Rarity Vs. Value

[GB_Amateur]

Although this post is inspired by old coin detecting, in many ways it applies to jewelry, native gold, and relics as well so I'm putting it in the general forum.

Actually there are (at least) two more qualities that enter this topic, so let's define what I mean by each:

1) Rarity is simply an extreme shortage of supply.  In general usage the word covers a wide range but it can be quantified.  (That happens in some areas of collecting, including coin collecting.)

2) Value is another general term but in this discussion it's limited to monetary value.  That is also quantifiable.

3) Aesthetics is the appreciation of something for its (subjective) appeal, typically for beauty.  It's non-quantifiable and reasonably explained by the saying "beauty is in the eye of the beholder."

4) Sentiment applies to things with personal, particularly emotional attachment.

Let's start with a simple example before getting to the more involved part.  Suppose a six year old girl brings home a piece of art made in elementary school.  In the sense that it is one-of-a-kind (the literal meaning of 'unique'), it is quite rare.  It has sentimental worth to a few close family members.  It *might* even have aesthetic worth, but in terms of value, I think it's fair to assign a zero.

Classical art (e.g. paintings and sculptures) can have all of the above, but value is usually associated by works of famous artists, IMO a kind of circular relationship, rife with subjectivity.  Enough of that....

Back up a bit, and now note that all four metal detecting disciplines listed above have examples that fulfill all four categories.  Native gold is guaranteed to exhibit rarity in the fact that no two pieces are alike (snowflake effect?), and all pieces are guaranteed to have (bullion) value.  Jewelry, in particular, can have aesthetic appeal.  A relic can be rare.  All categories have the potential for value.

From here on I'm going to concentrate on collectible coins, which have a conceptually rich landscape with many examples (and shall we say 'counterexamples').  I'm also sticking with something I understand, USA coins although I'm sure there are many parallels in coins from other countries.  Since I've already qualified 'value' with the word 'bullion', let's consider two kinds of value:  collectible and bullion.  These can trade off for some coins.  For example, I recall when a 1937-S was a semi-key date in the Washington Quarter series, with collector value that far exceeded its bullion value.  This was in the early 1960's when bullion value was more/less 'face value' (the denomination stamped on the coin, so now we have a 3rd kind of value).  Then when clad coinage replaced silver and the precious metal prices were disconnected from the dollar, eventually the bullion value of the 1937-S 25 cent piece exceeded the collector value.  Depending upon condition -- more on that below -- this coin has regained its collector premium, at least on the retail market.

Consider the 1909-S VDB Lincoln Cent, the key date of the now > 100 year series.  484,000 were minted.  That sounds like a lot.  Can you imagine having to count that many coins?!  How many are in collections today is difficult to quantify.  Another measure (clearly a lower limit) of that is to check how many have been certified and graded by PCGS.  I added those up and it's a bit over 15,000 (still seemingly a big number?), or just over 3% of those minted.  Guesses as to the total surviving (in human hands as opposed to still in the ground...) are considerably higher by factors of three or more.  I know of two detectorists here (Gerry in Idaho and Utah Rich) who have found this coin detecting, and I'm sure there are other members here who have also.  Clearly it's a great find.

In terms of value, let's just stick with retail value, keeping in mind that on Ebay what a non-specialist can get is maybe half that, plus or minus quite a bit.  Currently the retail price is around $600 for 'Good' condition (realistically the lowest collectible condition) going up to $2500 to $3000 for an MS-64 (one of the better uncirculated grades but not the absolute highest -- 'uncirculated' literally meaning never having been handled for commerce by the public).  Here's the Sheldon Scale which correlates verbal grades with numeric ones.  A great resource for self-estimating grades is Photograde.

Let's take another example (throwing a dart at the Redbook 🙂, 1881 (plain = no mintmark, from the Philadelphia mint) Seated quarter.  Only 12,000 were minted (a factor of 1/40 that of the earlier mentioned key Lincoln).  Right around 200 have been graded by PCGS (a factor of 1/75th that of the '09-S VDB).  Rare?  Maybe not quite, but we're getting there!  Let's just call it "very scarce".  Yet my 2022 Red Book (which shows retail prices for non-certified graded coins) says $200 in good condition (1/3 of the -S VDB cent) up to $850 in MS-63, again about 1/3 of the key Lincoln's price).

So what gives?  Basically it's the law of supply and demand.  The price/value is determined by both.  Rising demand (and/or falling supply) drives up the price.  Falling demand (and/or increased supply) does the opposite.  There are way more Lincoln Cent collectors than Seated Liberty Quarter collectors.  Rarity affects value, but in a controlled way, and the rarity has only a piece of that control.

Certainly aesthetics (e.g. the beauty of early 20th Century nickel, silver, and gold coins), and even sentiment ("I found my first ever silver dollar, a bucket lister") are part of metal detectorists' enjoyment of finds.  And for most old coin finds, that (plus maybe some minor bullion value) is all that we get.  Rare and valuable coins in general aren't easier to find in the ground than they were for collectors searching through bank rolls in days past.  It's not quite equivalent, though, since we get to choose where to look for those valuables, whether coins, jewelry, nuggets, or relics.  Advantage, us!

[F350Platinum]

Thanks for this post, GB.

It further illustrated to me the scarcity of the 1803 draped bust half dime I found recently, with a mintage of only ~38,000.

Thanks also for calling attention to Photograde, I was able to place my example in the bottom two grades 🤣

The hole obviously seals its fate, but I think it the most rare coin I've ever found now. That alone is enough for me.

I know I'm still on the "up" part of the Bell Curve, I hope it lasts a while. 🤔

[GB_Amateur]

14 hours ago, GB_Amateur said:

I know of two detectorists here (Gerry in Idaho and Utah Rich) who have found (the 1909-S VDB Lincoln Cent) detecting, and I'm sure there are other members here who have also.  Clearly it's a great find.

Only a handful of hours before I created this thread, Jeff McLendon added his name to Gerry and Rich's:

 

[Gerry in Idaho]

Very interesting and true read Chuck.  The supply and demand from collectors is what moves the market up and or down. I think since the Wheat Back Cent is collected by so many and many of us started as kids, it still pulls the strings when we see or hear of one being unearthed.  Jeff's addition is a highlight coin find and interestingly, in Denver ("D") he discovers the more rare San Francisco "S" mint.

You speak of rarity finds and your 1st Silver Dollar, but actual value not being that much more than Spot Price silver, which is true to this day.  So many people do not realize the value of 100+ year old Morgan dollar and just assume, it's $100+.  Heck, even to this day, you can walk into most coin shops and buy them for under $30 each and a few for $25 a piece. 

I'll need to find my little article I wrote for Fisher when I found my 09-S VDB as it was at least 15 yrs ago, heck, it could have been 20?

As for the 6 yr old little girl and her piece of art.  My friend..., wife and I never had kiddos (our choice), but that piece of art would be a Picasso to me and it's value "priceless".

As we grow and learn/earn wisdom, our classifications of "rare" can change.  Sometimes the simple little things are more valuable than an 09-S VDB, a silver dollar, or mouthful of gold.

Speaking of silver dollars, in the 90's when I was detecting England with Jimmy Sierra Normandi, one of the local chaps from Boise, would take about 20 silver dollars over to UK and he'd pass them out throughout the trip to different folks of the region who enjoyed his banter.  It could be anyone from the housemaid, bartender, bus driver, the farmer who let us hunt his fields, a chap or two in the local pub, just whoever he thought would cherish them.  You should have seen the expressions on many of their faces and the gratitude they had.  My friend has since passed away but to this day, I realize a piece of art from a child, a dug up Cent or a silver dollar, can make someone's day.

 

 

[EL NINO77]

16 hours ago, GB_Amateur said:

Although this post is inspired by old coin detecting, in many ways it applies to jewelry, native gold, and relics as well so I'm putting it in the general forum.

Actually there are (at least) two more qualities that enter this topic, so let's define what I mean by each:

1) Rarity is simply an extreme shortage of supply.  In general usage the word covers a wide range but it can be quantified.  (That happens in some areas of collecting, including coin collecting.)

2) Value is another general term but in this discussion it's limited to monetary value.  That is also quantifiable.

3) Aesthetics is the appreciation of something for its (subjective) appeal, typically for beauty.  It's non-quantifiable and reasonably explained by the saying "beauty is in the eye of the beholder."

4) Sentiment applies to things with personal, particularly emotional attachment.

 

....I think that the dream and target of every detectorist is to find and detect a coin or object that would include all 4 mentioned properties... Rarity, Value, Aesthetics, and Sentiment...

In my opinion, it's a perfect find.... have I found something like this? maybe yes...

it certainly moved me to achieve other challenging finds in the future.....

However, the practice is that some of the findings can have only 1, 2 or 3 of the 4 listed value attributes...

Every detectorist has his own scale or level of findings that he would like to find, and that is often the case, that another good finding... can move us further... in detection...
 
The value of a coin depends on many factors, and it is often true that the age of the coin itself and the number of mintages do not always determine the relatively greatest value of the object..because marketing around the value of different coins is a special thing and is often subject to various temporal and other changes. and sometimes it is very relative...

  I think that in this hobby...-detection, it's a good thing that you have a chance to find something nice as well as valuable...

  Sometimes it can also be time well spent in good detection..

...

[geof_junk]

Finding something rare is great because you have beaten the odds

[Valens Legacy]

GB, Nice read with some interesting points.

Since I am one of the younger people on here I just wanted to say that since I am fairly new at this I believe that every new find I make is rare. I don't have much time to use my detector, but when I do I know that I will always have a good chance to dig up something much older than me.

I enjoy sluicing or panning for gold over using a detector but don't get me wrong as I love swinging the 800 at some of the sites near me.

I believe that no matter how rare or many there are of coins minted, when one is saved from the ground I could never part ways with them. Grandfather was like that also and his collection was given to me, so they really do mean a lot to me.

To all who finds treasures and relics in the ground or waters, know that they are one rare item that you will never forget.

[Gerry in Idaho]

9 hours ago, Valens Legacy said:

To all who finds treasures and relics in the ground or waters, know that they are one rare item that you will never forget.

I used to think I would never forget the location of certain nuggets, nice gold rings, or old coins.  Boy was I wrong about that assumption.  Maybe it's because I have done so many thousands of hunts, trips and make some incredible finds, but I sure have forgotten some of the locations.  

One way I've learned to help save dates of finds and locations is with my cell phone.  Now I pull it out and take couple pics of the finds so I at least have the date.

Glad you have your Grandad's collection of treasures.  Hopefully he was able to share of history of their locations and such with each.

The value of that collection to you is certainly priceless.