Buying Silver From Ebay

Hi there....


I just recently got into silver collecting ( And found this GREAT forum ) So I thought I would make myself known with a question

I usually get my bullion from one of either TWO places...


Provident Metals or APMEX.


I hear a LOT of people also get bullion from Ebay @ cheaper costs sometimes.

So my question is this....


Does anyone have any tips are GOOD/REPUTABLE vendors on ebay for which actually sell legitimate silver bullion???


Also..what are some GREAT tips for purchasing bullion from Ebay??


Thank You!

xoxo

I too only use reputable online dealers or LCS, and have never used Ebay (seems like too much of a risk to me).

Sorry I couldn't offer up any input here, but welcome to the forum!

Unobtanium said:

I too only use reputable online dealers or LCS, and have never used Ebay (seems like too much of a risk to me).

Sorry I couldn't offer up any input here, but welcome to the forum!

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Thank you!!!!! Its just that I see deals all over ebay...for like (10)-1oz bars for $350 + Shipping.....Was just wondering if that was too good to be true....or was it all just silver plated brass from china!

Mr_BimmerLV said:

Thank you!!!!! Its just that I see deals all over ebay...for like (10)-1oz bars for $350 + Shipping.....Was just wondering if that was too good to be true....or was it all just silver plated brass from china!

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Silver bars are usually less than a dollar over ounce. At current prices, 10 one ounce bars should be ~300 dollars. $350 seems high.

For what it's worth, the ONLY bullion I've ever bought (or ever would buy) through E-Bay is 90% silver coins. One dealer there that I have found to be very reputable is WholesaleCoinsAndMore. I've bought quite a few pounds of silver dimes from them; excellent service and quality at a fair price.

Another good place to buy 90% silver coins is BigCoins.com. They sell all types in face value increments of one dollar.

When purchasing PM's on eBay you have to be very careful. I would make sure that the seller has at least a 99% positive feedback rating and at least a few hundred ratings, and make sure you read some of the feedback left for the seller to make sure they are getting the feedback as a seller or a buyer. Also make sure to fully read the description and understand the jargon, things that say clad and 100 mills or plated are not solid silver. IMO you are usually paying a premium if you are buying on eBay and could get a better deal elsewhere, but if you look hard enough you can find sometimes find a good deal.

I have found that e-bay is always far more expensive than the LCS or a reputable on-line dealer (APMEX, Provident, Scottsdale)...

The seller on e-bay needs to cover the percentage that e-bay and paypal take from the sale, plus make a premium on their sale.

I would be very wary of any PM item that sells below spot+10% or more on e-bay.

I have given up on buying 90% and sterling on e-bay, as well. If you calculate out the % pure silver and multiply by spot price, it always turns out to be a heavy premium. And, don't forget shipping!

FWIW... In my experience... etc.,

ADK

I know I am new here, but I think I made a mistake buying on ebay. Long story short I decided to purchase a few Silver Eagles. I got them for a better deal than most , but I think I could have saved a few dollars purchasing them from a vendor online. The vendors I bought from hand hundreds if not thousands of positive feedback, and were over 99% postiive. You live, you learn though. Just do a little research.

Hellos to both Bimmer and 69mach351, welcome to the forum. :wave:

I have bought both 90% silver and Silver Eagles via eBay in the past. I had money in a PayPal account that I wanted to spend without transferring it to my bank and at the time I only knew of eBay or Scottsdale Silver as accepting PayPal for payment.

I must have had very good luck, because I never had any problems - even buying from sellers who had very little feedback. Only once did I receive a coin a couple of weeks after it was supposed to arrive, but the packaging showed a postmark indicating it had been shipped in the proper time window, so it was the post office's fault.

A lot of people claim to get great deals buying 90% on eBay, but I suspect they are buying it by weight and not paying attention to the difference between ounces and troy ounces (see here for more info). I always found the auction prices when I bought to be pretty comparable to what I would have been charged at an LCS or to have the same coin delivered to my door from an online retailer. The only advantage for me in buying from people over eBay was the ability to buy 90% and Silver Eagles using my PayPal account.

So far so good on my purchases. I actually received a handful of shipments within 3 days or so. By the time you factor in shipping with an online retailer, I am sure that it probably works out the same, especially when buying in small quantities. I just wanted to pick up a few silver eagles with some leftover paypal money that was just sitting there.

I bought from sgsenterprise (who has A LOT of silver eagles up for auction) and it was a very fast and smooth transaction.

GL and thanks for the welcome!

I have to agree that in order to win e-bay auctions, you'll pretty much always end up over-paying. I bid on two 1 oz silver buffalo rounds. I set my max bid at about $1.50 less than APMEX's price. I got out-bid and the "winner" ended up over-paying by about 5 bucks.

Goldmart and provident seem to have good prices as well. Not quite cheap enough to buy and re-sell on eBay though.

To add to what white&yellow999 wrote, for buying on eBay in general:

If you have a question about an item, go to another of the seller's listings and ask the question from there. This will add a bit of work for the seller, if they want to add your question and their answer to the item description page. Maybe other interested buyers will not bother to ask a question, instead just continuing to look for a similar item that already has the question answered in the item description.

If you see an item that you want listed in auction format, send the seller a message asking if they will accept $x to end the auction early and sell the item to you. All they can do is say no. If that doesn’t work, use a sniping service such as Bidball.com to bid for you. It’ll bid in the last few seconds, helping to save you $ and avoid shill bidding.

Use ebuyersedge.com to set up saved eBay searches for items you want. You’d get an e-mail whenever a match is listed. You can use the price, category, exclude word, etc. filters to narrow down the results that you get in the e-mails. Excellent for “Buy It Now”s priced right.

EBay also has the saved search function, but they will send out at most one e-mail per day. The item(s) may be long gone by the time you get the notification e-mail.

Maybe not applicable for precious metals (although "bullion" may be easy to mistype) but if the item that you’re looking for is difficult to spell, try a misspelling search site like Typojoe.com to find some deals with items that have main keywords misspelled in the title. Other interested buyers may never see them.

Ello newbies and welcome

seems like several new faces in a short time
any connections ?

rblong2us said:

Ello newbies and welcome

seems like several new faces in a short time
any connections ?

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None here. Just found it on google searching for precious metals forums.

Of course I buy from ebay.

Shipping is 12.95 to over $28 via online dealers. If I buy a franlin half- why would I pay $12.95 to ship it? I can get it on ebay for close to the ship cost alone.

I stick with 90%, and eagles. If I buy 1 eagle- once again- why do I want to pay $12.95 and up to ship it?

There are no local coin stores here. When there are- there will be 6% sales tax.

Each month I add a few oz to my stack. Once I plowed my wealth into a stack- I do not churn. I stack what I can forget that I own.

I implore you- not to churn. To buy physical in hand.

I track my stack on a computer program- the goal is to grow it each month. I do not like miners. I also never sell. Some guys here had to cash some out- churning is not good.

Seriously- how much mad money do you have? Because to each buy a dime on a dealer is 12.95 ship.

Once you wealth is IN silver- there is no reason to churn.

I agree that you wouldn't want to pay big shipping on one coin... but what if you added up all of the costs for shipping 5 or 6 coins via e-bay? It's got to be close to $12.95 at that point.

Shipping from Scottsdale, where I buy a lot of silver, is only $6.95 USPS Insured for 10 oz. chunks. That's pretty reasonable.

It all depends on how you are building your stack and what you can swing for investment cash. I can't fault *anyone* for building a coin at a time if that's what you can swing. That's exactly how I started when I barely had the cash to do that!

I would just encourage anyone buying to weigh out all of the factors... spend your time. Shipping vs. premium vs. chance to get scammed (e-bay) vs. your cash on-hand, etc.

ADK

I buy, sometimes, from a guy named Paul Sims in Va. Numismatic dealer, but he sells bullion, almost at spot. 5.00 flat shipping, no matter how much you buy.

Jay said:

I buy, sometimes, from a guy named Paul Sims in Va. Numismatic dealer, but he sells bullion, almost at spot. 5.00 flat shipping, no matter how much you buy.

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$5.00 flat shipping? There must be a limit to that. What if you bought a monster box?

I'm not sure $5 would get you insurance on anything much more than a few hundred bucks...

:shrug:

ADK

ADK said:

I'm not sure $5 would get you insurance on anything much more than a few hundred bucks...

:shrug:

ADK

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I am sure most peopl ebuy small quantities though, which means he could ship for $2-$3. He probably makes money overall.

when silver was cheap- it was easier for buy a roll.

At todays prices I might buy a roll of dimes. 3 ish oz- and often the ship is free.

I don't like buying from Ebay. My reasons stem from the trust that I feel I need to have with the seller, which is difficult enough with established dealers, but to deal with random strangers is something I don't think I will do for any othger than ounce or less transactions.

If I am face-to-face at a flea market or something, I will do bigger stuff. For instance, in 2005 I bought a sterling silver platter, pitcher, coffee caraffe, ten spoons, knives and forks, weighing around fifteen pounds for a hundred and fifty bucks. I sold them in '09 for around four and a half grand.

When I see solid sterling stuff at estate sales that are being conducted by "family members" instead of professional auctioneers or estate planners, I will often pick up sterling for pennies on the dollar. I frequently pick up a pound or two of sterling for three to six bucks an ounce, then I immediately re-sell it in Orlando for 88% spot.

The masses often do not know what they have.

I garage and house sale for sterling items, too... It gives me a reason to run around on my lunch time and sometimes check out a profit.

ADK