I search rolls and bags of coins but hve never thought about searching paper money do many people do this? What can I expect to find or should I be looking for if I went to the bank and got 100 $1's for example? Is it true there were 5 different $1 bills in 1969 or were there more than that? I have learned some good stuff on this Paper Money Forum and thought I might try to see if I could find something special if I only knew what to look for. I had never heard of star notes or birthday notes or thought aboput find consecutive serial numbers, which by the way is that hard to do or just wait until the notes come in and ask a favorite teller to check for them? I hope this wasn't too many questions for one post but I know nothing about Paper Money except some of the old stuff is very ornate and classic looking like works of art you can carry with you. I hope I haven't been too much trouble. Thanks Kent
if you were to buy $100 notes, you wouldnt find much, and your chances of finding something wouldnt be high either. Its when you repeatedly do this that you chances increase. Yes, i am a strap searcher lol star notes average .5% of all notes, so for 100 notes, you have a 50% chance of finding 1 star - on average. I search $200 in singles on average of 3 times a week... the last several months i have not found a single star note. In the past i was averaging 3 stars per 200 singles. in printing 1 in 10,000 notes is a radar, so expect to find a radar in strap searching about those same odds. They can be found more frequently, but its all playing the odds. b-day notes can be found... some quite easily depending on how you warp the serial number to fit what you want to see lol repeaters of all types can be found as well. ladders too ... i also depends on how you warp the serial to fit what you want it to be.
Well thtis is all new to me i just learned what a b-day and a star was last week now you are using terms like ladders and radar and repeaters. Boy i have a lot to learn, could you explain some of these terms and how important they are compared to each other. thanks for replying Kent
a radar is a note with a serial that reads exactly the same backwards and forwards. 12344321 is a radar. a note with a serial of 12345678 is considered a laddar. I also like notes with 23242526 as a serial (23-24-25-26), but alot of folks dont consider that a ladder. so its open to some discussion. 34363537 would not be a ladder (34-36-35-37)in anyons opinion except for ebay sellers. a repeater is any serial with repeating numbers. 12341234 (1234-1234)is a repeater. 23242324 (2324-2324) is a repeater. 31393537 is not even though the 3 does repeat a few times. dont fear asking questions if you dont know or understand, there are alot of paper money collectors on this forum who would be happy to answer any they can
I recommend getting a couple of hundred in ones, then when you're done, strapping it back and exchanging them for another strap at the bank, I use to do this with 200 notes daily and found several notes, this was before I learned what RADARs and LADDERs were. I found a bunch of stars and older notes from the 60s and 70s. I inturn took them to my local dealer, sold them to him for 2-3x face and it helped get my main collection going. On average I would make about 20-30 dollars a week searching straps which helps when you want to get specific items at the shop.
In modern currency there ain't much to look for, In modern stuff unless you can obtain tons of Unc. bills there is not a whole lot to search for as compared to coins anyway. There are errors and stars and numbers and sometimes a printing/paper type error. Finding special numbers is fun but the ones that get through are not generally going to be the "big ones", like solid numbers - people with deep pockets have friends at the fed and the brick numbers are easy to see. These people buy bricks if there is special numbers in it then they get it. Modern star note are wayyyyy overrated as far as rairity goes and just do not sell well down here - people have $100 packs of $1 Stars and are lucky to get $125 if that. It's the $1 and $2 that bring premiems in that kind of stuff, a $20 dollar star note is worth $20. If I was going to search paper it would have to be unc. packs and the pickings are slim - but there are tougher notes even in modern times but your not going to find them and fine them nice in circ. stuff. If searching Unc. packs of $1 or $2's that don't appear to have stars always look at the back few notes for stars, even in the middle sometimes will be one or two stars. There are several good books on paper but not near as many paper collectors as coin collectors. Good luck!!!
bhp3rd does have a valie point, their is not alot of profit to be had in most places for finding and selling star notes and other fun things. But to me, profit is not the point. I love finding and keeping star notes, looking for radars and ladders ect. i love looking for printing errors as well, and have only found 1. Collecting is not about making a profit... investing is. If you are looking to cash in on profits from what you find, then i agree with bhp3rd - go with unc straps. otherwise, if you are only searching for the fun and love of the hobby of collecting... then search away quality of notes wont matter much then!
I am into this for three reasons #1 Fun of searching that is why I go through boxes of cents weekly #2 Keeping what I find for the long term because a find is still worth the face value even 20 years from now #3 Teaching my nephews and future Grandchildren there is a history and value to money other than buying video games. I am not giong to tell you I don't to have something of value, but I am not in the selling business I am in the collecting and trading of what appeals to me and what i can afford. I really appreciate all the help I get on here and also seeing the pictures of the stuff I will never be able to afford. Kent
Another thing you can do is ask at the bank if they have any packs of new bills. The numbers will all be consecutive, and you can sometimes find an interesting serial number in them. Chris
I used to have great luck finding stuff before all of the design changes. It has been years since I have even seen any of the 1928 style notes in circulation. You might get lucky if you have a friendly bank teller to watch for you. If had bought gold will all of the old bills I pulled out of circulation I would have more money than I have in keeping the old bills. Unless you find something very rare currency searching is just for collecting, not for making money.
I'm not specifically a US banknote collector but any I come across I previously didn't have I keep. So now I can identify year issues, mints etc. Here in Thailand I go through a lot of banknotes every week in business and I check them all. Obviously older issues are easier to pick out from batches and there are an awful lot of signatures to collect but I know that about once a year the signatures change on the standard notes. So the point is there's always something to look for and that to me is half the fun.
