Barbuda Stamp Values

I have noticed that Scott values for Barbuda stamps from about 1985 and on are exceptionally high compared with similar face values of earlier stamps. Is this because there was a change in the value of the currency or a dramatic reduction in the number of stamps issued or some other reason?

IMO Barbuda stamps are overvalued by Scott as there is little demand for them.

BILLRESH ----- I call it "Fun and Games " and you would know it as PRICE MANIPULATION . Dealers and most likely the Crown Agents are part of the scam .

A few select dealers and somebody higher up like a Barbuda Postal Manager or his agent is controlling who gets what,

Try contacting the Post Office in Barbuda and tell them you want to buy stamps at face value ,I bet they will tell you to take a hike .They only sell to their friends who are the dealers who make the price for Scott's Catalog .

Hi Bill,
agree, prices are extraordinary.
Pure speculation, I would suggest sales would have been low for modern stuff,
collectors abandoning the discipline.
ebay offerings for later material are high also.

I found that similar to my major discipline Turkiye
I had to stop around 2009, prices for modern material were outrageous.
I collect for fun, not to go into debt.

Barbuda no longer issues its own stamps but is combined with Antigua so there is no longer a price inflation as there was in the late 1980s. The Antigua stamps of the late1980s have a Scott value around 20% of the same overprinted "Barbuda" stamps. I suspect they just put the overprint on very few stamps to, as you say, give the locals high value for low face value. I can't find anywhere a list of the number issued of Barbuda versus identical Antigua stamps.

I had one Barbuda set I tried to sell on ebay and I priced it at a lower % than I normally would and it literally took years to sell.

The low demand may be due to the fact that Scott does not include Barbuda pages in its yearly supplements (although Minkus does). It could also be due to the unreasonably high price of some of the issues which makes it very expensive to complete the country.