Blog

Maria Durett

Special to the Asbury Park Press USA TODAY NETWORK – NEW JERSEY Belmar–

Joseph Carl has a skill you don’t hear about every day. “If you can give me a diamond, I can tell you when it was cut. I can just look at it and tell you.”

Carl said he can also determine the nature of a piece of gold or silver jewelry, such as when it was made, by touch.

It’s not a magic trick — it’s the result of years of learning, both from a mentor and on his own, explained Carl, who owns Belmar Jewelers, where he does free appraisals on Sundays.

“I just got into it at a young age,” Carl said, adding that he had worked for someone highly experienced in the jewelry business.

“As I was working with him — basically I was cleaning jewelry and polishing jewelry — and I would say, ‘Boy, this ring is interesting,’ and he would say, ‘I used to make those in 1932,’” Carl recalled. “So I would remember, you know, because I was handling it, I was polishing it. So now when somebody hands me a ring, (I can tell them) ‘Oh, they used to be made in 1932.’” Plus, he said, in a time “way before there was Google,” he would visit auction houses and purchase the catalogs that would have details about items, including jewelry.

“And I used to just love looking at those (catalogs) and memorizing the items. So when I would look at a piece, I would say that’s a so-and-so because I recognized it from reading those catalogs,” Carl said. “Hundreds and hundreds of catalogs I memorized.”

Now, Carl takes those skills and helps people understand the value of what they own.

Not having that information can sometimes cost people hundreds, if not thousands of dollars, he cautioned, because there are unscrupulous players in the business who will make lowball offers to people who don’t know the value of their pieces. Carl said he’s seen it time and again.

In one case, a customer first went to a gold buyer who removed the small diamonds from a ring and purchased the gold based on weight, leaving the stones loose. The woman ended up with $80 from a gold buyer, but didn’t realize she had lost out on what would have been $1,000 had the ring still been intact.

Another customer once brought in a 60-year-old bracelet for appraisal.

“I look at this bracelet, and I saw who made the bracelet, and the particular person who made it only made things for royal families,” Carl said.

The customer didn’t know that history and went somewhere else first for an appraisal. “They offered him $350. It was worth $10,000,” Carl said.

He’s even had customers come in who have inherited pieces and find out that the pieces they thought had minimal value were actually worth $50,000 or even $100,000.

Of course, sometimes the reverse is true — someone comes in mistakenly thinking they have something valuable and finds out the truth.

Sometimes it’s a result of incorrect family histories being assigned to a piece. People also will think their pieces are much older than they actually are, Carl said.

He said he can show customers what went into his appraisal, “and I can explain how they can look it up themselves if they have any questions.”

He said it’s important for customers to understand the kind of figure he’s giving them when they come into the store.

“When I do verbal appraisals, it’s what you can get for it cash-wise right now and what it would sell for right now,” Carl said. “That’s real money, that’s what it’s worth. It doesn’t matter what someone tells you it’s worth, it’s what’s actually trading in the market.”

He stressed that what he does is different from an insurance appraisal, which usually is based on replacement value, not market value.

Plenty of people are interested in benefitting from Carl’s wealth of knowledge, hoping it can bring them some wealth, too. Carl said the store can get crowded with appraisal seekers on Sundays, and sometimes people come in with pillowcases full of items.

“In the past it’s been like standing room only, you just never know,” he said.

The store not only buys jewelry, but also sells it — in the brick-and-mortar store, and on an online Etsy store.

Patrons are free to sell eligible pieces to Carl, or keep them — and the newfound knowledge about their worth.

“People should know what they own, whether they want to sell it or not sell it,” Carl said. _