what to do with old stamp albums

soolin

DirtPoorGuy wrote: »

I'll get my coat

Wanna buy some stamps? I can do you a good deal on a couple of large boxes?

DirtPoorGuy

Now now, you wouldn't want me to have to report a Board Guide for trying to sell goods on the forum would you?, all hush monies gratefully received.

soolin

DirtPoorGuy wrote: »

Now now, you wouldn't want me to have to report a Board Guide for trying to sell goods on the forum would you?, all hush monies gratefully received.

Oh well done..I think that's definitely one win to you :T

(Soolin-sloping off quietly to buy books as she knows more about the value of them than she does about first day covers).

suzukibandit

You could always take them to your local Oxfam shop - declutter your loft and give something to charity at the same time !:)

thepedestrian

could make some sort of picture from them I suppose - might look good ( and colourfull ) in a large simple glass frame for a wall - - or even a moziac of them if you be bothered to sort the colours into different piles

soolin

Im glad this thread got resurrected as I couldn't find it.

At the last auction I went to they sold two large fruit crates of albums and first day covers for £45. Yes that is an appalling price but it is actually the first time in the 5-6 years I've benen going to auctions that I've ever seen stamps sell. I've decided that I am going to put mine in the next auction in September, whilst i accept i may walk away with virtually nothing I really can't afford to keep paying storage fees for them on the off chance they will eventually become popular again.

I have already sold most of my first day covers, I got £20 at a car boot sale for 90 covers going back to the 1950s, again a terrible price but I had previously tried them several times on ebay with no interest whatsoever .

cestlavie

useful thread - thanks o/p. as an executor i had to go through the collection of stamps and coins of an elderly relative. broke my heart to think she had bought all these things as a supposed investment and yet now they were worth nothing. she had a huge amount of new commemorative stamps from 1969 -80 but nobody wanted them. we ended up using them - they certainly make an impact on the envelopes - you try sending a letter for 32p using up huge fancy stamps with denominations of 4p etc!
as for coins - yikes same story. memo to self... (whenever i have nay money )- invest in gold!

soolin

cestlavie wrote: »

useful thread - thanks o/p. as an executor i had to go through the collection of stamps and coins of an elderly relative. broke my heart to think she had bought all these things as a supposed investment and yet now they were worth nothing. she had a huge amount of new commemorative stamps from 1969 -80 but nobody wanted them. we ended up using them - they certainly make an impact on the envelopes - you try sending a letter for 32p using up huge fancy stamps with denominations of 4p etc!
as for coins - yikes same story. memo to self... (whenever i have nay money )- invest in gold!

I've already started using the decimal stamps as postage, a very useful tip indeed.

emmbrook

cestlavie wrote: »

useful thread - thanks o/p. as an executor i had to go through the collection of stamps and coins of an elderly relative. broke my heart to think she had bought all these things as a supposed investment and yet now they were worth nothing. she had a huge amount of new commemorative stamps from 1969 -80 but nobody wanted them. we ended up using them - they certainly make an impact on the envelopes - you try sending a letter for 32p using up huge fancy stamps with denominations of 4p etc!

You can buy decimal mint stamps on eBay for 10 - 20% less than face value (sometimes more) depending on how many you buy - commemoratives from the mid 60s onwards were produced in such large numbers that they have little value.

Most of my postage is made up of 20 to 30 year old stamps that I've bought at a discount - if you send a lot of mail it's a useful way to save some cash, and as cestlavie says, it makes the envelopes look bright!

Crowqueen

If anyone does have stamps to sell or get valued, the eBay stamp group is going strong - I haven't posted there in two years but they are very friendly to newbies and help out with informative and intelligent posts. They also have a collection of pages to assist in just these sort of circumstances. Make sure you have some pictures of your find ready.

My advice is always to sort the stamps for sale into country or thematic lots: either you get more for them that way than just loose or in clumsy and heavy-to-send albums, or you realise you enjoy them and become a hobbyist yourself.

Stamp collecting is a niche hobby but I suspect eBay has helped collectors get hold of stuff. I remember getting into it in 2002 by exploring eBay for the first time (I was after propaganda items from 20th century Eastern Europe and what better propaganda opportunities than stamps?) and building up a large Eastern European collection. I just bought some more wonderful stamps from Canada showing the immigration of the Ukrainian community. I have pretty much completed Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia from between the wars.

If you are using older stamps for postage, don't forget that 1/2p values are still valid alongside round values.