August brought is the first really hot weather of the year – almost every day temperatures exceeded 100 degrees. (It was bound to catch us). My garden is done for the year. I’m just keeping the perennials and grass alive.

We worked on updating our German states listings this month also and you will finds lots of good stamps added in the states section of our web site. We are now working on the German offices and colonies listings and will have them updated this month.

We have been reviewing most catalogs published which list German and Austrian areas. Catalog publishers have been doing very little tracking market changes in prices or revising existing listings when new information is discovered. Both Scott and Michel catalogs are becoming yearly reprints of the previous year’s listings.

We are going to review new catalog releases in the future only when there is something to say. There is little need for collectors to buy catalogs even every few years because there are few significant listing and price changes. (I might add that the market for German area stamps is very strong and market prices for quality material are on the rise.)
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AUCTIONS

As active auction buyers, we watch all auctions in the US and overseas for good German and Austrian collections. The market for singles, sets and collections has been getting stronger and stronger in recent years with a major upturn occurring during the past three years.

The biggest price increases are for the truly scarce stamps and better collections.

The trend for the bigger auction houses is to hold their auctions live on the internet. This trend has increased bidding on lots and resulted in higher realizations overall. On line auctions improve the chances of bidders absent from the auction site to compete against floor bidders. Traditionally most of the better material has gone to floor bidders but this has changed. Auction houses also do a much better job of showing images of the stamps in collections on line. This improvement has done as much to increase online bidding. Buyers now have a realistic idea of the content and quality of each lot.

For collections the best auctions are Rasdales, Kelleher, and sometimes Dutch Country. They provide good descriptions and images.

The auctions that I have best overall for Austrian and German material are

Rasdale Stamps Auctions Chicago

H.R. Harmer New York

Cherrystone Stamp Auctions – New York

HBA (Hanseatische Briefmarkenauktionen OHG) Hamburg

Heinrich Kohler Auktion – Wiesbaden

Dutch Country Auctions, Wilmington DE

Daniel Kelleher Auctions, Danbury CT

I should also mention that collectors interested in buying at auction should check out stampauctionnetwork.com. They list most of the major auctions conducted in the US and Europe. One can access each auction from this site which greatly simplifies the bidding process for buyers.

NEW ISSUES

We continue to supply a new issue service for the countries we stock. We make quarterly shipments for those who don’t like to wait. I would like to suggest though that it is more cost effective for customers to request new issues be shipped altogether at years end. Complete year sets generally run around two hundred dollars these days. Year groups qualify for higher discounts than quarterly shipments. We greatly appreciate those customers who sign up for year sets and provide us with authorization to charge their credit when the stamps are mailed. It greatly speeds the process for us.

AUSTRIA PHILATELIC SOCIETY (US)

We are in our 24th full year of the Austria stamp club. If you are a collector of Austrian stamps and covers we would like you to consider joining our group. We publish a quarterly bulletin in color and hold two club auctions a year. Our next auction will be included with the January bulletin. Our club auctions offer a wide variety of Austria related stamps and covers for very reasonable prices.

Dues are still only $16 a year for our US members and $23 a year for overseas members. You can join by sending us your check now. Dues for new members received from now through December will cover the 2025 membership year.

If you would like to see one of our club bulletins to help you decide , we will send you one.

R Schneider Stamps
PO Box 978
Iowa Park TX 76367

Office (618) 975 2099
Fax (940) 213 3596

Email:
Rschneiderstamps@gmail.com

Website:

RSchneiderstamps.com