Nobody has ever considered selling a car without finding out what a decent asking price would be. Similarly, if the thought of selling your gold coin collection has crossed your mind, then you will have to do some research and figure out its value before you proceed. In the following guide, we will discuss some of the aspects to account for when establishing the value of your collection.

Current price of gold

To find out the value of your gold coin collection, all you need to do is Google the price per ounce of the metal, and you’re bound to uncover last-minute information regarding the commodity’s dollar value. Take note that the overall value of your collection is determined by the individual coinage included, and that each piece is worth at least the value of its weight in gold.

If you inherited or bought the gold coins before the 1970s, when their value began to spike, then you’re probably sitting on a small fortune right now. In case you didn’t know the value of gold has increased 30 times in a single generation.

The weight of the coinage you want to sell

Those familiar with terms used in gold transactions most likely have a clue about the consistency and quality of gold. In addition to current price, the value of your coins is also determined by the metal’s purity – karat – meaning that the closest you are to 100% purity, the higher the value of your coins and collection as a whole. In conclusion, establishing a price for the gold coins entails calculating the actual gold weight, which is the raw weight multiplied by purity.

On a side note, figuring out the weight of the coins is fairly simple and usually can be done with a kitchen scale. Determining the purity on the other hand, implies a bit more research; nonetheless, with patience, you can learn this info from the various online databases of coin values, purities, year, mintmark, and style of the coinage.

Melting value

As a rule of thumb, when you sell the collection, it’s best to trade it for the spot price per troy ounce, which means its current value as a security on the market. In case you happen to have old and/or ancient coins in your collection, then you should know that their real value surpasses that of the melt value. The only time when selling gold coins for their melting value makes sense is when your collection consists of numerous and common coinage.

Blue and Red book price

The Blue and Red Books provide you with a lot of useful information regarding individual coins. While the Red Book helps you figure out the prices and understand whether you’re getting a good deal, the Blue Book focuses more on teaching you the ins and outs of the gold trade market. Both of them are extraordinary resources from which you can find out more about where to sell your gold coins, how much you can get for them, how to calculate insurance premiums and a great deal of additional useful data.