Out Of Curiosity

That's a great question. I have never found coins at any of those places but I've been hooked on those storage auction shows on tv and they have found some silver quarters and different things. I want to take a shot at buying a storage locker but they are few and far between in Montana.

Got 2 rolls of wheats at a yard sale once but nothing valuable.

I have never found anything, but I am sure some people do.

I've said this here many times. If you go to yard, garage, estate sales, you have to ASK. In almost every place people are afraid to put questionable types of items out on display. Same with items easily stolen that could be easily cashed in anywhere.
By this I mean you will hardly ever find any coins, stamps, guns, knives out on tables at those places. You have to ASK.
I do and have come up with many, many items that people just would not place out on tables. At one garage sale I asked and a lady said she had a jar of old pennies. She went and got that jar and the entire bottom was full of Indian cents. It was her deceased husbands. She wanted me to sit there and count them all. I estimated about $35 so I offered $50 without counting and she took that. At home I found all coins were older than the 50's. And yes, lots of valuable ones.
At other garage/yard/estate sales I've found guns, swords, knives, coins, etc all the time but you have to ASK.
Sometimes a person is there alone and don't want to leave their items alone so you may have to ASK if you could come back later when there might be someone else there. That too worked for me and came up with some really great things.
I really don't know anywhere where you would find coins laying out on a table at those places. You really have to ASK.
One other tip is when asking for coins, guns, knives, etc. it really pays to have a wife, kid, girl friend with you. People just don't trust men as much if alone or with other men.

Can't say about yard sales........ but once I asked the owner of a coin laundry,(it had been there forever and he was the second owner after his father had passed it down), if he had any old coins. I told him I would pay spot for any all silver coins he had. Three hours later I walked out of there with a 5gallon bucket half full of halves, quarters, and dimes! Seems they had been sorting out silver coins for the last 30+ years!

Good thing this was the first part of 2003 and spot was under $5 an oz.!

True And also "My Father, Mother, Aunt, Uncle, etc. passed away and left me with these" or "Found in a basement in a house I just purchased"
My favorite is "I know nothing about coins and have these....."


Exactly why so many people say they never find anything at those sales. They just don't ASK.
And that is true I find if you just blurt out have any coins, guns, knives, etc. I always sort of wander around looking at stuff. Then usually say something, to the people having the sale, like so much of this is always for women. Hardly ever anything for us guys. You wouldn't have any old coins laying around would you?
The main thing I've found is to try to start a conversation with people having the sale. And again it really pays to have someone with you that is not another man. Also, try to look presentable and not like you just got done changing the oil on your car. People just don't trust dirty people. You may really be shocked at how much stuff you can get this way.
And the main thing is you really have to just ASK.

Actually a garage sale got me "reinvolved" in colleting. About 10 years ago, my neighbor was having a garage sale. His brother in law was there selling stuff. He had about 50 half dollar tubes each full of stuff you might find in a dealers junk box. They were marked at $2 each. I bought about 5 of them. I went home and looked through them and they had a few silver coins in them. I went back and we dickered for a long time. I finally agreed to buy the rest of what he had at $1 per tube. The silver that was in the coins was worth more than what I paid for them (and that was back in 2000). A few weeks later I got his number called him and went to look at the rest of what he had. We agreed on a price and we were both VERY happy with it.

About a month ago I was at an estate auction, I picked up a bag of foreign coins for $13. It had coins with over 5.25 ASW. One of my neighbors was there and when he found out I liked foreign coins, he said he had some sitting in a box that he had no interest in. I told him I'd be interested in looking through it if he was interested in selling. I was disappointed that most of what he brought by was paper currency about 200 notes, most from WWII era. He had about 40 coins with about 1.2 oz ASW. I offered him $30 for the coins. He told me to make him an offer on the paper money, I offered him $100 for all of it and he accepted.

You have to make an effort, but yes, there are collections that are available.

As far as 'unsearched'- well these guys hadn't searched, didn't know, and didn't want to take the time to figure out what they had. I took a bit of a risk (although very calculated) and was willing to buy it and spend my time sorting and researching.

Frankly, if someone is selling 'unsearched' coins, there's no way to know if they have searched them or not. However, how do they know that the whole roll is wheat cents if they havn't looked at them? Strange...