@femmefan1946 wrote:
I agree.
A local dealer has a reputation in the hobby community.
If he is smart he will deal fairly, because word will get around.
Where I live there are several active stamp clubs and new members are quickly warned to stay away from the local stamp shops, who have built a horrible reputation over the years.
The club members will refer newbies to the quarterly shows where out of town and vestpocket dealers gather instead.
On the other hand, in our previous city, the stamp stores had stellar reputations (we were one of them, btw) and got referrals from clubs and collectors across Canada.
The roadshow guys are looking for widows and orphans. They buy estate collections cheap and often resell to auction houses and other dealers at a decent profit.
Best advice for collectors : if there is substantial value in your collection have a written appraisal done by a dealer who is a member of one or more of the national hobby groups. Keep the signed, dated, on letterhead appraisal with your will. You may also want to indicate which dealer or auction house you believe will give your heirs the best deal on the collection.
A fellow Canadian here. So true what you say about the roadshow guys looking for widows and orphans. When I visited one of those type of events. I live in a small community north of Toronto, Ontario and they come up from the city regularly, because our locality is a veritable goldmine for treasures people don't realize they possess. I didn't take my best items to that show, just things that were purely melt value. I had done substantial research, which still does not make me any kind of expert. Just enough knowledge so they couldn't rip me off. The guys I dealt with figured out quickly that I would not be an easy target.
I paid attention to what was going on at the other tables, and how they were 'fluffing' around (to put it nicely) with some of the other visitors. At one point they were so full of it to one particularly naive couple, that I casually walked over and 'innocently' butted it, using my eyes and facial expressions to convey to the couple that they needed to walk away asap. They had jewelry and coins. Jewelry I know a thing or two about, and that's what the dealer was targetting. The dealers hurried me out of the building after that, but I met the couple in the parking lot and directed them to a reputable jeweller who could help them.
I've been in touch with a few reputable auction houses and dealers, but everyone seems to complain that the bottom has dropped out of the market, and the true collectors are few and far between...thus rock bottom values. I think the big, new shiny thing is the amazing and unique coin sets the Canadian Mint is churning out with great success. I watch TSC whenever the Coin Show is on because S. Bromberg always has a wealth of knowledge on the resale side. From the fact that they have brisk sales tells me that people are definitely still interested in collecting, old and new money.
