http://completed.shop.ebay.com/i.ht...mpt=Coins_US_Individual&LH_Complete=1&guest=1 These have come down a lot, these boxes were way above $100 just a few months ago. My thought is that these will be good to have long term. Any thoughts?
There's a reason they're coming down in price...they were never worth that much in the first place. If you can get one of the boxes for $50...go for it...the copper is worth that much. Just be prepared to drag that "boat anchor" around with you (personal experience) for the next 20-30 years before you see a reasonable return on your investment. 1-5 coins is a collection...2500 coins is an investment. My personal opinion is that if you put $50 into a J&J stock dividend reinvestment plan (DRIP) over that same period...you'll make enough to buy two+ boxes...and you can let someone else lug "the investment" around for you until then.
I'd recommend holding out. Like its been said, that box is one big pile of dead weight and a shipping charge nightmare for low returns. The price is still dropping and they haven't even stopped minting the commemorative coins yet. At the start of the year the new boxes were over $200 and have been dropping steadily ever since. I say the price on those boxes has nowhere to go but down. Expect to see them averaging $35-40 by January, and staying there for several years. I've avoided buying even the rolls just yet, trying to find them on my own. No way I'm spending 2-4 cents a piece for brand new pennies when I'll probably find MS-like 09 coins in my change and bank rolls all next year. Just my personal opinion.
I got 12 mint bags of lincolns '59-'63...I'm ashamed to say how long I've been hauling them around. I've been making the same mistake for quite some time...just trying to share what I've learned. Here's a quote from Scott Travers' "TOP 88 COINS to Buy & Sell"...
I say that these are cut from a different cloth than those. People (and HSN) are going to want the complete 20 coin set of 2009 Lincolns. Collectors could turn to mint sets for those but these are completely different coins than the mint set ones, they are literally made of a different substance! (btw I flipped the one box I got early on, now I am thinking about grabbing a box or 2)
With the mintage sky high on them, why buy them just to have around. I bought a bag of 1978-s Lincolns, put them in plastic coin rolls and then in a box. Every time I move I have to lug them to a new place. The box is falling apart making it difficult to carry yet I keep on doing it. In hindsight, very foolish of me.
Someone mentioned that the copper in these coins would be worth the cost of the rolls. But these rolls listed on ebay don't have copper in them, do they? The copper coins were only in Mint sets and were never put in rolls, correct?
For 2009, the proof lincolns and the satin finish lincolns included in the mint sets are the only ones to have the high copper content. All the obw rolls you get at the bank and also the rolls released as two roll sets by the mint are all copper plated zinc.
I'm not sure why, but I thought ALL the Lincoln cents this year were 95% copper, and 5% tin/zinc. I went back to confirm and see that composition used in the Proof sets and satin-finish Mint sets, only. If you go to the Mint's Coin Specification page, the composition of the "circulating" coins is copper plated zinc...with only a 2.5% copper content. Edit: Beat me to it, Buck!
I put together 2 boxes (100 rolls) of the Formative Year D mint wrapped rolls. You know how guys were breaking open the mint boxes to search the P mint rolls for errors, and left the D mint wrapped roll unopened. I'll hold onto to them, as they're a little different than NF String boxes.
As you know 100 rolls weigh about 35 pounds, so forgive me for not dragging them out of my closet for a pic. They are the LP2 mint wrapped D rolls. I picked them up one at a time on ebay, some in multiples (5 at a time) on ebay. Finally some bigger off ebay purchases. I know I have more $ into to them than they're worth, but it's kinda fun to look at a 100 mint wrapped rolls of a one year issue.
I'm hoping my delayed purchase of the '09 Lincoln cents pays off and the prices keep dropping. I already have the mint and silver proof sets coming from the mint, so all I need is the circulating examples now. I'm just too cheap to spend big bucks on coins that I may one day find in my pocket change.
