Nickel Find Rates @ 250,000 Coins

Can you post the total of each coin that you found out of those 250,000 nickels?

I would love to see how your numbers compare to my much smaller finds.

Nice Summary! I like seeing the numbers and comparing to mine. Have you found any good dated Buffalos? I'm working on putting together my overall CRH stats but here are my nickel averages:

V nickel: 1 in 175,000
Buffalo: 1 in 9700
War Nickel: 1 in 2400
Low Mintage: 1 in 6900

NickelSearcher,

Great data!

I will present an update of my son's and my collecting in the format I used last time.

Nickel #found (mintage in millions) Find Ratio

GROUP 1
1950D 0 (2.6m) 0
1939D 3 (3.5m) .86
1938S 0 (4.1m) 0
1938D 2 (5.4m) .37
1939S 2 (6.6m) .3

GROUP 2
1951S 19 (7.8m) 2.44
1955P 14 (8.3m) 1.69
1949S 10 (9.7m) 1.03
1950P 14 (9.8m) 1.43

GROUP 3
1948S 13 (11.3m) 1.15
1946S 11 (13.6m) .81
1942D 9 (13.9m) .65

AND
1938P 15 (19.5) .77

As you recall, the find ratio is the number found per million minted.

We only save the coins listed above, plus the silver, buffalo, and Liberty nickels.

We have actually had an easier time finding the group 2 nickels (especially the 1951S) than the group 3 nickels even though the mintage is lower.

For the last 3 months I've bought 5 rolls of nickels a month to sort through. I'm trying to fill out a couple of albums for fun - 1938 to date. No silver, a few 1938-9, and the run of the mill 1950's era are the highlights. Did get 3 silver quarters in change from a retail store earlier this year. They were mid-1940 dates. But it's all fun, anyway.

I really wanted to collect for the fun of it but potentially provide investment as a strategy. I collected nickels because they are cheap to invest in. I have roll searched only about 15 boxes. The statistics shown in this thread has a good sample rate. I do also believe that location may have a effect on the numbers for example out of at least 15 boxes of Jefferson's I only found one from 2009.

Number of collectors

I believe that there may be one million coin collectors but I doubt they are full time jefferson collectors who will by an expensive nickel like the 1939-D. My interpretation of the numbers is what recently made me skip buying the 2009 rolls and went to 1955 BU for the same price yet significantly less mintage 7,888,000. Certainly from a short or long-term investment perspective the 2009 value is questionable. I made the mistake with the low mintage mistake with the 1968-S Lincoln pennies.

What to collect

Theoretically if you saved new MS60 (BU) coins in 1950 and were selling them to individuals today you could gain great profit for some of them. But hoarding common Jefferson's in circulation, even those that are pre 1960 are harder to justify. I remember one experienced collector saying he searched 100's of boxes and only had a handful of keepers. I don't agree but I am not at his level and don't have the money to buy the best. On a typical box I will save less than 2 rolls worth (and that's probably too much) 30 are pre 1955, 30 are selected dates and the other 30 are only MS60+FS coins

Here's what I keep

1. Any Coin without significant damage prior to 1955 -- Keep.
2. Any Key Dates; War years
3. 1955-1970 selected coins of lower mintage, good strike/grade.
4. 1970-1980 dates, AU+ condition, 1971P good strike / grade.
5. 1980-1990 selected 82, 83, 84, 86 dates, Good strike / grade.

Grade

Grade is a significant factor and most coins I find from boxes are not MS60. There may be a better way than collecting coins by date; you should consider all the factors like rarity, mintage, grade and strike. I did not understand this before so many of my coins from earlier collecting where AU or less. Shiny nickels does not mean MS60.

A question of Value

Why are you collecting - for fun, potential future value, because you like to hoard? I don't want to be pessimistic But if you put 1 roll of nickels ($2.00) at a low 2% interest in the bank for 10 years you would have over $ 20.00. Certainly you should be highly selective of the coins you keep. I am now at the point where I seriously examine the potential overall value.


Buying Jefferson's

Would you rather have one 1958 MS60 coin or 7 average circulated 1958 Jefferson nickels?

That's what it came down to for me. Coins can be expensive to buy and it's hard to make up the value, but there are some exceptions. I found a local store that sold some older 1946 to 1970's Jefferson's in MS60 for as low as .35. So I took my old rolls (when I didn't understand grade and strike) and went through them again and traded them in for less but better MS 60 coins...just a thought.

Your model doesn't account for "replacement". When considering sampling theory, you need to consider whether an object gets returned to the population or not. I would venture a guess that the entire population of Nickels is not static (ie, just those minted and put into circulation), but also includes Nickels introduced back into circulation after many years of being out of circulation. That is how Liberty and Buffalo nickels are appearing in your sample. Trying to account for replacement or reintroduction back into circulation is a very impossible task. So all my blabbering is really just theory.

With that being said, great job with the experiment and keep up the great work.

Well done David !
I didnt count how many boxes I searched but my finds almost equal yours so I guess I searched about the same amount as you did and I wish I did a report since I started .
My 38-67 folder is completed except for the 42d that is the only thing that make me keep asking at the bank for boxes of nickels !
I had more luck with v-nickels as I found a total of 11 but only 2 of them was from 1800's.
I found about 20 buffalos but only 4 with date
I started nickel roll search In january 2010 thats why I only found 1 of each key date , 38s,38d,39d,50d,39s,43D ; I found 3 or more of each semi key dates as 51s,55,etc
I didnt have any problem in finding War Nickels as I just sold 100 to a coin shop , but allmight 43D I only found 1 and it was about month ago !
I wish you hade tracked your proof finds because I found a lot and I would like to know if is possible to make a full proof set from roll search ?!.
I hope you dont get mad by my post , I just want to show my numbers in your post because I though we had basically very similar results duo we are almost in the same area as I live in the jersey side of the delaware bay !
What drive me crazy is the fact that I didnt find a single 42d ?! Sometimes I think if is possible every time if one 42d passed buy my hands during roll searching if my brain had identifyed as different date lol !
Again weldone and thank you for share the results of your hard work !
And btw the fact that I only found one of each key dates and you found doubles or triples of some of them tell us is because you started your search couple years before me what make think complete a set from search is race against time where everyday account as the coins somehow are been taking out of circulation !
After read your post again I saw you only found 3 proofs what is kind odd because I found a lot . I had boxes where I found 3 proofs , I found 2 on my last box ! I guess there is not many nickel searchers on my area thats why I found a nice amount of v-nickels and proof coins !

ancientcoinguy,

We all have different ways of keeping our statistics, and we all save different coins, so trying to combine statistics would be like comparing apples to oranges to pineapples to tangerines, etc. It would not be a bad idea, but we would not all be speaking the same language, so to speak.