Questions For All You Experts Out There

Great question! To find most contemporary coinage you do need to look through a lot of coins, more than just pocket change, that would take forever! So yes, searching coin rolls is actually the most efficient way to do that. Your bank should be the source for obtaining these rolls, whether individual or by the box ($25 Pennies, $100 Nickels). The problem comes in returning these coins. We call it "dumping" , "dump sites". Some banks if you have an account, will gladly give out/order boxes for you, the nicer ones will take them in. Banks that have coin counter/sorter machines that routinely do this for businesses may allow you to dump yours, hopefully without any charge or fees like a Coinstar machine does. Ideally that is what you want to find, free source and return.

Some coins like the older Wheat cents are nearly impossible
to find all issues but the most common of the 40/50's dates in circulation any more. These you can purchase in rolls or bulk quantities, may cost a bit, but can make a family day out of searching. Wheat cents I know, bought quite a few. Same with the older Jefferson nickels, you can still find the common high mintage ones, but the Key dates, hardly ever, if you do find it in a roll, celebrate!

Above all keep it fun!



Like that quarter book, mines full, yea! Has all the issues including the territories that other folders lack!

As a word of warning, most of the ebay sales offering unsearched coin rolls are not legitimate. There is a scam market of this on ebay, and many people get suckered into it.

Make friends with a local coin shop and tell them what you are trying to do. They will most likely work with you. By local coin shop, I don't mean the "We Buy Gold!" type places that exist to take advantage of people, but an actual coin shop.

I feel for you because getting into coins now is a lot different than back in the old days . CRH now is a hit or miss proposition ,with mostly misses unless your into errors and varieties . a good way to find coins of interest is to check your change whenever you receive it . You can get your feet wet buying or bidding coins on E-Bay . But we can't stress this enough, be care full not to fall prey to scams , fakes, and dishonest sellers . Experience will pay off in time . We also don't want to scare you away from E-Bay; As many CCF members participate either in selling or buying on the Bay . Good luck with collecting .

T-bop - thanks for adding that biy about ebay not bring a totally bad place. The unsearched rolls scams are bad, and or course, Lelah, if you are wondering about a coin on ebay - ask the people on this forum about their opinion of it.

We have experts that can ID fakes, bad deals etc. ebay is actually a great place to buy from, but like everything else - a little education goes a long way.

Going to banks for rolls works for cents, and it can be fun too. If I turn my head to the left a little, I can see the three boxes of cents on the ground that I'm working my way through. I'm not sure how many wheat cents you'll find this way -- I haven't had many -- but if you start looking for errors and varieties, you'll have more fun.

If you need wheats, Crazyb0 on ccf has a decent batch in the classifieds section. I would definitely buy from him before buying "unsearched" rolls on ebay.

Keep away from ebay and other on line sites if possible. In so many instances people only get ripped off. You should try asking everyone you know for old cans, jars, boxes of coins laying around. Look up coin shows in your area too. Those are the best places for coins. I know how banks are getting ticked off about roll coin collectors. They have a habit of getting a lot of rolls, opening them all and then taking them back to that same bank. To stop this by me, BOA has a new policy. You bring in coins, they put them in a plastic bag, send out for counting. And then the amount is entered into your account. And there is a fee for this too. NO account? Then they send you a check and a larger fee for that too. Some banks refuse to give out rolls of coins unless you have an account there and the account must be set up for coin distributions.

Search this site. There was a thread about trusted ebay dealer. I know one is oozentoo. He is also the guy who owns the local coin shop near me. A great guy to deal with and honest.