How do you keep records of your coin collection?

Hello everyone,

I’m curious how fellow coin collectors keep records of their collections.

Do you use Excel, Google Sheets, a dedicated coin-collecting program, a handwritten ledger, photos on your computer, or something else entirely?

I currently built a custom program for cataloguing antiquities, and now I’m considering making a similar program for coins. Before I start designing it, I’d like to learn what collectors actually need and what existing tools may be missing.

For those of you who keep detailed records, what information do you usually record?

What features would be most important to you in a coin catalogue program?

And what frustrations do you have with the tools you currently use?

I’d really appreciate any ideas, examples, or advice from collectors who have already developed their own record-keeping systems.

Thank you.

 

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I use Excel. The spreadsheet contains as much information as might prove useful to my heirs. I include all identifying information about each item in the collection, for example: country of origin, type, date, mint mark, metal, grade, TPG slab info, date purchased, place of purchase (if from an auction I include the lot #), price paid, serial number for paper money, rarity #if notable, and a column for comments that include description of coin obv and rev for ancient, tokens, and foreign coins, condition notes and provenance.

I also have several tabs for coins: bullion, US, world, ancient, commemorative, paper money, British trade tokens, exonumia, colonial, errors, California gold, patterns, and beehive coins which are a sub specialty.

 

Index cards

I trust nothing...nothing...nothing digital.

 

From past threads, most folks use Excel. It's free and easy to build a sheet. I started with just a ledger but went with a program called Coin Elite about 30 years ago. There is nothing it can't do. I was too lazy to build an Excel.
Coin Elite has a built in data base of about every US coin that has ever been minted. That saves a lot of time if you have a large collection to enter. It also has a price guide you can buy updates for.

 

Excel, plus gradually building a file of photos. CT got me into that so I could post, but I am woefully short of picturing all of even my better coins.

 

I don't really trust it either, but it is more convenient. I do make multiple encrypted back-ups and once or twice a year drop a flash drive into my safe deposit box, safeguarding not only my coin file but tax records, photos, and other important documents. The main danger, however, is not physical destruction (even index cards can be lost or burned in a disaster), but changing technology so that files can no longer be read. I have to make sure to keep saved files readable by current technology. I don't trust anybody's "cloud" for anything!

 

I don't.

 

Where do I find Excel for free?

 

Records?? Oh dear.....

 

I'm wrong. Sorry. For me it came free. Before I retired I bought 50+ new PCs from Dell every few years. Many programs were already loaded on each system. Right now my system is running a really old version of Excel running on Windows 8. I use it a lot for many things.

 

For me, I use Numista for record keeping. You can sign up for free and it also allows you to limit who can see your collection. You are also able to add your photos when you catalogue things in your collection. There are also little graphs that populate to show the spread of dates, your heaviest and lightest coin, etc. I really enjoy that feature. For me I like this platform because you are able to sort by different countries/issues, which is quite important with world coins.

As the majority of my collection is slabbed by NGC or PCGS I also add them to the respective registries.

I am a very terrible record keeper when it comes to what I paid for coins though.

Mycollect, which I also add coins on, has a neat feature to search by certification number which is really convenient when you have the coin in hand. It also pulls the population data from NGC/PCGS.

I perform almost all of my coin collecting tasks on a cell phone, so having the program compatible with tablets/phones is a must. And I detest an app that simply opens a page on a website. I'll immediately delete it.

 

I just use a journal book and pics, most of my buys are tokens or so called dollars so I don't always need a KM# but for the SCD i need the HK number. All I keep in my book is the name, what it is, date I bought it and price paid. On my laptop I keep pics that have a numbering system underneath that contains the price paid, I keep it as simple as possible.

 

Excel.

Z

I know a guy . . .

Z

 

While not Excel, you can get a free Microsoft Office copycat in Apache Office at openoffice.org.

 

I use Excel. Nothing fancy tracked:

• Country
• Date/mint
• Denomination
• Variety / Catalog #
• Grade
• Purchased From
• Purchase Year
• Cost
• TPG Cert
• Notes - Things like variety not listed on cert
• Provenance
• Location - Which safety deposit box it's in
• Picture - A clickable link to a picture of the coin on my computer

For anyone who has insurance on their collection, this info is something that you need to track in case there is ever an incident. It's much more difficult for them to deny a claim if you have meticulous records.

 

Google sheets for me.

I know many collectors think of this as a hobby and don't care much about the eventual disposition of what you've collected but I've put enough money into some of my coins that I need to track my cost basis as accurately as possible.

Sales of your collectibles are a category that the US IRS recognizes for capital gains and losses (https://www.irs.gov/instructions/i8949). This makes sense if you have put a significant amount of money into your collecting (yes, a relative term for each of us) and have not used your collectibles for personal use (for coins that would include having them displayed in a museum), then you can claim capital losses when you sell them. Believe me, if you sell through an auction house there are plenty of costs you can add to your basis to make it worth your while to claim a capital loss.

 

Excel-You can design a spreadsheet to contain the information for the coin.