Coin Roll Hunting Out of State for Silver

beckariuz | November 5, 2014 | Most Recent Coin Roll Hunts | No Comments

It's been a while since I've done any Coin Roll Hunting...I've been traveling and this is the busiest time of year for my business, so I just haven't had a lot of time. A couple weeks ago I was traveling to Seattle for work/vacation with my family and thought it would be worth it to pick up some boxes of coins from some of the banks up there - just to see if the success rate for finding silver coins would be any higher. Towards the end of our trip, I stopped at a couple local banks to see if they could sell me any coin boxes that I could take home. Between Chase Bank, and US Bank I scored 4 full unopened boxes of Quarters, 1 box of Half Dollars, and 5 boxes of Dimes (Total value of $3,750). I struck out at a few other banks who either didn't have enough coins on hand to make it through the week, or the person in charge of the vault was not working. (HEADS UP - Photos are at the bottom of the post)

TIP: When you're going to the bank to get full boxes of coins, most banks I go to get their shipments on Tuesdays...so either go on Tuesday, or ask them to order you some boxes on Friday or Monday so they can get your order in when they get their shipment.

Turns out I didn't get time to sort through anything until I got home and had some down time between Trick or Treaters on Halloween. I started out with the quarters...roll after roll after roll...First box, NOTHING. Second box, NOTHING. Third box, NOTHING. Fourth box, a big FAT NOTHING 🙁 I was totally bummed. Silver quarters are always tough to find when you're coin roll hunting, but I thought coins from a new area might show a little more promise. Severely dissapointed.

For all you who think you're going to just open up a box and be staring at loads of silver, think again 😉

I gave up for the night and took my time over the next couple days going through the halves, and dimes. It's never a good sign when you open a full box of halves and they all look like they are in pretty good shape, and you don't see any silver 'enders' (silver coins showing on the end of the coin rolls). But, you have to open them anyways because you just never know. I got through the first few rolls, and found a 2003 clad proof. Although these half dollars aren't worth much over face value, they are still fun to find, and usually stick out like a sore thumb. I usually find a proof every 10 boxes or so. I kept plugging away, and towards the last few rolls BINGO - I see a nice shiny silver edge among the hoards of clad coins. It was a 1969 Kennedy Half Dollar (40% silver). The rest of the box was a bust. So far on half dollars lately my average is only 1 silver per box...maybe I need to look harder 🙂

My average for 50 cent coins lately is only 1 silver coin per box...ugh.

Searching through the dimes was pretty painful. Roll after roll was brand spanking new 2014 dimes...LOADS of them. Not exactly what you want to see when you're coin roll hunting. 3 of the 5 boxes were brand new dimes. The fourth box was a mix of new and recent dimes but NO silver. The fifth box showed some promise. A lot of the dimes looked fairly worn and old (that's a good sign), and there was even a 2004 proof dime on the end of one of the rolls - so I excitedly started opening the rolls. I started with the roll showing the proof, but that was all it had. About halfway through the box I saw a nice silver edge, and pulled out a 1963 90% silver Rosevelt Dime. The rest of the box had squat... So, for a LOT of coin hunting, I sure didn't end up with much this time. I get better results from my local banks, so I don't think I'll be coin roll hunting in Seattle again anytime soon. Here are the totals for this hunt: