How do you know what a variety is worth?

[sumdunce]

Hello.

I have just been notified by John Wexler that the five 1944 DDO Lincoln cents that I submitted for attribution are new varieties (five of the same variety though). How is the value of any variety determined?

Thanks.



Sumdunce
P.S. Here is a link to another forum's discussion if you would like to see some pictures: http://forums.collectors.com/messageview.cfm?catid=26&threadid=361910

[coppercoins]

There are a few different things that go into the value of a newly discovered die variety, but suffice to say most of it involves experience and comparing the die to other known dies. There is no specific formula.

I have seen the images of the die you sent to Wexler. I have known about that particular die for over 5 years, I found some of them in a BU roll back in 1999 and promptly lost them never to be found again...that's why they aren't listed on this site. Live and learn.

Anyhow, I would give them a value of around $30 in Ch-GEM state and work my way down from there for the lower grades, to a value of about $5 in F-VF. I would base these values on another 1944 die and a 1951 die that have rather similar appearance and assumed rarity based on the numbers I have seen come out.

As soon as one of these sells I would adjust the values accordingly. Could be that they are worth $40 or more in GEM, but I doubt any more than that at present.

I hope this helps..

[sumdunce]

That helps quite a bit, thank you. All five coins are appear MS63 or better (one may make MS66), however ANACS will make the final call on their grade. My thought was they might be worth $5 to $10 so I am happy to know I was wrong on the conservative side for a change. I am most excited about being the first to successfully bring this new variety forward.

Do you remember the source of the ones you found? I got these about 4 to 5 years ago too. I did not think much of them and put them away. If not for some house cleaning in my collection late last year I may have missed my opportunity to get the "discovery" credit.

[coppercoins]

Mine came in a roll group I bought from a local dealer here in Missouri. I believe I found four of them in the BU roll.

[sumdunce]

If I remember correctly I got mine from a dealer in Ohio. I had placed a bid on an auction (not the auction I had intended to bid on) and had won the bid on the roll. When I later went through them for a high grade one to send to PCGS the best coin just happened to be one of the five. As I was looking the coin over for contact marks that I might have missed I noticed the doubling on the last T in TRUST. At the time I did not know how to get coins attributed and they did not match any known varieties, so I pulled them, placed them in 2X2s and dropped them in my misc. error coin box. They had been sitting in my misc. error box until late last year when I read some details on how to get a coin attributed.