Coins, Currency, Cards and Collectibles
By Douglas Keefe
This article is about an experience I had a while ago and is a cautionary reminder when someone is selling collectibles or precious metals.
A woman came into my shop with a collection of old baseball cards that were inserted in cigarette packs in the early 1900’s, known to collectors as T-206 tobacco cards. She was interested in having me make an offer to purchase, which we do purchase old baseball, sport and non-sport cards. She asked if she should leave them with me, which surprised me, and I responded no, she should wait as I wouldn’t take long. I went through the cards, they were mounted in pages which made reviewing them easy, and after about 15 minutes I arrived at an amount to offer for purchase. When I made the offer, she accepted and asked when she should come back for the money. I told her I would pay her immediately, no waiting, but her questions about leaving the cards and waiting for payment had me curious.
The story she told afterwards really raised some red flags. She had taken these cards to another dealer before showing them to me, one who claimed to deal in sports cards. When she showed them to that dealer, after a few minutes he asked if he could take them home to study them closely, to which she agreed. Several days later he called and asked if it would be OK to rearrange the cards in the pages to make it easier for him to study them, this to which she again agreed. Finally, he called and said he was ready to make an offer so she should come back to his store. His offer was $650 for all the cards, but he would need to keep them and sell them to pay her, which might take a week. In other words, she wasn’t going to get paid then. She told the dealer she was going to take them to Beachcomber for a second opinion, to which the dealer told her Beachcomber would be cheaper than he was. When she got her cards back, she noticed 3 of them were taken out of her pages and placed in individual holders.
I then understood her questions about leaving the cards with me and wondering when she would get paid. There is so much wrong with how she was treated by that dealer (whom I won’t name), that I can’t help but wonder if she got all her cards back. First and foremost, she should have never agreed to letting this dealer “take them home” to study them. There were a less than one hundred cards, most of which were commons, so studying was not necessary. (I once appraised a collection of over 600 tobacco cards while the owner waited. It took about an hour, but the owner was with me the whole time. That collection cost me $15,000.) Then to ask to rearrange them makes remembering what was there almost impossible. Taking cards out and placing them in other holders was unnecessary and confusing, mainly because only one of the cards was a slightly premium priced card, the other two were common. And if a dealer is so undercapitalized he can’t pay immediately, he shouldn’t be buying.
When Beachcomber reviews a collection, regardless of what it is, we want the owner to stay with us, even if it takes hours, and we never ask for the collection to be left with us. We want the owner to feel comfortable, and if there are any questions on their part, we can answer them immediately. And if our offer is accepted, we pay Immediately.
While there is no way to determine if any cards were taken or switched, the opportunity was there. I paid $2000 for the collection, I guess I wasn’t as cheap as I was accused of being.
Beachcomber Coins and Collectibles has been in business since 1970 and is managed by Douglas Keefe and his wife Linda. Formerly located in the Shore Mall, they are now in their own store just west on the Black Horse Pike in Egg Harbor Township. While they no longer offer retail sales, they still do extensive buying of most collectibles and precious metals. Current information and store hours can be obtained online at beachcombercoinsinc.com.
