Purchase and Appraisal Procedure

[bostonlawguy]

Hi All,
I am just making some final decisions on a diamond for my girlfriend (soon to be fiance). As I am narrowing down on the stone, I am also trying to nail down procedure for getting the stone appraised. I have found an independent appraiser (the gentleman from Brookline, MA, that many have suggested). My questions are the following. . . .

1. Should the stone be loose or set?
2. Should I try to get in writing from the jewler that the sale is contingent upon successful appraisal, or is a good return policy sufficient?

Thanks in advance and I hope to share some stats with you later. I am very excited about this whole thing.

Jay

 

[Lugus]

1. Loose

2. Absolutely, make sure you can return the diamond for any reason for a reasonable period of time. Make sure you get 100% of your money back (less shipping or similar if applicable). No store credit, no discount on future purchase, 100% of your money

Congratulations, on getting close. Get some stats and post them here. Make sure you get crown and pavilion angles, as depth and table % alone aren't too useful without them. We might be able to tell you a bit about the stone, and tell you if it's a good value/well cut, etc.

 

[Mara]

Lugus is completely right...make sure the stone is loose to get an accurate appraisal, and make sure to get the agreement on either a return policy for ANY reason within a certain period of time (at least 10 days or so), and/or sale contingent on the appraisal to YOUR satisfaction.

Ask for a Sarin unless the stone has an AGS cert where you can get the crown and pav angles to plug them into the HCA and have people run you a DiamCalc image.

Good luck!

 

[Spinning Head]

WOW!

Lugus you've hit on a topic that I would love to talk about:

The fact that the Table and Depth really don't matter much.

I have so many things to say I don't know where to start!

let me try here: When doing my diamond search I find that of the 100's of diamonds that meet my general quals only a few have more data than the Depth and Table. As a result I have spent the past two months comparing only the diamonds that have Crown and Pav angles online. This is disheartening.

Am I correct to say that in order to get additional data I need to buy it or reserve it? This seems to me to mean that my search could take many more months and my credit card bill will be mind boggling.

What are my options? How do I get more info on a stone before having to commit to buying?

Seems to me that using the 4C's, Depth, Table, Flour, Cul, just isn;t enough to make a good choice on a stone.

Please help!

 

[Mara]

Spinning--More and more online vendors are putting up crown and pav angle information from Sarin's or will be willing to get you the Sarin information if you request it. Giangi pointed out that a Sarin only costs $10, so having one done should not be a big deal--I think it is touted as more difficult than it really is as the vendor needs to actually put some work out to find a Sarin if they do not have access to one.

While I was searching for stones, only a few vendors did not have this info and were not willing to give it to me. Even offline when I was looking through our jeweler, I asked specifically for stones only with Sarins as I knew that I wanted the additional info.

So keep in mind that just because a vendor does not have Sarin information on their stone or an AGS cert on a stone, that does not mean that you will not be able to get that information if you ask. I was working with DirtCheapDiamonds who got me Sarin info on the stones I was looking at, and I think diamondwholesale.cc did as well (they are part of Whiteflash).

Also as you search, start asking for IdealScope images for online stones. This will help you see the light return of the stone and certain vendors have started including this with their information on the stone (e.g. GoodOldGold, some Whiteflash stones), so besides just the Sarin/crown&pav angles you have an idea of light return and leakage on the stone you are considering.

Yes all of this is slightly more tedious, but I would request as much as possible from the vendors..discounting the stones that do not have the info you want, and narrow the search down to a few stones. Then you may want to compare details to details and if you have 2 stones that are the final contenders, have the online vendors send the stones to an independent appraiser such as Rich Sherwood, RocDoc, etc. Have them run their analysis and reporting on both stones, and give their opinions. A few people have done that and it has helped with the final decision. To do this you don't have to pay for the stone up front (most vendors will honor this), and the sale is contingent upon desirable results of the appraisal. That way you only pay for the appraisal fees (depends on appraiser but ours was around $125/hour) and don't have to buy the stone, appraise it, send it back etc. Utilize this policy as much as possible. But first narrow down the field.

There are tons of stones out there..it is easy to think you want to keep looking and looking, but if you are already getting to your saturation point, maybe you have a few stones you are considering...maybe those are the final contenders? Don't stress yourself out to a breaking point, it's supposed to be fun!

Good luck!

 

[Lugus]

Exactly what Mara said. When you find a stone you are interested in, simply request this information from whoever you're buying from. There's no reason to commit to buying without seeing this information, and many here would question your intelligence if you did.

 

[Mara]

Also I looked up another post of yours, Spinning, and noted that you were looking for an H&A stone between .8-.9c size. You didn't mention budget, but since you mentioned H&A I assumed that you wanted a well-cut stone.

So I ran a search on Pscope because I was curious to see what sort of constraints you were running into on looking for stones with alot of information...and I found 20 (sold by 26 vendors) stones that were .75-.95c well cut HCA scorers under 2.0, mostly H&A AGS0 and some A Cut Above stones, ALL excellent performers with colors of E-G and VS1-SI1 clarity. The range was around $3500-5000. Not knowing your range...here are the first 10, priced from $3300-3800. There are still another 10 that are listed.

Not sure if you knew all these stones were out there or maybe your budget is lower than these prices (btw these are pscope prices so be sure to mention them to get that cost), but the costs are all pretty similar. I was surprised at the amount of ACA stones (absolutely amazing cuts, see the IS images on the pages), and the H&A and SuperbCert stones.

ALL of these stones have crown and pav angles, as well as some having IdealScope images, Sarin reports, closeups of the stones, H&A images, light ray return mapping, Brilliancescope reporting, ETC ETC. Large amounts of information on the stones to help you make a decision.

Seems like there are more than a few really great stones in your carat weight and cut class out there? If you need more info on how to run this search, please let me know-I'll detail it via PM.

Have fun! Sorry this post is so long! I wanted to post all 20 but lost patience after a few minutes..hee.

http://www.whiteflash.com/acut/diamond_details.asp?ItemCode=365084

.75 G VS2 ACA H&A SuperIdeal $3367


http://www.whiteflash.com/acut/diamond_details.asp?ItemCode=2565

.76 F SI1 ACA H&A SuperIdeal $3410


http://www.whiteflash.com/acut/diamond_details.asp?ItemCode=2564

.76 F SI1 ACA H&A SuperIdeal $3410


http://search.virtcert.com/cgi/u/1012/v.cgi?stock=1313312&_s=1012&_p=sdf348gd743&_c=&_fs=1&prestock=

.81 G VS2 SuperbCert H&A $3536


http://www.niceice.com/certcopies/ags0003501807/index.htm

.78 E VS1 H&A $3705


http://www.whiteflash.com/acut/diamond_details.asp?ItemCode=440111

.88 G SI1 ACA H&A SuperIdeal $3700


http://www.whiteflash.com/acut/diamond_details.asp?ItemCode=365085

.78 G SI1 ACA H&A SuperIdeal $3705


http://search.virtcert.com/cgi/u/1012/v.cgi?stock=665957&_s=1012&_p=sdf348gd743&_c=&_fs=1&prestock=

.80 F SI1 SuperbCert H&A $3718


http://www.whiteflash.com/acut/diamond_details.asp?ItemCode=446045

.84 G VS2 ACA SuperIdeal H&A $3771

 

[Spinning Head]

Thanks Mara!

I guess I should let the cat out of the bag and give some more info on the search.

Clarity seems to be tops along with Color. D-F and IF-VS2. I figure that if you can visually see the inclusions it's not too good an idea. Same with color, as I understand it you can tell a G if you're good.

So next is price. Id say the max I'm looking to spend is about $5K.

With that said, what do you think? I would like something at least .8, probably .85-.95.

I do like the info on sending to a Ind. App. though.

 

[Mara]

I can maybe agree with you on the G/color issue...but I think between the two, color is more important over clarity. As you probably already know, you are going to pay alot more $$ for an IF, VVS1, VVS2 stone. If you have a VS1 or VS2, you will not see anything that you won't see with an IF/VVS. Unless you have 20x magnification eyes that is. Those are the safe ranges. SI1 can be tricky...BUT in this case...you will see from the chart I posted that you can get some really nicely cut stones that are in the SI range. Yes there are a few in your VS and colorless range, but open it up to SI1 and wow...you have mulitples.

Here is my two cents. When working with a co such as WhiteFlash or NiceIce, SuperbCert etc..all of which have HIGHLY regarded reputations on this forum, ask them the simple question of 'Does this stone have any inclusions that could be considered eye-visible' on the SI1 stones. If they say...'well maybe'...then discount that stone. But there may be stones in this bunch below that WILL be very eye clean, and a well graded SI1. You will save a bundle over a VVS stone, and may be able to get a little more carat weight, and still end up with an amazing stone. When buying online I like to tout 'stay within a VS to be safe', but in a case like this where you are ONLY looking at well cut stones and the vendors are all very highly thought of, you have much less to worry about in my opinion. If you were working with JoeVendor.Com and they had an SI1 and no one had heard of them, I might tell you to stick with a VS. But in this case..all of these stones look amazing with their cuts..and the vendors are straight-up. So call them and ask!

You don't have to listen to me of course. But if you are feeling constrained within your range of IF-VS2, it may be the time to really consider a few very eye-clean SI1s to keep your carat weight, color, and excellent cut. It may be a sacrifice worth making and if you get an eye-clean SI1..it will be NO sacrifice at all.

Check out my screen shot chart below, these are all .82-.94c stones, excellent cuts, HCA scorers under 2.0 and within your price range. I removed the VVS1 stones because they were bumping the amount to $6000 and in my opinion, not worth it!

Sorry for the big file..good luck!!

 

[Spinning Head]

WOW! Thanks for the info again. You've got to stop of I will never stop posting.

I love the screen shot too. How did you get the HCA to post? I am so clueless about computers now. And to think, back in Jr High I was in the computer club back when the best computer we had was a Commador PET. I knew I should have stuck with it...

Thanks Mara! Watch for my next post....

 

[niceice]

The reason why so many on-line dealers don't have the Sarin / OGI information available is because they don't actually have the diamonds in their possession and most of them never will at any time during the sales process... They are merely brokers mirroring the listings on the multiple listing services reserved for the diamond trade and most of the cutters don't post the crown and pavilion angles because they don't want to take the time... We practically fell all over ourselves the other day when we offered to bring a diamond in for a guy so that we could evaluate it and he asked "how much is that going to cost?" because apparently one of the other dealers told him that it was going to cost another $150.00 if he needed them to actually look at the stone! Now we have to say, this concept seems rather absurd to us... It seems to us that if you're going to be in the diamond business, then you should be in the diamond business and be prepared to be the expert your customers expect you to be... Spinning Head, you have a right to the information you seek and we hope that you insist on it from whoever you are buying the diamond from... Marty prefers to evaluate diamonds loose...