Success Stories In Coin Collecting

Good thing you don't get tired of posting that coin because I don't get tired of looking at it!

 

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When I was a pre-teen coin collector,a friend of mine showed me a shoe box full of old coins. I came across a 1912-D Liberty Nickel, and knowing it was a good coin, and pretending to think it was only a 2012, no D, I asked my buddy if I can buy it for a quarter, and he agreed, and I got a 1912-D Liberty Nickel for a quarter.

 

So now Mike .....you sell used cars?

 

Dealer junk boxes are full of surprises.
I have cherry picked two 1879-CC for just a common date Morgan.
and a 1919-S Buffalo nickel with some goo on the reverse for 69 cents.
Cleaned it up sent it to ANACS and received a AU-50 grade but cleaned, sold it for $150 and a year later I missed having it, so the dealer that I sold it to still had it and I bought it back for $175.

 

My biggest success as a coin collector was to get paid for practicing my hobby.

 

That my friend isn't a Success story it's " LARCENY"
Dishonestly , among other adjectives ....... but I do appreciate the insight of your moral fiber.....or lack of !

 

If the "complete" collection included an 1877 (the ONLY example for that year), in ANY CONDITION, that was a jackpot!

 

@Paddy54
The hunt is most of the fun!!

 

Can't argue with that. I'd like to.....but I can't.

 

I kinda feel the same way you do. We each measure our levels of success differently. My expectations for you guys are very high, not so much for myself.

Bottom-line for me: I'm having a good time, satisfied with my collect and I'm learning something.

 

I can imagine that this is very cool.

 

A number of years ago, my dealer was getting ready to scrap some 80% Canadian silver. I asked if I could pick through it before he sent it off to the smelter and I ended up buying an Edward II 1904 half for about $6. It was in VF/XF condition with a bad rim bruise, but I liked the design and the coin seemed cool enough. When I got home and opened my Charlton's imagine my surprise when I discovered it was the second lowest mintage for that design (60,000) and carried an value of $400-600. I got a little more interested in picking foreign rarities after that and managed to continuously pick semi-key Canadian and Mexican from that dealer until recently when he started looking them up himself.

 

As you know that's one of my go to favorites but there are two more that don't get the play but are on my 100 most favorite list.

And the 1833 Xf condition has a nice dark tone to it through I'm sure it would get a detail grade that's why it's raw. The damage is old and has toned the same color as the surfaces. The 1827 Au. was purchased from Alan ,and I so love its color. Both coins shown are pretty much the same colors in hand as in the images.

 

Wow ripping off friends and bragging about it. [emoji107]


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

I guess mine has been a slow building "success story" from the beginning. I started collecting again (after giving up in my teens) about 15 years ago. Pretty much my first buy was a box of mixed foreign and British for £50 from an old gent who was de-cluttering. When I sorted through it I quickly dicovered a Bulgarian 10 Leva Gold coin, which at the time was worth about £80, so that was me covered.
Being new to the hobby, I checked every coin carefully and discovered 4 Portuguese 1926 1 Escudo coins. They were base metal, so I might not have looked to closely, but the book suggested they might be worth $25, so I put one on Ebay. It sold a week later for £212! The other 3 made similar amounts, all going back to Portugal and suddenly I had a battle fund of £800.
I kept buying lots, putting what I wanted into my collection and selling the rest - somehow making a profit most of the time. On one occasion I got a call from an old lady who said: "My husband died 7 years ago. He sold the best coins before he went and left me with the c**p, are you interested?" I went to see and recognised a decent collection of Indian coins including a lot of silver. I reckoned there was £150 of scrap silver so made a cheeky offer of £80 expecting her to beat me up - but she accepted straight away! It took me 18 months to sell them all on Ebay and by the end I had netted about £4500.
Now 15 years from start I have a collection worth probably £50k, Spares worth another £10k and a battle fund of £5k - and I have rarely if ever dipped into my wages apart from the original £50. I think that counts as a success story?

 

And anyone can do it...

 

Doing what you love, love what you're doing and getting paid for it?!? Priceless! Don't leave home without it.

 

One of the many pleasant surprises that I had while collecting coins came while doing some grocery shopping in a neighborhood grocery store a couple/few years ago. After arriving home with my goods I emptied my pocket of the change that I had accumulated during my outing that day. It was one of those rare times that I used cash to pay for my merchandise instead of my debit card. To my surprise I had a Flying Eagle cent in my change. I concluded that the cashier mistakenly gave it to me thinking it was a dollar (Pres/Sac). Needless to say I was ecstatic! I went back to the store and made another purchase and asked that same cashier if I could trade her for the dollar coins that she had. She was glad to comply, but there were no other surprises found.

Over the past few years I have had some very nice blessings to come my way by way of pocket change. Mercs, War nickels a couple of Indian Heads. I tell you when it does happen I am like a kid on Christmas morning.

I would have to dig through my collection to post a pic of the Flying Cent and unfortunately, I just looked through my spreadsheet and noticed that I did not catalog it. That is why I did not reference the year or approx. grade. The next time I do a reconciliation I will pull it and post a pic.

 

This was like 1992 or 93...

I bought a 1911 sandblasted Proof 64 NGC 2.5 IND for $21K from a dealer friend of mine. I immediately asked him to crack it out of the NGC slab, then about a month later I took the coin to Long Beach show and did the $100 PCGS walk through service and the coin came back PR65.

Another time I bought a nice group of 27 gold pieces (raw $5,$10 & $20 Libs). sold two of the $10 Libs raw for $5600 ea. and sold two $20 Libs raw for $5800 ea.

Yup, Those were "the good ole days"..

 

I thought of my best,while reading thru the comments.Great thread BTW @Paddy54 , I hope this thread keeps going and we all add to it and see who reels in the biggest fish.

So there I was ... on a Sunday afternoon, at the flea market dealing coins, and at the very end of the day, I go over over to a fellow dealers stand . I find a book of mostly foreign coins, flipping thru pages I'm pulling silver out. Nothing is marked so I ask about an Australian 1932 1 florin 2 schillings(I think) & the dealer says $7, we haggle down to 5or6 bucks and I leave there not knowing if I paid fair or not for the item. When I finally checked ngc price guide, I was floored with astonishment, it was the key date of the whole series and it booked for around $1000 in the estimated grade I gave it (vf)