Buying junk silver

[mts]

So I've been in the mood lately to buy some junk silver. I went out today and bought 9 90% silver junk halves (3 walkers, 3 bens, and 3 kennedys). One each for me and one each for my two kids. Does anyone have any thoughts on where to buy to get a good deal and whether or not now is a good time to buy? It looks like silver has been lagging gold for years so there is reason to believe that it could continue to rise. But it's all pure speculation.

The reasoning behind my recent move is that my neighbor (who is moving) found an old chest that his 90 year old grandmother had given him. Knowing that I would think that sort of thing is really cool, he brought it over for me to look at. Nothing spectacular. About 1000 copper pennies (wheats and memorials), 1 IH, 9 rosies, 1 merc, 1 90% kenedy half, 1 40% kenedy half, 2 liberty nickels, 3 buffalos, and about 22 steel cents. He also had some neat tokens and a whole bunch of carded foreign coins. None of it was in good shape so I estimated it to be worth about $120 total. I took it all to a coin dealer who confirmed that none of it was really worth anything. That got me thinking. The kids really loved seeing all of those old coins. I reckon I could easily buy the equivalent of what he has for about $50. So why wouldn't I?

[Goes4ever]

what did you pay for the silver halves?

[mts]

what did you pay for the silver halves?

Probably way too much! The melt price today is about $6. I paid $7 each for them. It's a local guy so I didn't mind giving him the business. Plus he spent some time with me going through my neighbor's coins and giving me honest opinions about them. He then pulled out a box of junk coins and let me pick whatever I wanted. I picked the nicest ones he had. The bens and kennedys were actually very nice with very few scratches. They were the typical circulated quality. The walkers were badly worn. But this is to be expected. Walkers that are of the quality of the bens and kennedys I got today are usually much, much more. So they were the typical junk coins that are sold strictly for melt value.

I guess I have several trains of thought going on here so maybe my goals aren't too clear.

On one hand I have the idea that I'd like to pass down a set of decent (but not necessarily monetarily valuable) coins to my grandkids. My own kids really enjoyed seeing mercs and indian head pennies because they had never seen them before. And holding a real silver coin in their hand made them feel like kings. So it would be easy for me to spend about $50 (even though I spent more than that today) and get a nice representative sampling of circulated coins so that people could really get a nice feel for the history of some of our American coinage. It would still never be worth much but it would be a nice conversation piece for those not into coins.

On the other hand, the idea of building up a nice cache of silver is appealing as well. It will probably go up in value but more than likely would not prove to be as good of an investment as what I could do otherwise. Still, it's the allure of handing down something like silver to my grandkids that has me thinking about putting some money there if I can get a decent price on it.

Finally, obviously I'd like to create a collection based on my findings while detecting. This would be a great way to accumulate silver, gold, tokens, and other relics. However, I'm not going to fool myself. I've been at this for less than a year so far and I've found nothing but clad. Granted, I've only been out about 6 times and I'm still getting the feel of my detector and learning where to go. So things will hopefully be looking up this year.

Anyway, enough rambling. I just wanted to put some thoughts out there and get some opinions from the group.

[Goes4ever]

wow $7 is a bit high! I recently sold a bunch of NICE walkers for $6.05 each. What town are you in? I know a local dealer close to me who gives real good prices. I bought Barber halves for $8 from him a few weeks ago. Got a seated half for $10

[Goes4ever]

About 1000 copper pennies (wheats and memorials), 1 IH, 9 rosies, 1 merc, 1 90% kenedy half, 1 40% kenedy half, 2 liberty nickels, 3 buffalos, and about 22 steel cents. He also had some neat tokens and a whole bunch of carded foreign coins.

wheats can be had for .03 cents in bulk
common IHC for $1.00 or less
rosies and merc common date, melt price, so about $1.25
liberty nickels 40-50 cents
buffalos .25 cents
steel wheats 20-30 cents

I buy a lot from ebay, if you watch auctions at odd times of day you can get some killer deals!

[mts]

I'm in Columbus on the west side. I knew that it was a little high but it wasn't terrible considering that the guy is only about two miles up the road. I had checked the ampex site and they were essentially charging about 6.30 in bulk if you bought at least $100 face value (which is way more than I was ready to spend). So individual coins are going to be much higher. If I'm going to continue buying though I'd like to do so at better rates.

Thanks for posting the values of the other coins. That's right in line with what I was thinking based on values I saw on eBay and melt values on coinflation. He basically confirmed those prices today too based on what he was offering. He probably marks it all up by a minimum of 100% and he pretty much offered 50% of what you listed for everything. However, it was pretty clear that my neighbor didn't have anything that this guy was too interested in. It is all circulated coinage of common dates and such. It wasn't for sale since it wasn't mine but if I had been wanting to sell some he wouldn't have gone out of his way to offer me top dollar.

I've never personally been one for wanting to deal much with eBay but I have heard that you can get some good deals on coins there. I'll have to start looking around a little more. Where are you located? If you are nearby I'd love to give your guy my business.

It sounds like you are selling off a little silver right now. Does that mean that you think it's a poor time to buy?

[Goes4ever]

a poor time to buy? No way.........I build up my silver stock for coin roll hunting and when I need to get some cash I just sell a few rolls, right now I am looking to unload 2-3 rolls of 40% silver Kennedy halves if you are interested

I am in Van Wert Ohio

Now is a good time to buy silver is in $16-17 range now, wasn't too long ago it was $22 an oz. I buy and sell all the time, buy low, sell high

as far as ebay, I look for deals, and many times I buy from ebay, re-photograph it, re-list and sell at a nice profit. If you have a super clear close up your auction will bring more money

[mts]

Thanks for the info. Van Wert is pretty far away from me. Plus, for now I'm going to stick with the 90% silver for "investment" and collection purposes. If you ever want to get rid of some 90's let me know. I might be interested.

I appreciate the tips and guidance. I'm pretty new at this. But like all treasure hunters I really love the sight of those precious metals. I think I'm hooked! And so are my kids! I can see myself dabbling in some silver over the next few years. It's awfully cheap compared to gold so I can't imagine that it can really do anything but go up.

Thanks again!