element47.5
Well-known member
- Joined
- May 10, 2012
- Messages
- 295
I go hot & cold on buying sterling on ebay as a means of acquiring silver. I am buying it strictly for bullion value and place no esthetic/collector value on it, although I am a little less interested in buying crumpled up jewelry and busted up candlestick bases. I am most happy buying solid forks and spoons, especially if I have bought that brand/style before, because over the years I have developed a pretty large database of brands and their weights. I've been doing this since silver was $11-$12.
I can't buy a thing over there now. Any sterling auction gets bid up to (per my calcs) 115% of bullion value, with plenty of bids 50 cents and $1 under the winning bid, so the bidding is competitive and thick. I suppose if one was buying flatware as flatware, in other words, as a replacement business, this would be fine. But for bulllion, there is nothing goofier than overpaying for scrap sterling. Especially if you have to spend hours and hours searching for underpriced aucs and auto-snipe them. It is a "shunned" form, it is not convenient to deal with. I am happy to buy it under market, but there's no point whatsoever in overpaying for it as a means to acquire bullion.
So you say, "well, then be a seller". Feh. After about 12% in total fees and the costs of jiffy bags and gas to the post office, it's a wash.
I can't buy a thing over there now. Any sterling auction gets bid up to (per my calcs) 115% of bullion value, with plenty of bids 50 cents and $1 under the winning bid, so the bidding is competitive and thick. I suppose if one was buying flatware as flatware, in other words, as a replacement business, this would be fine. But for bulllion, there is nothing goofier than overpaying for scrap sterling. Especially if you have to spend hours and hours searching for underpriced aucs and auto-snipe them. It is a "shunned" form, it is not convenient to deal with. I am happy to buy it under market, but there's no point whatsoever in overpaying for it as a means to acquire bullion.
So you say, "well, then be a seller". Feh. After about 12% in total fees and the costs of jiffy bags and gas to the post office, it's a wash.
