I'm not sure what to start with? "newbie"

Rolls are usually filled by big hoppers at the counting houses. These are Brinks, Wells Fargo, Purolator etc who contract with the FED to supply banks with coin. The hopper is mostly filled with returned coins from the banks and these tend to always be totally random; any coin in circulation has about the same chance of going in the roll. Collectors do sort coins a little so it's possible to get something like a roll with eight or nine 1971-D's in it but this will be unusual. Returned rolls from customers are often sorted.

There won't always be enough returned coins from the banks to keep the hopper full so they'll run a jumbo bag of brand new coin. These are the size of the old pallets of coins and are handled by forklifts. They may or may not empty the hopper before putting these in so there can be mixed rolls when they start and end the jumbo bag. These bags are so large that they will always run a lot of solid new coin rolls in between, I believe. New coin can be anything up to three years old. The FED and Mint rotate out the coins they've held the longest so three years is about the oldest any coins can stay in storage. Different FED districts consume vastly different amounts of new coins because of regional usage patterns for coin.

My personal favorite of the circulating coins is the quarter. It used to be that this coin was almost not picked over at all but in the last several years it has become picked over somewhat. But those collectiong this coin tend to not be extremely sophisticated and pass up some of the most desirable varieties. You can still put together a nice VF/ XF set with a lot of later date AU's.

Whatever denomination you settle on it's a good idea to assemble a nice set as a reference and they become a goal inthemselves as well as a source of pride. With most clads it might be wise ro pay a lot of attention to strike. So many of these are poorly made that it's difficult to find nice attractive specimens. Your set will look better if you avoid the poor strikes, culls, and tarnished coins.

Good luck.

 

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Could somebody elaborate on this. This is the second time I have heard somebody say to do half dollars. I don't understand, thanks again. Is it a date thing or something else.

 

.... you purchase bank rolls of Half Dollars at face value and with any luck you'll get Ag Clad or even better Ag Coinage. Look them up in your Red Book.

You'll immediately 'profit' as the Ag content is worth more than the face value at which you purchased.

Good hunting!

 

Ag = silver (just in case you didn't know that).

 

Thanks for the information guys. I am still wondering what to start with. I am not going to be looking to make money off of collection, but I really would like to find a rare coin someday. The thought of possible finding a treasure is neat to me. I am not sure what to expect. If I start with penny's and buy from the bank is it going to be possible to find an earlier 1900's coin in there? Or will I find a mid 40's or lower nickel? Maybe I should just buy 10 dollars worth of penny's and 10 worth of nickles. Thanks again guys.

 

*****
that good Idea cent are cheap maybe you will find a wide AM or 1983 DDO& DDR
nickles are cheap too. but the 1st thing is to have fun. the mother load may not be there as soon as you hope. so don't quit! one day you will find it!

 

Holy crow. Just goes to show one can find treasures anywhere.

 

Half dollars are en excellent place to start because there is still quite a bit of silver in them...as they don't circulate as much and people haven't picked out all the silver coins yet. Most people know that dimes, quarters and half dollars 1964 and older are 90% silver. For that reason, you will very rarely find them in circulation. However, with half dollars...for some reason most people don't know that from 1965-1970 they are 40% silver and as a result worth well over face value. You won't find a ton of them...but silver half dollars are a lot more common in circulation than other silver coins. When I worked at a bank, a couple times I bought $500 bags of rolled half dollars. When I went through them I would always find a couple silver halves. My best bag 7 or 8 in it (including a Fanklin Half) and the worst I think had 2.

 

Hello Newby. I would start collecting the coins currently in circulation. That way you can decide what coin to persue over time. That is how I started and I've decided within a few years to go with half dollars.

 

Thanks for all the information guys. I don't have a lot of free time today, but I am going to buy 10 dollars worth of penny's and 10 dollars of nickel's today. I am also going to buy a magnifying glass, because the only one I have is really small.

 

Have fun!!! Let us know what you find. :thumb: