I want another cell to be able to read the numeric value if the cell
has an * before it. Any ideas?

If you mean that only for cells that have "*", then the formula given
above wont do
because it will give you the numerics after the "*" in case there is a
star.
In case there is no star, it will return the value in the cell, but
this doesnt seem to be what you exactly want unless i misunderstood
you, but in the way you are asking "... value if the cell has an *
before it" means only cells with "*", if this is the case than use
this:

=IF(LEFT(A1,1)="*",--MID(A1,2,LEN(A1)),"")
this will return the value after the "*" if there is a star, and
nothing if no star was found.