A lot of collectors have a miracle story where they found a valuable coin at almost no cost. Here's mine. One day, about two years ago, I stayed at my parent's workplace for the day. Everyone knew that I collected coins, so the owner of the workplace gave me a bowl of change to look through. After about an hour of picking through the bowl, I hadn't found much except for a few Wheaties. I decided to dig down to the bottom of the bowl, and there was this large silver coin staring at me. I pulled it out. It turned out to be an 1888-S Morgan Dollar (semi-key date!) but I didn't know it was valuable at that time. I dug into the other end of the bowl and found an 1879-S Morgan. Not believing my find, I looked up prices for these coins on Ebay. The 1888-S went for around $160 to $170 in a similar condition to the coin I had found. The 1879-S was a common date, of course. After work, my parents drove me to the nearby coin dealer where I got the coin checked out. It turned out being a genuine coin actually worth $160-$170, but I didn't sell it. I still have the coin, and I will try to post pictures soon.
Nice! My mothers friend owns a consignment antique shop so when I was a kid getting into collecting, I saw a big silver dollar in a pendant for $20. I knew it was a morgan so I bought it. A year or two later i found out it was a 1878-CC in AU condition! I was able to remove it without damaging the coin luckily. Still have it to this day
I bought an average circulation roll of 1920-D wheat cents for just a few bucks. I dumped out the roll and immediately saw a shiny coin. I figured sure it had been cleaned. Turned out very nice and came back from PCGS as MS63 RB.
No miracles here, but I think this can be a neat thread and wondered if I had something to contribute. I thought of one that I guess was too good to be true. This was years ago and an important step in my coin education. I was in a local flea market one day, the owner likes coins and always has some for sale, though he is no real expert. I have bought a good number of coins from him. He has always been a square shooter. When I walked up to the counter that day he grinned and said, "I have something you need," and he slapped an 1803 bust dollar down on the counter. I had only seen pictures and now I was holding one! It had decent detail and to my eye a nice original look to it. The vintage design was captivating to me. He said that he had graded it AG because Photograde said all the reverse lettering needed to be readable to make Good. I looked at it and some of the letters in the motto by the eagle's head were not readable but as I examined the coin and noted the full rims and the amount of detail I knew there was NO WAY that awesome coin was only AG. I think he was asking around $300 and I was sure that was an absolute bargain. Heart thumping, I bought it. I got it home and got out a couple grading books and decided it was at least VG. My first real cherrypick! My superior knowledge of grading had allowed me to pick a great deal! But....over the next couple of days I showed it to a couple of guys who knew more that I did and they were skeptical. I took it back to the flea market and told the owner of my growing concern about the coin's authenticity. He said he felt the coin was good but said if a grading service condemned it he would stand behind it. I sent it to Anacs and groaned when it came back "struck counterfeit". So back to the dealer I went and he made it good, let me choose some other coins ( I wasn't too hard on him). I then told him I wouldn't mind having the counterfeit and we worked that out too. Today I keep it around to remind myself to be a little skeptical, to not spend "big" money on coins I don't know anything about, and that raw coins can be a minefield for the fellow who has just enough knowledge to be dangerous to himself. I was fortunate the dealer was nice about it all and we still have a nice friendly relationship. I realize this story probably was not exactly what the OP had in mind but I think an occasional caution to those of us who are less then expert can be a good thing.
Well, I have told this story before, but it is always worth telling again When I first got into collecting a few years ago, I used to go to a local auction house which did coin auctions about once a month. Most of the stuff looked cleaned to me or was overpriced. But every now and then you could get a good deal or cherry pick a DD or RPM. One night I saw a lot listed as "Misc. world mint sets and commemoratives" and decided to check it out. They were all in a bag and shifting it around a bit I spotted a bunch of stuff like Israeli mint sets and a few other things. Then I spotted two cool looking coins with dragons and a sundial and compass rose on them from Bahrain. They looked like they might be silver so I decided to take a chance and said I would bid up to $25. Sure enough I was able to get them for just a bit less than that. When I got home I checked out my haul. Most of the other stuff, while interesting, was not really valuable. I quickly grabbed out the two coins that I thought were silver. After some searching they turned out to be silver and from one of those cheesy collectors sets you see put out. But they were cool and with silver price at the time they paid for my purchase. I was already pretty happy, but as I got to the bottom of the bag I found a coin that I immediately recognized as being unusually heavy. It was Israeli and when I looked it up I about lost it. It was a 500 Lirot commemorative coin for David Ben Gurion struck in gold! I immediately figured that I must have something else like a cheaper version or something. I went out and bought a digital scale and when it arrived checked the weight. It was legit, about .75 of an ounce of gold if I remember right. I ended up selling it to one of the online bullion places when gold seemed like it was getting high (but still pretty low considering how high it went.). Still, I think I netted around $800 or $900 from a $25 misc. bag. Doubt I will ever top that find
