Why Flip A House When You Can Flip A Coin?

"Flipping" anything, whether that's a house or a coin, requires deep knowledge, research, trial and error, enough capital to invest, lessons (both painful and profitable) and being aware at all times of what the market is doing. You also need a large enough financial "cushion" that you can absorb losses and ride out market troughs without going broke.

To that end, whether you have $20 or $200,000, I'd recommend you start by learning everything you can about a given coin series you think you'd like to flip, whether that's Morgan dollars, commemoratives, type coins, or anything else. Once you've gotten a fairly good knowledge in that respect, start watching as many auctions as you can and learning what coins sell for what prices, and more importantly, why they sell at/above (or didn't sell at all) for their bids / offer prices. Stick exclusively to PCGS/NGC graded slabbed coins until you are very experienced with raw material. Avoid bullion (modern gold/silver) wherein resale profit is entirely at the mercy of the very unpredictable commodities markets and stick to coins with numismatic value.

In other words, become an expert on a particular coin series, if possible, then study sales of coins within that series for a couple of years -- the longer, the better. You will eventually be able to identify coins which are undervalued or underpriced, acquire them, and then sell them in the future at a profit.

What, you thought this was going to be easy? :P

Look at it this way, though: if you find a coin for $20 and resell it for $40, you just doubled your investment. Now take that $40 and your skill and either buy a $40 coin which you can sell for $80 or buy two $20 coins which you can sell for $40...that's how wealth is accumulated. Of course, sometimes you're going to have to sell that $20 coin for $25, but a gain is a gain.

Be prepared to spend many, many hours looking at the coin markets and auction sites/auction results...

Don't get too attached to your inventory -- you say you want to be an investor, not a collector, so treat your coins like commodities and either sell them to generate investment capital for future purchases or hold them as a store of appreciating values.

I urge all new collectors to sell some coins just to see what it looks like from the other side.
Many costs with ebay and paypal can eat into your profits. And you still have to pay for the computer, printer, ink, stationary and a camera. All things considered, I'm probably getting less than minimum wage for my efforts. That's why I'm a collector and not a dealer.

with everything that's been said so far.

I will add that there are 3 things I keep in mind.

1. Collect what you love, or for this discussion, buy and sell what you love because you will have to spend a lot of time learning about it.

2. I have heard (and it may be true) that it takes 10,000 hours to become and expert in a subject. It seems that figure matches the length of time it takes to get a Ph.D., that is after you've already gotten the degrees to begin a Ph.D. program.

3. I really wish I could remember where I first heard this, but I once heard someone say it was easy to make money dealing in coins. All you have to do is go to all the shows and always be the smartest person in the room.

Anyway, to answer your question, if I had $20 to spend on coins I hoped to sell for a profit, I would coin roll hunt and dig through the junk bins. If you don't enjoy those kinds of searches, I believe it would seem like a very hard way to make a buck. I enjoy it -- but I don't sell anything, or at least I haven't yet.

Roll hunting is a zero cost profit opportunity if you don't include acquisition costs (fuel, wear and tear on your vehicle) -- if you find a cooperative bank or credit union, and pick up $20 worth of, say, customer-wrapped pennies, and find nothing -- no Wide AM's, no errors, no Indians, no wheats... -- you can always return them to the bank and get back the $20 you started with.

I guess that solely depends on the topic and area. As OP is a newbie on the field, I suggest coin roll hunting, as that's basically harmless and a good way to learn some basic stuff like grading and varieties and errors. Worst case scenario you just miss some good valuable coins due to lack of knowledge, but without losing the money invested. It's like coin collecting in sandbox mode. In hindsight, I really would have wished I had possibilities like coin roll hunting over here, it would have saved me a lot of money, trouble and time in learning just all that.




Now those are some wise words to live by!




I fully agree that probably even collecting empty bottles for bottle bills is more profitable than it is to go CRH'ing or trading in coins with a budget of $10 to $20, but I guess that's not the point. If OP wants to make cash on coins and doesn't know much about the topic, than this is probably the only viable way: ebay has too many fakes, false advertisements or coins going for ridiculous prices nowadays to be a reliable start for a beginner. Just see the 'worst coins of ebay' topic to know what I mean.




This. Exactly this.

Some very good points here!

Roll hunting is definitely a good way to get your feet wet, if you want something that is essentially zero-risk. Searching cents for WAM is a fairly safe bet; the general public is unaware that such cents exist, and the 1998 and 2000 go for a good $5 on ebay.

If you are going to flip anything for profit, you need three things going for you:

1. Knowledge to be able to sort out a good deal from a bad one.

2. Work ethic to put in the hours that the seller is unwilling to.

3. Dumb luck to find the deal in the first place, and double dumb luck to be the only bidder to recognize it as such.

I've made $750 off of a $5 purchase. It really helps to know your stuff, and in this case, rare die varieties.

What I do is set aside a specific amount (for me, it was around $1000), and set a specific ebay algorithm. Find good deals (usually at 50% or less of wholesale) and flip them. Keep what you want, as long as you can cover the cost with what you sell. You can amass quite a collection following this method. (I doubled the value of my US type set, got ~$4000 in Chinese coins, and bought a new musical instrument without having to dip into my pocket outside of the $1000. I have been doing this for a little under a year now.)