To normal people, coin collectors are a strange bunch who cannot pass up the opportunity to poke around in the cup holder of loose change looking for the next big find. If you were to just happen to come across something that has value, would you tell the person who owns the pile, or just keep it to yourself? If it were my wife, I would tell her; I confiscate all her change. My kids just give me theirs, then take what I leave laying around. I have a brother though, who collects change, but isn't a collector. I dig around in his cup holder sometimes and if I find something interesting, he wants to see it and then won't give it back. Yea it was his to begin with, but he don't actually collect, except to cash it in once a year. He told be a couple weeks ago that he cashed in enough change to pay the taxes on a new car. We are not quite a year apart in age and a lot of people get us mixed up, because we do look a lot alike. We used to work together and would stop by the same bank to cash our checks on Friday. I would always ask the teller for any half or silver dollars that she had in her drawer. Sometimes when he would beat me to the bank, they would give them to him without asking because they thought he was me, if they they turned out to be silver, he would poke at me for a week over it and never give them up. It's all fun and games but I have never sold a coin that I collect and have never sold one that I found. If I found it, I would keep it, and if it just so happened to be in his cup holder and I let him know about it, I have no doubts that I would have to buy it from him at market value, so I consider his cup holder fair game. I would like to hear others ideas of fair game.
If the nickel was a 1918/7 Buffalo, I would reach into a urinal (bare handed mind you) to retrieve it!
That can be a problem. My brother and I looked a lot alike and both banked at the same bank. They "knew us so well" they knew our last name and account numbers. Problem is they didn't realize there were two of us. so when either one of us made a deposit they put the money in my brothers account, and when either of us wrote a check they took the money out of my account. I was operating on cash and depositing my paychecks building up a pile for a coin show but they put all the money in his account. Went to the show, wrote checks to dealers all around the country, and they all bounced! Not a good feeling. About that time his account went screwy as well. We did some checking and found my deposits going to him, and that his account hadn't been ballooning because they were running someone elseses checks through his account! When we went in to get is straightened out they did a double take and said "Oh my god there's two of you!" They did make my checks good and they wrote letters to every dealer explaining what had happened and that it wasn't my fault.
Never had that happen but I did have to dodge a slap from a chic that he went out with once. Never seen the girl before in my life.
