How Do I Start A Coin Collection?
Most people who end up as coin collectors stumbled into
the hobby, and began collecting purely for the love of
collecting interesting and cool coins. Most collectors are
NOT motivated by profit. While it is nice if your
collection grows in value, it is not the primary motivator.
There are others who collect purely for profit. These are
not true collectors and some are sure to be disappointed as
there is no guarantee that a coin you buy today will rise in
price. Saying you collect coins for profit, is like saying
you collect stocks for fun. That being said, if you are the
type of person who has not collected coins but want to get
started, it is not that hard.
Starting a coin collection is not that tough at all. You
may think that you have to buy a bunch of expensive coins, but you do not. You
can merely reach into your pocket and pull out a bunch of coins and you have a
collection. More accurately, this would be an accumulation. OK, that does not
sound like much fun, and there would not be any organization to it and thus,
would likely not yield much pleasure. But the point is, any logical grouping of
coins can be a collection.
In order to truly start and have some organization, you
will need to determine two items. The first is how much you want to spend and
the 2nd part is what you may be interested in. Let’s say for the
sake of discussion you are interested in Lincoln Cents. The first thing you
should do is buy a few books on Lincoln Cent collecting. Since I doubt you will
go buy that book and then come back here and finish this article, I will discuss
several ways to collect. These strategies would be the same or very similar for
any other series of coins. Let’s discuss several of these strategies:
A Short Set
Many collectors will collect just a date range of a
particular series. The primary reason for this is cost while the other reason
is availability. Most series of coins usually have one or two coins that for a
variety of reasons are just not available or way to pricey. These coins are
called “keys” or “semi-keys” and are called this because they are the key to the
series, which means they are usually quite rare and pricey in comparison to
other coins in the series. An easy and popular example of a short set of
Lincolns is the date range from 1941 to 1958, including all mint marks. All the
coins in this range are very easily obtainable and happen to coincide with the
popular Whitman folders in regards to date ranges. You can buy a very
inexpensive folder, usually around $3.00. The folder usually has the date range
from 1941 to 1974, but many people stop at 1958 because that is when the Mint
stopped making wheat cents and began Memorial Cents in 1959. Since this is YOUR
collection, thus choice is yours. If you want a higher end collection, you can
collect BU/UNC Lincoln Cents that are still blazing RED. While it may cost you
a few hundred dollars, it is very obtainable and your net result will be a very
beautiful collection.
Another great example of a good short set is a set of
Walking Liberty Half Dollars dated from 1941 through 1947 including all mints.
This set consists of 20 coins and can be obtained in average circulated
condition for not much over melt.
A Set by Year
Some collectors will collect a coin from each year. The
advantage to this is that you can usually obtain a coin from each year very
reasonably and not have to buy any keys. For example, many years have at least
two and sometimes 3 choices to obtain. In the Lincoln series, the year 1939 has
a 1939 P, a 1939 D and a 1939 S. But in 1922, only Denver made Lincoln Cents.
Since there were no “P” and no “S” coins that year, the 1922-D is your only
choice. Note: While there are some 1922 Lincoln Cents without mint marks, they
are rare and expensive and are the result of a mint error. Another series where
you might want to opt for is a year set is the Mercury Dime series, The 1916-D
is a very pricey coin while a 1916-P can be bought for under $5.00 for a G-VG
coin.
A complete Set
Putting together a complete set in any series of coins is
usually a challenge. The Lincoln set is no exception. A complete set is every
coin from every year including every mint. Some people will take this a step
further and insist a complete set must include the most popular
varieties/errors. For the Lincoln series this might include a 1955 Double Die,
the 1922 Plain and a few other coins. These are very pricey. To complete this
series, you will need to spend several thousand dollars as the 1909-S VDB,
1909-S, 1914-D may run $2000 for just these 3 coins.
Almost all other series of coins can get very pricey when
trying to put together a complete set. A couple exceptions are Roosevelt Dimes
and Jefferson Nickels
Summary
When beginning a collection, remember the choice is yours.
You can collect what you want and how you want. When it comes to coin
collecting, there is no right or wrong answer if you are collecting for fun.
Want to discuss coins? Join the coin forum.
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