How "devoted" are you to your collection?

A while ago I was imagining what I would do if the following situation would present itself...

Image you are a beginning collector (Minerals, Coins, Stamps,...). You recently acquired a very good piece at a decent/bargain price. Image for this piece you payed 100€ (or dollar/whatever currency that rocks your boat). After carefully cataloging the piece it disappears in your cabinet/album/... for a while. As you gain more knowledge in your field, you bring out the piece to get a good look at it again and decide to exhibit/share photograph/... with the rest of your community. Quickly you learn you got lucky and the piece is way more valuable compared to the price you paid for it.This is confirmed by all the "oohs" and "awwws" coming from the more "advanced" people seeing the piece. One day you are approached by a man you met before in your community and he offers you a great deal of money for the piece (let's say 10-fold the price you paid one year ago, so in this case 1000€/dollar).
Catch is that the piece is your very first piece bought/gift from a deceased family member/got you into collecting/special bond/...

What would you do bearing in mind you are a young collector and could use the money for expanding your collection/start saving for a house/car/...

A/ Blow the guy off. You don't sell anything from your collection, period. (maybe stop sharing your collection with the community, avoiding future situations)
B/ Tell the story behind the specimen and you having a hard time letting it go. If the gentleman wants to come back in a few years...
C/ Same as B only with the hope/play of raising the price further (knowing what yo paid for it). Let the buyer sense you are reluctant to sell.
D/ Be honest and tell him you didn't pay as much and if you would consider to let it go, the price of the piece will be lower
E/ Let the piece go regardless of the price/story attached. Since your philosophy is to share as much as you can with fellow collectors
F/ Name a ridiculously high price (in the example 5000€/dollars or so). Hoping the guy will stop inquiring. (But without thinking what to do if he still accepts the deal)
G/ Take the deal no questions asked.
(other options)

I am curious as to what anyone else would do in a situation like this?

Still thinking about what I would do though...

Best wishes,
Philip

You are probably not going to be able to replace the specimen for a like quality one for the price being offered.

If you have settled into a specialization in collecting for which your specimen doesn't really fit in, it might pay deaccess it.

When I first started non-seriously collecting minerals, I bought several very good quality specimens from various Illinois and Ohio and China sites at very favorable prices. I quickly realized tho, as I matured, is that in order to personally acquire a really top notch collection, I would have to specialize. Colorful copper minerals and pegmatite minerals etc etc and bought stuff from an unending list of places I would never see, much less personally collect in just didn't really tweak my interest. So, living in Indiana and being able to have quarry access and personally collect Indiana geodes, I would specialize in just these. Bottom line is that I sold off most of my first and early acquisitions, both purchased and personally collected. I got considerably more $$ than I paid for them. The first lesson I learned was to buy or collect only the best and you will be rewarded in the end. Some of us have personal attachments to particular specimens, but for me the early ones were not Indiana specimens so there was no strong attachment. If the early ones had been good INDIANA minerals, then who knows................ CHEERS..........BOB



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 05/18/2012 02:31PM by BOB HARMAN.

Do you need the money more than the specimen?

It's not important to give any justification as to why you don't want to sell your specimen to the person interested in buying, a polite "no thanks" will do, but you may want to say that if you do consider selling it, you will give them first refusal on it.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/18/2012 03:35PM by Jolyon Ralph.

I can safely say that as of right now, nothing in my collection is for sale! I have worked long and hard to obtain my specimens, mostly self-collected, so they all hold special sentimental value to me. Plus, when I show my collection to friends and other collectors, I have the added joy of saying "I was at that particular mine on a cold, rainy day in September and collected this myself"; what value can you place on that?

Hello Philip,

First of all, I collect minerals because I enjoy them, and while I want my “money’s worth”, I do not collect as an investment. The Mineralogical Society of Southern California (MSSC) has a motto, “with understanding comes appreciation” and this pretty much defines my philosophy.

As to your question, I have not been “young” for a long time and so will answer your question with personal experiences.
I have on a few occasions received offers for an item in my collection. In one case, I declined to sell but was gratified by the offer as I have a great respect for the person who made it. In another instance, a person made an me offer for a specimen that was many times my cost, and in the process, he became so pushy in his desire to acquire it that he offended me and I don’t think there is any offer he could have made that I would have accepted. Years later, a friend made me an even better offer for the same piece. In this case, it was more of a proposed business deal which didn’t interest me so even though I declined to sell, we remain good friends.

Philip, I have been fortunate in never having had to sell specimens to meet basic needs and as they were acquired because I enjoy them, I am reluctant to part with them..My guess is there are as many answers to your question as there are people in your hypothetical scenario.

Regards, Fred

Note, To preserve the privacy of the persons involved, I have not identified them or the specimens.

Well I certainly do not have the quality or quantity a collection of Indiana geodes or the 40 or so minerals that Bob [Harman] has.
But I value my specimens from all the AMT localities such that I probably could have sold them off and paid off all my debits year's ago. Since my first specimen (AMT #30) a lovely fluorite from Cave-in-Rock purchased when I was a tender 9-year old for 75 cents, now valued over 100$, gives me the comfort that keeping it is wise.
Similarly Bob's Indiana specimens, which I covet majorly (although they were not included as an AMT site, that oversight rests solely upon the shoulders of one Dr Nelson Shaffer) is a wise decision.
Remember many of these minerals are from localities never to be collected again, anyone been to AMT #13( Ladysmith, WI)
Tsumeb anyone?
Ronald

Helo Philip,

A difficult question as I dont know your background.
If you really need the money then sell it of course! There are many other things in life way more important than minerals.

If thats not the case then keep it. I would even say give away everything else and keep this one and try to get more such quality specimen! If you sell it I can almost guarantee that you will regret it. And you will loose interest in this hobby. Talking about my own experience (not with minerals of course but another hobby of mine) !

It probably boils down to sentimentality. There's a few specimens that helped generate my interest in collecting that I wouldn't mind letting go of--in fact I've given some of them to extended family members who've expressed interest. I don't collect minerals to sell them, so my mind isn't on making a buck off them. Of course that would change when I wanted to sell the collection for estate purposes. But that's a way down the road.

John

First of thanks to everyone for their replies. It's been nice reading everyones comments.

To be clear: To this date I haven't sold or needed to sell a single mineral for profit or personal gain. I don't foresee this to be changing in the near future.

I guess the reason why this question (or hypothetical situation/example) came up is the line between buying and selling ethics and in the end what (hopefully extraordinary) circumstances it would take for a collector to part with a cherished collection specimen. And if such need to sell should occur (for whatever reason), how strong the need will be to drive up the price, trying to get out the most of it.

Since I haven't been in such a situation yet, I guess what I really wanted to know how easy it is to cross the line you have set yourself for other dealers/collectors when acquiring new specimens. Tossing those ethics and asking whatever you want for a specimen/piece, just because you can (if the specimen gets sold or not is another matter).

I hope this makes any sense?

Cheers
Philip