I am new to the whole silver investing, and I came across dozens of junk silver quarters and dimes at a pawn shop selling for $5.75 per quarter and $2.30 per dime. I did the quick math and figured that at the time quarters were going for $6.52 at spot, and the dimes I think were around $2.50. I bought some quarters and some dimes, but I mostly bought quarters. I was surprised at the low prices as opposed to what I've seen other junk silver selling for. Was this a good deal, or is this the norm when it comes to junk silver prices in relation to the spot price? I've done some research and reading on the forum on prices, but I'm still a little confused on what to pay for junk. Any help or advice before I buy more would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance.
At this very moment, the melt value of a quarter is $6.45. A dime is $2.58. So you did well. I've looked at E-BAY recently, and have seen some junk silver going as high as 30X face. Most of the coin shops in my area are sold out of junk silver and are having trouble finding anymore. Anyway glad you got some. Welcome to Coin Talk!!
I'm guessing that most folks running pawn shops are pretty busy these days, and some of them don't keep on top of repricing items the way they should. I've been thinking I should hit a few of the pawn shops around here and see if any of them are trailing the silver price.
When it comes to silver coinage, most pawn shops don't track the price of silver. They buy at one price, and triple their selling price to make their profit.
Here is how I look at it. Spot silver as I'm typing is at $35.79. There are 715 ounces in a $1,000 bag. Therefore a bag prices out to $25,590. That's 25.59 times face. Tulving will pay spot minus $.85 for whole bags. That is about 2.4% under spot. I never pay more than 95% of spot and on average, over time, I probably pay 92 or 93%. Silver dollars are an exception. I'll pay a little more for them (spot times .773 plus $1) since they still have some premium if you sell them.
I don't have Pawn shops here in this part of New York anymore . They are a great place to occasionally find some good buys.
My local coin shop is only paying around 19X to 21X face. Is this typical and do coin show vendors typically pay a bit more for junk silver?
