Statehood Quarter Coin Cover Sets & Other Modern Sources For Choice/Gems

I am sure you already thought of this but how about ebay?With most collectors overlooking them the prices might be reasonable on the bay?
John1

I just haven't pursued many coins since the states quarters began. I often call these "ultra-moderns" and, no doubt, I'd have collected them except I developed a condition in 1998 that severely restricted my physical abilities. I'm "better" now but I'm also quite a bit older and am selling due to age rather than seeking new collections. I still watch these markets and keep an eye on the coins in circulation and in coin shops. I don't believe the way to acquire Gems is much different today than it was in 1998; volume. You have to look at a lot of coins and sets and you have to look in the right place to start with. In the old days I could go to a show and find a few Gems in dealer stock. I usually didn't even bother to look at the mint sets unless he obviously had a quantity of nice new sets and then I'd look through those.

And that is the way to find Gems; look for nice new sets at coin shops. I'd reassemble the sets and make sure each was complete with the proper paperwork and the dealers would let me mix and match what I wanted at only a small premium. We'd both come out ahead though at the time the market value greatly favored him because sets were hard to sell at retail and costly to ship. My Gems weren't worth much of anything but they were my goal.

I believe that the "ultra-moderns" actually present more opportunity for the young collector since there are lower mintages and almost as little competition as I had. There is one concern about ultra-moderns that should be kept in mind. Back in the day coins were made on a vast spectrum of quality with most weakly struck and heavily marked before leaving the mint and a very few well struck and clean. This set up the world of today where very high grade clad can sell for a lot of money. Quality improved dramatically in 1999/ '00 so the range isn't as wide and nice coins can be found in bank rolls. It's possible future collectors will be more concerned with mintage again rather than quality in the future.

Another way to find Gems was to watch your change for Gems. When given one at the store just ask what bank they do business with. That bank will probably still have boxes and boxes of similar coins. Go to the same branch. This is actually easier today because in the old days they didn't like providing coins this way. I was in Sandusky, Ohio in April of 1983 looking for the '82-NMM dime. It was too late though I might have been able to find them in bags but the BU's were long gone.

Keep your eyes open, talk to dealers, and check coins. they are always out there. Even today there are still a significant percentage of the sets you encounter in coin shops have never been checked by anyone for anything. A few things are mostly picked out but not so much Gems. You don't see them mostly because they were scarce in the old days and still scarce, even scarcer.

I'm selling only what I can sell at a profit and very few losses. This means it's mostly bulk stuff that has increased and a few high grades. The high grades are slabbed and auctioned but I do sell a few for very low prices (20 - $30 each) on the net to interested buyers. These are really nice high grades that are "out of the money" and not worth the cost of slabbing at this time. Most of the stuff is going to wholesalers who have been scrambling to get stock in nice attractive moderns. I hate to sell it so cheap but my heirs would do even worse. Once in a while I'll offer something on one of the coin forums and may be offering '82 and '83 mint sets by next autumn. I paid very high prices for most of these and only bought the finest. I'm probably going to sell the bad ones cheap, the nice ones (most of them) very high and cut out the highest grades since I don't have enough envelopes for all of them anyway.

I've still got a long way to go and have emptied only half of my safety deposit boxes. I really hate to be selling but I can console myself that at least I'm selling into a strong market. Otherwise I'd be hauling a lot more to the bank.




My thinking here is that it's only natural for collectors to gravitate to the highest grades in the older moderns because nice specimens are so uncommon. Some of the ultramoderns might not develop as much of a following in high grades since if you can't afford an MS-67 an MS-66 might be very inexpensive. The long run always remains to be seen.




Demand for moderns is soaring so in a sense you really are late to the party but there are lots of coins out there that have still never been looked at. An individual could get first crack at a lot of them with obnly a few good contacts. Also don't forget prices on many scarce items have hardly budged because demand ois still "unsophisticated"; collectors are still working without good price guides so scarce items are available far too cheaply.

"Modern" applies across the board to almost all world and US coins plus tokens and medals. Most of this stuff is terra incognito where it's first come first served. And "modern" means something very different in different collectibles with some from as far back as 1919 having almost no demand or supply.

Just poking around a shop recently I found an MS-67 heavily frosted '66 quarter in a set. I bought the small stack found three keepers and wholesaled the rest at a small profit. To me the three keepers make it a huge profit.




This is important though perhaps not so important as it once was. With limited time and resources you just can't check everything.

I just don't know about first day covers. I once saw a spectacular Gem in one struck on burnished planchets but haven't seen enough of these to know. Ultra-modern mint sets are often spectacular. Where I'd have to look through dozens of sets to find something so spectacular now days there can be two or three in a set.

The mint does toy with collectors and might hide Gems almost anywhere. While I've never seen any of the late date souvenir sets I'm told that the coins in these are sometimes top notch. Back in the SMS days one set would look like it was all run over by a forklift and the next set would have all spectacular coins. The mint never even admitted they put Gems in mint sets until 1997!!! Their literature always said mint set coins were regular production uncirculated coins. But in point of fact virtually every Gem made in many years went into a mint set. They simply made mint set coins to a far higher standard. If you think about it this is why there are no BU rolls; if the mint set coins are awful imagine what the coins in BU rolls looked like. People just didn't save them.




I've had to cash in hundreds of BU rolls at the bank. Over the years I saved a few nice rolls when I had the opportunity. Most of these were quite scarce and will have a premium some day but I couldn't wait. I checked them all for Gems and varieties but many of the coins were dark and splotchy so they went to the bank.




This is one of the best coin forums on the net. I have a low "threshold" for posting here.

You think moderns are lonely now you shouldda been around 50 years ago. People would get irate if I told them I collected clad coins.

Good luck with having fun and helping future collectors and hopefully at a tidy profit. I'm confident you'll do well in any of your endeavors.