Some friends and I were talking the other day about gold coins, specifically gold coin prices, and what constitutes a fair price. One of my friends’ husbands has been thinking about starting to get serious about collecting coins – he’s always collected, but not seriously – and was talking with her about starting to buy gold coins for his collection. So my friend went online, looked at gold coin prices and was stunned at how much some gold coins cost.
This whole conversation got me started thinking: how would one go about determining fair gold coin prices and what’s involved in making that determination? I went to a website called Coin Week (www.coinweek.com) and started reading about gold coins; I honestly had no idea that there were so many types of gold coins, from ancient to modern, from all over the world. And these coins are sought by collectors, so these gold coin prices are determined based on numerous factors, such as rarity, condition, how much a collector wants them to round out their collection, and so forth. In other words, collectable gold coin prices are based more on the amount that someone wants to pay for the coin rather than the actual worth of the gold in the coin.
With the other types of gold coins available, those which are more geared toward people looking for investment opportunities, those gold coin prices are – generally speaking – based on the amount of gold in the coin, especially when we’re talking about bullion gold coin prices.
The United States Mint (www.usmint.gov) makes both gold bullion coins and collectable gold coins. The Mint’s gold coin prices vary depending on which type of coin one wishes to purchase. You can read about the gold coin prices from the Mint here: catalog.usmint.gov/wcsstore/ConsumerDirect/images/catalog/en_US/GoldCoinGrid.pdf. When you’re buying coins produced by the U.S. Mint, there are varying “grades” of gold coins, including proof coins and uncirculated coins; these gold coin prices vary, too.
So how does one go about deciding on what makes for fair gold coin prices? It seems to me that one first must decide why they want to buy gold coins – to add to or start a collection or for investment purchases – and then to do lots and lots of research. There are some great, legitimate websites for those interested in coin collecting, such as My Coin Collecting (www.mycoincollecting.com) and Coin Collecting News (www.coincollectingnews.org) when you want to see what fair gold coin prices are. But if one is looking into gold coin prices for investment, the best place to start is with the U.S. Mint.
This whole conversation got me started thinking: how would one go about determining fair gold coin prices and what’s involved in making that determination? I went to a website called Coin Week (www.coinweek.com) and started reading about gold coins; I honestly had no idea that there were so many types of gold coins, from ancient to modern, from all over the world. And these coins are sought by collectors, so these gold coin prices are determined based on numerous factors, such as rarity, condition, how much a collector wants them to round out their collection, and so forth. In other words, collectable gold coin prices are based more on the amount that someone wants to pay for the coin rather than the actual worth of the gold in the coin.
With the other types of gold coins available, those which are more geared toward people looking for investment opportunities, those gold coin prices are – generally speaking – based on the amount of gold in the coin, especially when we’re talking about bullion gold coin prices.
The United States Mint (www.usmint.gov) makes both gold bullion coins and collectable gold coins. The Mint’s gold coin prices vary depending on which type of coin one wishes to purchase. You can read about the gold coin prices from the Mint here: catalog.usmint.gov/wcsstore/ConsumerDirect/images/catalog/en_US/GoldCoinGrid.pdf. When you’re buying coins produced by the U.S. Mint, there are varying “grades” of gold coins, including proof coins and uncirculated coins; these gold coin prices vary, too.
So how does one go about deciding on what makes for fair gold coin prices? It seems to me that one first must decide why they want to buy gold coins – to add to or start a collection or for investment purchases – and then to do lots and lots of research. There are some great, legitimate websites for those interested in coin collecting, such as My Coin Collecting (www.mycoincollecting.com) and Coin Collecting News (www.coincollectingnews.org) when you want to see what fair gold coin prices are. But if one is looking into gold coin prices for investment, the best place to start is with the U.S. Mint.
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