Is this a bad time to get into coin collecting?

V. Kurt Bellman · May 28, 2015

Conder101 said: ↑

Not if you are searching for something rare, specific, or obscure. In my fields I can search at shows, shops, online, even on specialty dealers lists, and I am very lucky if I can find more than a few items I can use (in ANY condition) in a years time. I spent years searching for an Essex 3 Conder token. It is supposed to be Scarce. During the ten years I searched I must have seen close to two dozen of them listed. Every single one of them misattributed. I finally found a lower grade corroded one in an ebay lot unidentified. Sure I'd like to find a better one but at least I have one. believe me it wasn't like buying a new dishwasher.

And in my searches I've also found some previously unknown items.
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I smell a reason for somebody's user name, don't I?

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V. Kurt Bellman · May 28, 2015

TaterTot said: ↑

Lots of interesting responses.

I totally get the need to determine how one approaches the hobby... picking an area of desire, determining if it's for fun or investment, setting a budget and a goal. I agree these are all very important.

But the responses that interest me most are the ones about "the hunt." This really gets to the crux of my original pondering, I think.

Like DieHard11's story mentioned previously... I do not have much opportunity to have reasonable success looking at coins from the grocery store like there would have been in the 60's. Supply and circulation are down. Hoarding is up.
Sure, I can go to the bank and order a ridiculous amount of rolled coins and pick through them to try to find some cool half dollars. But that isn't really a find in the wild. And yeah, I can just go buy the coins at a shop or online. But there's no hunt & find in that at all. It's just like buying a new dishwasher.

To put a real example on it, say I'd like to focus a little on a Walking Liberty half-dollar short set. My options are at extreme opposites of the spectrum. I can just buy them all, even all at once. Or, search forever in circulation and find very little, if anything. What am I missing in the spirit of the actual "collecting" verb in this hobby?

Long story short--what's the more important part of the hobby? The "hunt" or the "own?"
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When I was a young buck, it was about "own". Two marriages, one kid, 20-some years, and one cerebral hemorrhage later, it is ALL about the "hunt" and helping others, and being helped by others, in those hunts. "Release the hounds..."

Maybe I'm nuts, but I find being a "process guy" very much more fulfilling than being a "mine, mine, mine" guy.

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Is this a bad time to get into coin collecting?

V. Kurt Bellman Yes, I'm blunt! Get over your "feeeeelings".

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V. Kurt Bellman Yes, I'm blunt! Get over your "feeeeelings".

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Is this a bad time to get into coin collecting?

V. Kurt Bellman Yes, I'm blunt! Get over your "feeeeelings".

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V. Kurt Bellman Yes, I'm blunt! Get over your "feeeeelings".

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