Need expert help - interesting situation!

[vintagelover229]

Please don't be discouraged. If anything you should feel ENCOURAGED because you're now getting educated on this. It's like going to a car lot buying a car based on price and what little you know only to take it to the mechanic to find out it's not what you thought it was an you have the option of 1) starting new and returning what you have and use the knowledge you have or 2) Pay the extra 1k and be happy with what you have.

With your budget of ~7k you'll be able to get a great ring from a PS vendor that will blow the stone you currently have out of the water. There isn't a comparison for ideal cut stones vs non-ideal cut ones. However it's all relative to what's important to you. As long as YOU think it's beautiful and you don't feel that you paid an unfair price (I consider fair price to get back a good chunk of what you paid if you had to resell it. For example I bought an August vintage cushion from a vendor here for 4600.00 *before the price increase* and managed to sell it for 4500.00 when I went to sell it. That's almost unheard of in the re-sale private diamond market.)



My point is if you love your ring and want to shell out more cash and it makes you happy GO FOR IT. If you want to see what you can get for your $$ towards an ideal cut (or not even SUPER ideal, but almost ideal) we're more than happy to help you out. There are lots of places to get nice vintage type settings like the one you have (heck, you can probably KEEP the setting and get a loose stone from a vendor and send your setting to the vendor to have set) if you really want to.

All's that matter's is that YOUR happy. But IMO you get more bang for your buck dealing with ideal cut stones bc they will always outshine even the biggest poorly cut one.

ETA: Here is a 1.2 for 6500.00 wire price. You could ship your setting off to BGD and have him set this in it.
http://www.briangavindiamonds.com/diamond/diamond-detail/?product_id=BLAGS-104049675012

 

[Circe]

No... What I have now was a total of $5900 for the
he is now asking for an extra $1000 after the deal is done?..

Because he says the H stone that is 1.36 ct is $1.000 more than the 1.48 J color. It's confusing, I know

I feel really bummed about all of this now.

Well, don't. You're trying hard to find something beautiful for the lady you love: it's just that this is more complicated than you'd think.

We can't tell exactly what the cut on the H is from the photos: it might have a fish-eye, your head might have been blocking the light source when you took the photo ... we don't know. We'll know more with the numbers.

If those don't suit? It sounds like your guy is amenable to trading, so you can ask him to bring in something within the parameters that Charmy posted; you could alternately ask him if he'd be willing to let you buy the setting from him, and bring in a stone from another dealer. Or, like Dreamer said, you can keep the H - you already said everybody who's seen it has loved it, and, at the end of the day, #s aren't everything. I know that, even now, after having seen H&A ideal cut diamonds, I still adore my uncerted e-ring (which has a great cut, just not an H&A great cut - you can have the one without the other). You have options, so don't despair.

 

[Kimmy]

I think you would be better going with a GIA or AGS certified stone and dropping in clarity and color, but improving cut. An EGL H/VS 1 could very well be a GIA J/SI2 so look at GIA J/SI2s with excellent cuts. Ask the experts, but what about....

THIS ONE! It scores a 1.8 and is priced at $5924 bank wire price. Ask for the pricescope discount.
http://www.eternitydiamonds.com/diamond_detail.php?id=512364&ref=pricescope



or cheaper, but not cuts aren't as great...

http://www.abazias.com/database/NewDiamondInfo.asp?stock=83958010&flag=ps
http://www.b2cjewels.com/dd-2106811-1.30-carat-Round-diamond-J-color-SI2-Clarity.aspx?cid=DiamPS

 

[Dreamer_D]

No... What I have now was a total of $5900 for the

he is now asking for an extra $1000 after the deal is done?..

Because he says the H stone that is 1.36 ct is $1.000 more than the 1.48 J color. It's confusing, I know

It should not be confusing. If you paid and bought the H VS1 for $6900 and have the H VS1 in your possession -- which is what you have told us -- then you do not owe money. I do not know of a jeweler who will give you a diamond in a ring without you paying for it .

What is confusing is the fact that you are giving us contradictory information about which stone you presently own -- The H or the J.

 

[TristanC]

From my understanding of this convoluted and confusing thread - you proposed with the H stone, and everyone loves it, and now you want (really really want) to save $1000 by exchanging the stone everyone likes for a larger but worse cut & coloured J stone.

Every single person here has told you that you should not do this.

You still want to do it.

So from a different perspective, I'm gonna ask you: Do you feel that you really need to not spend the additional $1000? We do not know how important saving that money is to you. The posters here only advise you that given the information, none of them would take the larger diamond and keep the $1000 in the bank. They would rather have the small stone at a higher price.

It actually seems you decided that you Should save $1K, but nobody here is backing you up.

So why don't you just do what you intended? Just change the stone out, show it to the pretty lady you married. If she can't tell the difference, or looks just as delighted, be glad that you saved $1K.

If she looks confused, or asks why it isn't as nice or tries to say something nice but you can just tell from the initial look that she is disappointed, then call the jeweller and tell him that it didn't work out, you want the H stone back and write off that 1K as spent for a good cause and a beautiful lady.

Sorry, if I seem a little blunt in this post, but there was lots of good advice above that didn't seem to be helping you make a choice so I was just trying a different tack.

 

[Amys Bling]

Totally agree with Tristan. It seems like you are trying to find a way tp save 1,000 and trade for the bugger-lower color-worse cut stone and justify it in your mind. In the end you should do what makes you and your FI happy, you just asked a bunch of diamond fanatics heat they would do and they gave you the truth. What you do is ultimately up to you.

 

[Dreamer_D]

I think if he wants to go to the trouble of switching stones and saving $1000, he should get a better cut stone that is smaller.

 

[Circe]

Or a better-cut stone that has lower stats - I became a BIG fan of SI stones after I got my pendant and earrings, and I like a little warmth, so I'd be v-e-r-y comfortable with a beautifully cut M SI1, if staying above a certain size is important.

Ex: High Performance Diamonds almost specializes in "weird" stones - excellent cuts on rough that isn't inherently the most valuable out there. A nice M VS2 with an average 6.9 diameter at a weight of 1.23 for $5200, perhaps? http://www.winkjones.com/index.php?page=view-id-diamond-infinity&id=479

 

[LoveMunkie]

Definitely don't do the trade. If you love the ring as is now, leave it that way.

I'll add that it usually is a bad idea to buy diamonds from friends and "wholesalers." It's like borrowing money from family. It can go south very easily and rarely pays off

Mrssalvo is right!!! Even knowing EXACTLY what I wanted in a stone and setting (including acceptable dimensions, performance requirements, percentages, etc.) working with a "family friend" has been a HUGE pain and very difficult. I'd say in general, your standard jeweler/"family friend" probably isn't used to working with customers who know anything about diamonds or expect higher quality then the mostly poorer-quality stones available at retail stores. It took 4 months for our "friend" to find us a stone that was suitable for our requirements after multiple tries (and also trying to convince us they were all good enough) and we're STILL waiting on the final ring (3 months after purchasing the stone - set it incorrectly, had to send it out-of-house to get the quality of design we expected/he promised).

If she knows it is coming, definately take the time to get it right - a few weeks/months isn't that long to wait for something she's going to wear the rest of her life (or first upgrade, lol)!

*Sorry - didn't realize there were more pages in this thread! I'm a little late on my advice