here still estimate at around 10-20% of SG catalogue values for most material.

I thought that wording seemed a little strong, and didn't mean to offend anybody using it. But I figured that because there's more potential for counterfeits, it wouldn't be as trustworthy as an auction house that specializes in collectible stamps, coins, etc.
You're certainly not "ripped off" by the buyer. They're just making a bid. But because the space isn't specifically dedicated to stamps (+ the reasons you mentioned above) I was thinking it may be wiser to seek alternative sites according to the rarity of your stamp.

I've been a buyer/seller on ebay for many years, so I didn't mean to offend!
Just curious as to what sites people use on here to sell high-end stamps specifically.

And because of the reasons mentioned above, I certainly don't think checking ebay's limited sold history is a good way to determine a stamp's value.

I'm not offended! I'm not sure what constitutes "high-end" material, but you'd probably need a pretty high CV/potential realisation to make it worth your while consigning an individual stamp to an auction house.

How do you define 'high-end' stamps? Are you talking about a group of stamps or selling single stamps?

I agree with GeoffHa, ebay generally 'finds the market value' since it is the most highly competitive online marketplace (in terms of traffic and number of eyeballs). As I hope you have found out here, stamp condition is paramount. ebay has a large amount of lower quality stamps being sold by less experienced sellers. Mixed in are better sellers who often have better quality material. And of course specialized auction houses typically handle better quality material. This explains the wide diversity in 'sold' prices that you are seeing.

Catalog values and market values are very often different things. I would guess that if you polled the experienced hobbyists and dealers in this community, they would tell you on average market values are usually between 10% and 65% of catalog values. Again and in particular with single stamps being sold, condition is a very large factor.

Inexperienced folks in the hobby are often mislead by catalog values or searching online for values at high-end auction sites. These high values are not typical because they are for stamps which are not common (i.e. extraordinary condition/centering or rarity) and/or in collecting areas which are in higher demand. The majority of stamps do not fit within this definition.

I am unsure what to tell you, you have shown an 11 cent stamp which is a precancel and has a significant stain. This stamp would not be anywhere near a catalog value. But you have also shown the 1901 series and a 5 dollar stamp which appear to be nicely centered and without any condition issues.

I have not yet seen you show anything that would be of interest to a higher end auction firm (as a single stamp).
Don

Aah, I see what you mean. Their cut would definitely be higher yeah?
Then the government has to come in and get their cut too! Haha.
May be best just to make a website and move to Puerto Rico.

Yes Don, it's only for future reference. Nothing I've shown on here is considered high-end, I know that. But when I do get high-end stamps (which I plan on), I want to know what people on here use/trust if they plan on selling one or two, and what they use to determine the value of their stamp since the gap in value is large depending on which site you're looking at.
10-65% is a big gap, so as a collector I want to understand how to stay in the 65% range rather than the 10.

And thank you! That's very informative.

It's all about centering and condition. When looking at stamps on ebay look at those characteristics. I sell on ebay and I will sell the same stamp, but in two different conditions are hugely different prices ranging from a fraction of catalog up to double catalog or even more - all depending on appearance, centering and condition.

For me the key to think about is auction vs. Buy It Now. Auctions sell right away, but unless there is an active market for the stamp on ebay it may sell too cheap. But stamps like say - popular early commemoratives - have lots of demand and will sell at fair price at auction. Selling a stamp with a $2000 catalog value at auction is probably not going to work. Buy It Now will work, but it can take a long time to find the right buyer.

If you aren't an established seller and you have really high end material you are probably better off selling or consigning to a dealer or auction house.

Two differences between ebay and a regular auction firm:

1. The material can be physically examined prior to auction and the firm is more responsive to questions.
2. An issue with an item is more likely better handled by the firms.

As an aside, ebay allows a sold/completed review of 90 days. That is quite good to get a trend for items which sell regularly; less so for things which sell infrequently. Such is also true with auction firms when considering items infrequently sold. Lastly, for true high value items, the catalog value is spot on in comparison with the last prior sale; of course that may have little connection with when the item next sells. Plus one needs to understand items or categories go in and out of vogue with the selling/buying prices varying accordingly. Want a Hindenburg crash cover? Now is a good time to buy. Want certain animal topicals? Now may not be the time to buy Burundi, Scott# 589-601 or 589a-601a as even Scott Catalog suggests there is speculation affecting the market prices of the issues. The mint 589-600 cats at about $187.00 with the 601 adding another $1100.00; used and the WWF overprinted sets, mint and used, are only a little less.

The ebay market is not retail, it is a mix of retail and wholesale and much of a firm's sales are wholesale as well, especially the bulk and collection lots. To understand if a sale is retail or wholesale at a firm, one needs to understand if an end collector or a dealer made the purchase.

Catalog value numbers are just numbers. As you have demonstrated, numbers can be manipulated. For example an 8 could have easily been a 3 but that makes a 50 farther away. Likewise if buyer are only willing to pay 20% of a published value, then dealers (retailers) only pay the wholesale price which may be 4% depending on the dealer's required markup to stay in business. Thus the "correct, non-ripoff pricing" depends if one is buying or selling as well as who is buying or selling. and is not always the same. Which reminds me of a story:

A customer want oranges but complains to the owner that the oranges he has are $1.00/pound while the owner down the street, she has her oranges priced at $0.10 per pound. He replies, we price our oranges at 10 cents pound too, when we don't have any.

Is that informative, Stephen-P?

I just paid 5-1/2 times catalogue value for this stamp.

I was high bidder at 2x catalogue value until the very end.

Someone came along and bid me up at the end.

I don't know if Siegel could have gotten more out of it or not.

This is not my scan. This is the ebay photo.

Most of the time, I pay less than what I think something is worth. Sometimes more.

I would have rather gotten this stamp at $37, where it stayed for most of the week.

Stan Shepp