Coin proof and mint sets?

What are your feelings about collecting Mint & Proof silver sets? Which or either a wise investment?

 

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Common sets aren't worth it for investment purposes, but older low mintage sets w/ silver may increase in value over time.

 

Go to the Red Book and see the section on Mint and Proof sets that shows the Face Value, Issue Price and Current Price. It won't take long to figure that buying anything from the US Mint is not a good investment.

 

Collecting proof and mint sets for fun is what we do.... DO NOT collect them as an investment!! I know my dealer buddy will throw you out if you try to sell him mint sets... I am kidding of course, but he has stacks upon stacks of them. Historically, they just don't trade as hot as most collector coins..... I think it is a backward trend. Mint sets are beautiful. But I would never suggest buying them as an investment. If you like them, absolutely buy them.

 

Neither.

 

Been there, done that, lost my arse…Maybe silver….

 

U.S. Mint Proof & Mint sets are not worth trying as an investment. But if you have access to any of the Krause catalogs, look through them for different countries mint & proof sets. There is some real money in many of these as many are made in very limited quantities. I wish I had invested some back in the day.

 

I've been buying foreign mint sets for many years but the rarities were hard to find. The Indian mint sets were only a dollar or two each but I never found a single one of them and now they bring as much as $4000. Sure, I've found some winners and have safety deposit boxes with all sorts of them but there's never a sure thing. I passed up a few Soviet mint sets because I didn't want to pay over a couple dollars for them and now they go for hundreds and thousands. I passed a big stack of 1982-P US souvenir sets because the guy wanted $4. I picked out a few nice ones for $5 instead.

Now days everything is speculative. Even bank accounts are speculative. There are worse things to save than nice 1959 proof sets.

It's very hard to go against the common wisdom. Everyone knew that every modern was common junk so paying $5 for a set felt like sticking my neck out. I passed up far better deals on more expensive coins.

Buy with blood in the streets and sell when your taxi driver buys. Everyone will do the wrong thing but you'll be right once in a while if you just don't do whatever others are doing.

 

They look nice but try to get your money back. The Red Book has issue price and current value. Notice the difference?

 

There's certainly some research to do as to which countries to try out. But many countries show steady & positive upwards tends so that's where I've picked out a few. No crystal ball for this for sure.

 

Investment?

I think I'll echo the sentiments of others when I say that I don't see any common modern US Mint/Proof Sets accumulating too much extra value in my lifetime.

Maybe if you could find really nice original 1964 and earlier Silver Proof Sets or Double Mint Sets...but not only are they going to set you back at least $25/set (much, much more for the DMS or early 1950's sets) they'll take up a bunch of space - plus you'll have to worry about environmental damage. And even then the value of the sets might just depend on the condition of the coins inside (any Top Pops, cameos, toners or die varieties?)

Now, if you want to buy Proof/Mint sets to cherrypick for die varieties, mint errors, toners, cameos or high grade specimens...and use that money to fund other areas of your collection, that's another thing. But that's going to take a lot of time (both in learning what to look for and in actually looking through the coins) and will still require you to know which coins to submit, which to save, etc. Then you'll need to find a way to unload all the extra sets/loose coins once you've gone through them.

I suppose it all depends on what you can buy them at. I wouldn't turn down any proof/mint sets at face value because I know I'd have a blast looking through them and I couldn't really lose money on the deal...but buying them at retail? No thanks unless I already know there's something in there really worth paying up for.

FWIW, most coin shops I know turn up their noses at most large groups of proof/mint sets, especially the 70's-90's years, because they already have enough in stock for the one or two people who come in looking to buy them, so if you do want to sell something like that you'll need to have another plan ready to go.

I think you could find plenty of other things to buy that would be a better investment. Unless you can get them for free or face value.

 

Thanks for all the wisdom. Pretty much what I figured. I am not big on them either. Curious what others thought more than anything. I still enjoy hunting that 1914D, 1909 S Dvd, and that DD 1955 penny.

 

Most moderns from all over the world simply weren't saved and are very hard to find in pristine condition. Most were poorly made so nice coins are even harder yet. Where the US made mint sets from the beginning most countries didn't start until the mid-'70's and the mintages were tiny. When I started back in the '70's there were very few mint sets and lots of proof sets. Even though I selectively bought mint sets there just aren't many and most are rather common like Mexico.

The best thing about mint sets though is that most mints put their nicest coins in the sets. This allows collectors to find premium examples for low cost. Most of my mint set coins were purchased as singles. Dealers knew the mint sets wouldn't sell and a few dollars was the best possible but if they cut the coins up then they could get more total.

I tried to find one of everything and if I noticed I couldn't find something I put it on the list of coins to watch for. A few times I was able to find quantities of such coins. There are a great number of highly underappreciated coins. Swiss, for example, is widely collected as silver but the same designs in cu/ ni are very inexpensive despite their scarcity. People see inexpensive coins and they assume they are common but in moderns "inexpensive" is more likely to mean uncollected. Obviously some moderns are exceedingly common and it will take a while to identify these. Millions of some issues were imported into the US for collectors and promotions. There are about 150 different of these that exist in staggering numbers.

 

I was just thinking to myself this morning that world clad coins from the 1940’s through 1970’s should be a nice area of opportunity. It must have been poking through the mint sets I recently picked up that did it - for example, my Hungary 1978 mint set had three coins in it with mintages of only 50,000 pcs.

 

I get the point that they started earlier than a lot of countries, but they certainly didnt start from the beginning

 

I only collect sets if there are silver or gold coins in them. Most of the sets that don't have silver or gold in them aren't worth what you paid for them. I did like the 2021 Limited Edition. It had 2 ASEs in it..one T-1 and another T-2, a half dollar, 2 quarters, and a dime. It was a great catch... for me, that its.

 

We collect silver sets for fun and for our granddaughters' future. Of course, along with other safe investments, they should be fine! Good question, thanks.

 

So, you don't have the one from 1793?

 

Lol I wish

 

I agree with most of the threads that mint and proof sets are definitely for personal enlightenment, certainly not for investment purposes. Only the super rare coins are decent investment material. However, if you are truly a collector of coins, you no doubt have other reasons for collecting. Could be sentimental, historical, genealogical, etc. One great thing about coins is that they all tell the story of history. I collect them to keep my family's history alive, concentrating on German and Welsh coins with pertinent dates that correspond to milestones, births, deaths, etc. The hunt for them is the fun part.