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Originally Posted by dpaul ...would prefer Akoya pearls but would be alright with cultured pearls. |
Well, akoya are a type of cultured pearls... so it makes no sense to say ether or.
I n pictures I cannot tell them apart from outright fakes and quality if typically very, very difficult in pictures unless those images are of truly impressive quality - which is really, really uncommon and definitely not the case with either of those auctions.
It could be that someone could feel confident to make a judgement based on the pictures, but I do not. In fact, I have yet to hear anyone daring to risk serious cash on images like that. There might be other clues - the clasp of the first strand is quite unusual / would guess it is some sort of costume (=fake) piece... dunno. The others - anybody's guess: obviously neither of us or the seller believes that they are selling pearls worth $1700 for $60 or so or that 7-7.5mm freshwater pearls with a flimsy clasp could be worth $1k to begin with... The last thing I want to do is slander somebody's auction for no good reason - frankly, it is quite difficult to guess which is what on Ebay auctions and these two fellows don't make it obvious at all.
On the other hand: does this purchase have to be on Ebay? There are safer ways to go about it - even online.
Would expect 7-8mm round freshwater to be $150 - $300 on established shops. $50 is stretching my imagination, although somewhere down the production chain.... maybe.... What's worth all that hassle to you? Akoya $300-$500 or whereabouts - however, those are really not in my comfort zone (I never looked for them).