mackbrass

I buy the coin not the holder and right now it looks like my morgan dollar sets will be on hold. I have found with many of the morgans I have purchased, the pcgs stabbed ones were nicer so I purchased them. I doubt I will spend money on crossover for so many coins so as of now the progress on completing the sets will slow down to a crawl if I complete them at all.

Someone mentioned a National Registry, i agree, then the best of all grades can be added. Of course, there will have to be a limit as to what slabs will be allowed.

This may be so obvious that it doesn't need to be said, but I think that the first thing that a new collector should purchase is a Red Book.

The books i recommend are the red book as a first then two others, the blue and the book i use most is the red book deluxe edition. The deluxe edition has far more information and details such as varieties, total graded, mintages, background and much more. Its relatively expensive but needed when you start getting serious.

One thing to think about is a safe. So far as my collection has grown, so have my safes as its easy to blow them out as your collection grows. My suggestion is, if you know your in for the long haul then invest in the biggest you can afford and make sure its heavy and does not have wheels. If i could do it again, i would have paid 1000 bucks from the start for a larger two door rifle safe and customized the inside. I probably have spent more than that in the first two i bought. My third safe still has room but i give it another few months. Think about a seperate place to store Govt mint packaging as they will kill you on room. I seperate them and store the OGP' in a seperate area.

Rethink how you store using air tights and clear tubes. Over time these will take up a lot of room. At first they look great but i have had to break down plenty of them and put coins back in their original mint tubes. Now anything i buy stays in the original mint tube or generic round tubes as they take up less room. If i do need air tights i have about a thousand for the future, wasted money for now.

Storing slabs, you can either just stack them as they take the least room this way or buy the NGC plastic holders that will store 20 at a time. I actually have several aluminum storage boxes with clear tops as they are great to see whats inside. The aluminum boxes fit 20, 30 and 50 slabs depending on your needs. Its easy to label the boxes and keep slabs organized. When i bought my first 50 slab holder i never thought i would fill it but they do fill fast.

If your going to study grading, then you will need a good grading lamp and a dark space to work. This is my next purchase, not that i plan on getting into thw business but i would like to max my potential on what i submit.