A Want List Is a Collection You Haven't Finished Yet.

Pick the notes you're after straight from the catalog, and watch the empty slots fill in.

Ask any collector what they're working on and you'll get a list. Not a vague one, either: “the small-size one-dollar Silver Certificates as a type set — I've got the 1928, the 1928A and the 1934, I still need a decent 1935A, a 1957 and a 1957B, and I wouldn't mind a star in there.” The list lives on an index card, or in the back of the Friedberg, or in their head. It's the most useful document a collector owns and it's almost never written down properly.

That's what the wish list in NUMA is for. You build it straight from the catalog: open Silver Certificates, one dollar, and add the series you're missing — Fr. 1608, Fr. 1619, Fr. 1621 — the same way you'd add a note you own, except these are the ones you don't own yet. If you care about a particular variety or a star, add that line specifically. The list is exactly as fussy as you are.

Then the good part. When you come home from a show with the 1957 you've been after, you photograph it, confirm it against the catalog, and add it to your collection — and it comes off the want list on its own, because NUMA knows that the note you just recorded is the note you were looking for. Your collection gains a line, your want list loses one. Over a year, the slots fill in, and you can see the set completing in front of you rather than reconstructing it from memory.

We find the want list changes how people collect, in a quiet way. Once it's written down, you stop buying the third 1935A because it was there and start buying the 1957B because it's on the list. You walk a bourse floor with a purpose. When a friend asks what you're after, you can tell them precisely and simply share the list with them.

The want list is part of the free NUMA app, on your phone and at ngtnuma.com. Build it from the catalog, work through it at your own pace, and let the collection catch up.