One of my branch banks is getting close to filling the $1000 HALF bag. I was able to see some of the contents inside last week when she was pulling out a dime bag for me. Inside the HALF$ bag I happen to see a lot of non-50cent coins (dimes,nickels,garbage). My question to those who have purchased HALF$ bags before, are they usually right on the money as to exactly $1000 in halves, or is it SHORT because of different smaller coins that we're included in the count? Is it worth my $1000 to buy it, or am I to get short-changed big-time? Replys!!!!
While I have never bought such bags from any bank, my experience with the counting/sorting machines that are used is that they aren't calibrated and cleaned as often as they should be. I've found discrepancies in the count amounting to as much as 13%. That being the case, I would not trust the stated amount of any bag except when a hand-count confirmed it. Chris
I Agree totally, The banks are paid by weight, Not that there is $1000.00 in the bag. I have been shorted as much as $70.00 on a little over a thousand in coin. I have found where it says I gave them Quarters,Dimes, Nickles, On my printout when all I had was halves. But they are the only game in town so I just feed the machine super slow.And hope it comes out close.
When presented with such an opportunity, always buy the bag. Usually the short on the count for halves is less than $10, and the silver retrieved is extensive. I have been doing this for around 5 years, and have gone through around 15 bags of halves like the one you described. I was only skunked on silver three times on a bag like the one you described, and those bags were for dump banks. Typically, the amount of silver I received from them is usually at least $100 for each one. On my last road trip, I got one from a bank, which was combined from two or three other branches. It had around $400 in silver melt value, an 1810 large cent, 3 silver dimes and a few dollars in foreign spendable currency. The count on the bag was only short $5, so I consider myself ahead.
I would have to agree on the risk being worth it. My best silver scores always come from the counter bags. I've also found quite a few Presidential and Sacagawea Dollars in those bags as well Canadian $2.00 coins. Most of the Dimes, Quarters and others are not part of the count. I also had on one occasion, found a 14kt gold ring in a bag of Half Dollars. So you never know what you might find in those counter bags.
Bags of halves might also produce old British pennies, SBA dollars, prexibux, Canadian Loonies and Twoonies etc. The bags I have gotten from the casino are not worth the trouble, they do calibrate and check their machine in house. The banks are another story, they usually have the lessor of the machine do the calibration and it can be spotty.
Yes. It came from a Wells Fargo branch. I was notified that almost all coin counting machines use the half dollar bag as the reject for objects that don't get picked up by the magnet. Not all the rejects are necessarily counted, only objects of similar size. I've found I don't know how many guitar picks and key's over the years. But besides silver, my absolute favorite to find in half bags are Canadian Twoonies. I mean I have found a lot of those and I can easily get 75% on the dollar exchange rate on them.
Thanks guys for all the input. I'll keep you all informed once I get the bag & checked for silver. Wish me luck, HH, DozerD
I have bought 3 bags from bank counter machines. On the first bag, the machine counted $164. I trusted the machine and bought it as advertised. I found (50) 40% and (1) 90% Kennedys! It did have a handful of odd denomination coins as well, and the total face value in the bag was around $162 so it was well worth it. On the second bag, the machine counted $315 worth. I only found (2) 40% Kennedys. Again the machine count and actual count were within a dollar or two. My third bag had $334.50 and I found (3) 40% Kennedys. Again, the count was very close to exact. I'm buying my fourth bag later this week, it's $500 worth so I am hopeful. I will always buy the half dollar bag in the event somebody dumps their grandfather's coin collection.
I don't think I want bags where I live. My area is infested with coin roll hunters and all I will get is someone's dump. If I am not traveling, my only option is Loomis boxes. I do 5-6 of those a week.
The bags will be off. We used to get them all the time. You take them as you find them. We found several keys in them (as in, door keys and car keys), a bullet (.22 cal), jewelry, tokens, foreign coins, many other things. You want the bags that take their time to fill up, as the others are usually dumps. If you can stand a short bag (usually not more than a few bucks, unless there are a lot of cents, nickels, dimes, quarters in there, which are sometimes counted as halves), they're worth the wait.
I'm in Central California. Find a lot of marked coins as well. Especially with a dark line under the building on the reverse of bicentennial halves. Wouldn't mind trying a bag though. Just to say i did.
Yeah, I see the same tag marks a lot. You have to be quick on the draw to get teller tray halves too during the week too. I often get "someone just bought all of mine this morning" when asking for them.
