Undervalued?

Eastern European coinages used to be undervalued but now they have risen to some insane prices these few years.

You can always invest in silver. ITs bound to go up. Also gold is good because of all the activity it has seen in the past year.

First, Mike, welcome to the forum! We have a lot of fun here, learn a lot of things about numismatics, and there's a LOT of expertise here to help and guide you in your new endeavor.

You're asking a toughie question since eventually just about all coins are undervalued in that historically, the value of all coins will go up. Some go up faster than others depending upon their mintage numbers and condition; as a very general rule, the fewer coins minted and the higher the condition (grade), the more demand and the higher and faster will a coin's value increase.

Given that none of us are rich enough to collect everything, all of us have narrowed down our collections to specific series which interest us for personal reasons, e.g., we are attracted to certain coins because of their attractive appearance or they are "different" or they represent a particular period in history in which we are interested or they might prove to be a good long-term investment or a combination of all these factors. My particular bent is 19th century coins and I "specialize" in Morgan silver dollars (I'm a Civil War/Indian War military history nut, so this series fits in nicely with my history interests), but also have a side collection of Flying Eagle cents and am looking at 3-cent pieces. A growing field is Bust Half Dollars. There's a lot of 19th century series, so the field is quite expansive and it's easy to get carried away. I think a "sleeper" field is 1800s dimes in which some nice specimens may be found for relatively low cost (with a LOT of exceptions), but this is just my opinion. Others prefer "modern" (mid-20th century and later) coins because of their ease of collection in terms of availability and relatively low cost (again, with exceptions).

What it comes down to is your personal interests, the amount of time you want to spend searching for a specific coin or coin series, and of course, the amount of money you want to put into the hobby (or avocation or investment). Coin collecting is a lot of fun and has advantages over many other hobbies in terms of small storage space needed, potential for investment gains, and a huge source pool from which to choose. Most of us also have other hobbies or leisure time activities which may be completely unrelated to coins, so we have a wide diversity of viewpoints and can (and do) articulate from these external perspectives.

Fred

Jeffersons are probably a bit undervalued, since the key date 1950-d can be had in MS-65 for around $15. Roosevelt dimes are also another sleeper series, since they can be had in very high condition for a relatively low cost. I think that 3 cent pieces would be a great investment, seeing as many pieces with mintages under 1,000 won't cost you nearly as much as a semi-key morgan.

But then again, this is just my opinion. It's really hard to predict what will actually happen in the coin market, since it's volatile like the stock market.

Roosevelt dimes and Franklin halves, better get them while you can. I think these two coin denominations are sleepers. This is only my opinion and observations.

I will agree with Irishraider on the Franklin halves, especially the uncs and proofs. Best grab them while you can as I see an explosion in value in the near future. I also have had a national dealer tell me many dealers are currently buying them up in anticipation of that upward trend.

Common date Peace dollars in the low (MS-60 thru 64) grades.

Good Luck
Ben

I believe the move in price of the post-WWII coins is really in its infancy. The time that people quit saving new coin varied all over the world and always started when the silver was removed from circulation and mintages soared. The earliest were '46 or '47 and the latest were in 1968. Some of the earlier ones have already had substantial moves. New Zealand coin became cu/ ni in 1947 and now despite the debasement, huge mintages, and the fact that there is very little demand for moderns these coins often sell for more than the older silver coins. You can find dozens of the old silver coins for each of the debased coins and there is little demand for cu/ ni and still they sell for only a little more. As time goes on this will be seen increasingly. Greek 1957 2D listed for less than $10 in unc in the '86 Krause but these small cu/ ni coins now sell for nearly $1000 in nice condition and even XF's list for $200. Every year it seems more and more of these are being exposed as very rare. Prices are being pushed up by a very small number of collectors.

The same thing is occuring in US coins though we aren't leading the world in this particular case. While very high grade US moderns are bringing prices many find insane there is a growing and firming market for lower grade coins. Few guides still list MS-65 clad for prices based on roll prices. This was meaningless anyway since most moderns are virtually unavailable in rolls and if you could find them there would be no MS-65's anyway. Now even Coin Values is listing realistic prices for such coins for the first time. While there's still work to do on the guides this realism will be a major boost to these markets because for the first time buyers and sellers will be on the same page. There is no reason to discount the special issues, varieties and errors in modern coins. While relatively few old time collectors have much interest in these it is very common for even beginning modern collectors to seek some varieties. If you're actually collecting modern US and world coins rather than hording large numbers of what's available then you're probably doing extremely well.

The number of overlooked issues is still nearly endless. A young person starting on some comprehensive collection like aluminum or the coins of Africa would find an enormous challenge simply because these coins have mostly been completely ignored. Every year there's a little more demand and there never was much of a supply. The coins went into circulation and then were often melted to make refrigerators or medical instruments.