Selling My Collection- Suggestions?

*** Moved by Staff to a more appropriate forum. ***I have a nice France collection in six Yvert albums up to 2010, including a lot of early stuff. I currently have other interests and could use money from selling it. I am getting a lot of refusals in interest from dealers. Anyone who can suggest someone who might be interested? Stamps mostly mint and unhinged after 1960.

Many thanks for any comments.

Possible buyer is Dr. Bob Friedman. 1-800-588-8100

Dr Friedman is a good possibility, I can try to call there today or Monday, I honestly never thought about him at all.

One of Kelleher's collection sale Auctions?

It depends on the value of the collection , Auction firms have both a minimum per item and per customer .

I assume that the dealers contacted and took a pass had reasons that maybe they passed along? Are the earlies and key stamps missing/faulty/poorly centered? Are there short sets? I can't see a dealer passing on a collection that has meaty items such as good airmails or souvenir sheets. If any of these things are true you might be best to, as suggest by PPG, consign it to Kelleher. The downside to that is you won't see any money for a year, give or take. Another thought is a European dealer if there is a lot of face value to make up for singles and sets that cannot be sold on their own.

of the pre 1876 material please

The problem with collections of France is that there are a lot of them around, and most don't have the high value items that make them special - good copies of the 1Fr Ceres, the scarcer republic Napoleons, the 5Fr Napoleon, the 1920s and '30s mini-sheets etc. French dealers will have armfuls of postage, and the cost of shipping to Europe would, in any case, be substantial.

Agreed Geoff. You could pick any country on the planet and the same principles would apply.

Without some pics we're flying blind though.

Yes I have a camera, it takes terrible pictures and I doubt posting them here will resolve this issue.

I called the dealer, he has a recording telling me he not interested unless you are selling rarities, not at all in line with his other ads

Any suggestions welcome Unless you are selling a hot collection, no body is interested. .

Everybody is interested ,if the price is right . I just bought some French .I paid $120.00 for a used 5F Napoleon in very fine condition Catalogs $800.00 for that shade ,it was a different shade than mine . Also purchased a B11 ,that is the 1918 red cross issue. MNH cat's at $250.00 purchased for $60.00 with the commission.

So if dealers are selling to me at 1/5 catalog for very good material you can expect 1/10 for good material. Then the common stuff your going to get 1/15 to 1/20. Cry all you want but I am not paying more than 1/5 for the best stamps only .

Just a note to everybody else , when I talk prices these are Last weeks prices not what someone thinks , it is real prices in real time .

Did you try Mystic Stamp?

Thanks for your post. No I am not expecting much out of this collection, just 10% percentage would be fine. I've already had fun owning it.

There is a dealer in Arizona I buy approvals from who might be interested, I need to email him explaining I am not after big bucks here, just a low percentage.

All the dealers do a lot of fast talk, then it's different when you contact them. I don't blame them but it's sort of unsettling when you approach them just to get a brush off. Mystic stamps runs ads asking you to just call them if you want to sell them some stuff, then they want photos, etc when you do.

Just for your information, as I think postage may be a problem, you might consider this site (Catawiki): https://www.catawiki.com/en/c/187-stamps

You can charge for postage. It will have the correct audience.
They will not accept a reserve unless it is a very special lot.
Even if you can charge the buyer postage, there is a good chance it will not attract bids or go for almost € 0 as postage from the USA may me prohibitive, If so, a maiden bid of € 1 may win someone the lot.

The overarching problem with selling an average single collection is that most if not all dealers can purchase a literal truckload of the same material at auction in one transaction and often with net terms. Because of that there is no incentive to offer anything other than a lowball offer at best. Add to this the overhead that a company like Mystic has (150 employees and a 50,000-sf facility) and it is apparent that they really have no reason to be interested. Dr. Bob is a much smaller enterprise but again they sell collections at 35-50% of catalog and need some more valuable stamps or some other "hook" (mostly MNH; many complete years/sets; etc.) to interest people. If collection sits in inventory for a year paying the seller even 10% is not going to happen because that is cash tied up.

Don't forget the stamp dealer's credo:

Buy Low - Sell High

Sometimes a terrible picture might be better than no picture at all