The Feasibility Of Roll Hunting Complete Sets, Which Ones?

I almost completed the entire State Quarter collection with one box this weekend. That said, I am trying to get a Franklin set together from circulation, and my daughter and I are working on a LWC collection. As stated above though, there are a number I expect we will never find.

If you add the caveats that you are only searching for clad and intended for circulation then halves are very easy, you could do it in a box or two, otherwise it is harder but probably still possible. SBA dollars shouldn't be too hard if you don't worry about the NIFCs ('81), same with Sac's.

Unless you are in it for the challenge, you could just buy uncirculated mint sets, most of them are cheap, the coins are better than you'd find in circulation, and it will be a whole lot faster.

Some of it depends on where you are. I'm near Chicago, so there are a lot of silver searchers in my area and that makes certain sets hard to complete. Here are my opinions of what is considered possible. Obviously, some of these are theoretically possible, so when I say impossible I mean practically impossible.

LWC: Impossible to complete. People have found keys and I'm sure a whole set is out there, but you can't realistically look at enough cents to find them.

LMC: Doable depending on what you consider complete a set. Date/MM set is easy, once you add in even the standard varieties it gets a lot harder. 1970S small date is very hard, 1960 small date is extremely hard.

Buff: Impossible

Jeffs: Definitely possible. A number of people have done it here.

Roosies: Clad (except 1996W) are relatively easy to put together, but the silver issues are much harder to find with fully half of circulation finds being the last year. I'm of the opinion that it's doable, but haven't heard of anyone completing them.

Wash: Clad are doable (but see cladking's comments) but the pre-65 silver set is impossible to complete. The State / Territories / Nation Park quarters are all easy to complete too, but it may take a few years for enough to circulate for you to get them.

Bennies: These were probably doable up until a few years ago, but unless you are in an area untapped by roll hunters, it's probably impossible now.

Kennedys: Doable with a lot of volume. The only rarities are the 70D and 87P&D as previously mentioned. I've also found that '65 is pretty uncommon too - I have more of each of the later date NIFCs than 1965s.

Ikes: A full date set is hard because of the 1973P&D and because you usually don't find enough of these to search. The varieties are difficult but doable too (I've found the 72 type 2 and 3 FEVs for example) but the silver ones are nearly impossible to find.

SBAs: Same problem as the Ikes. You can't find enough to search (usually) and there's a mint set only year too (1981). It's a small set though so you may be able to complete it on the side (I buy every baby dollar I can get from my dump banks).

Sacs: Difficult due to all the NIFCs. Not sure if this is doable or not.

Native American: More doable than SBAs and Sacs - I've actually found all these as incidental pickups without specifically looking for them.

Prez: Easy to complete with a little effort, but the coins tone pretty quickly so the early ones are getting ugly fast! It will probably take awhile to complete these because not a lot are circulated so if you order boxes, they'll likely be solid.

You guys rock! Thanks a lot for the info! I'll save the comprehensive responses to all of you and just condense:

Since I've never touched halves or dollars I'm kind of flabbergasted that you can still get Franklins and Walkers or Ikes (SBAs make more sense) from rolls--the halves make sense but the dollar thing still amazes me since obviously they're different sizes so how are they rolled together? Or are they separate? If you get a box does it come with 1 roll of Ikes and another that is a mix of Sacs/Pres's/etc.? Or is that one of those "just pick a few up from the bank tray at a time" things?

Anywho, as I said above, since I'm pretty much done with nickels (stupid 2009P...ugh) I'm looking to branch out and since the part of roll hunting that I love is, well, the hunt, I have no problem questing for something that's quasi-ridiculously rare but I'd still like to know if I have a chance at it or if it's just a white whale. With that said, even the possibility of coming close is pretty neat.

As far as any decisions? Probably Cents, Quarters and possibly the stray dollar/dime box pickup and I'll see how far I can get with them (of course, I have no intention on stopping the nickel obsession). Eventually I'll work up the courage for halves but that's a bit too much for me right now.

Am I hooked yet? I don't know but I'll be able to tell you more after I finish another roll.

For Ikes, you just have to go into lots of different banks on a regular basis and ask if they've gotten in any "large size dollar coins". I've found about 30 total in the last few months. I've heard of a few people who've actually gotten banks to order them - apparently some casinos still use them and they're provided by some coin services for that purpose.

Just to clarify, Ikes come in as strays. I've never seen a bank that can order them and though I've heard of people doing so, I think it's dubious at best. I got lucky once and found ~450 at the bank I order my nickels from - they begged me to take them. Usually if you find 5 it's a lot. Try grocery stores too (service desk and banks inside them). When people dip into the coin collection, they use it to buy essentials.

Though I haven't completed either, I think Kennedys are the easiest to complete followed by Jefferson nickels. Kennedys won't be for much longer I think so I'd hit those first if they interest you at all. There are SO many half dollar roll hunters out there, that silver is being stripped out at a prodigious rate. The internet makes it worse because it lets people know it's possible and gets the idea of the huge score in their heads :) I never would have started roll hunting if it weren't for stumbling on this site and for each person that posts here, there's probably 10-20 that don't. The high price of silver in the 80s didn't get it all, but that was relatively short lived and they didn't have a coin counter in every bank and every grocery store back then. There will still be some small amount of circulating silver for the foreseeable future, but your 70D will get exponentially harder to find.

Nickels will be around for awhile yet and the number of roll searchers is insignificant compared to the mintages.

I started a LWC = since I started to count the boxes I searched 500 and gave up missing about 8 coins because the only way to finish would be if I could search all the cents in circulation but it would be impossible in a life time !

Nickels = I missing 2 dates and Planning to finish this year . Is still possible , very fun !

Dimes 46-64 I think is possible but need to search a lot ! 64 to date is simple !

Quarter 32-64 easier then the LWC (lol) 65 to date take some search but is the easier !

Halves = duo the roll searchers for silver depending on the area dont even start I mean is possible but the location is a factor related to halves

Dollar = some hard ikes but very possible and I think if I started 4 years ago I woul have the S mm circulations strike as well !

Just do it for fun !