ALWAYS look anyway

[jerseyben]

Went to a church rummage sale and headed immediately to the jewelry section and started browsing. A woman saw me looking and tells me "you won't find any 14k gold here because I know jewelry". I basically ignored her and just kept looking. I spotted 2 boxes of misc jewelry and immediately the glimmer of gold caught my eye as I picked up a small gold earring. I then looked in the other box and found its mate. I asked the same woman how much for the pair? $2. 1.7 grams of 14K stamped on the underside of the ear pin.

 

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[Nightowl 280]

My 14k marked find today came up fake failed the mag test . Would of been nice to have gotten a nice 14k neckless almost a full oz in gold and not junky plated or fake stuff . Oh well . But congrad on the ear rings everyone alway over looks them at sales and markets .

 

[Maggot]

I always look anyway.

I was going threw a box at a garage sale that said ''silver plate whole box $20" The guy says, there nothing good in there, his buddy looked already. I already saw a sterling lid in there so told him, Well if there is nothing good in there I'll give you $10. He said OK, When I got home I checked the rest. There was 2 sterling bowls and the lid was over 300gr. Some cool plated pieces too.

 

[jerseyben]

I always look anyway.

I was going threw a box at a garage sale that said ''silver plate whole box $20" The guy says, there nothing good in there, his buddy looked already. I already saw a sterling lid in there so told him, Well if there is nothing good in there I'll give you $10. He said OK, When I got home I checked the rest. There was 2 sterling bowls and the lid was over 300gr. Some cool plated pieces too.

Agreed. This is another "garage sale secret". Assorted silver plated lots often have sterling mixed in either accidentally or people just don't know what they have.

 

[creeper71]

I always look anyway.

I was going threw a box at a garage sale that said ''silver plate whole box $20" The guy says, there nothing good in there, his buddy looked already. I already saw a sterling lid in there so told him, Well if there is nothing good in there I'll give you $10. He said OK, When I got home I checked the rest. There was 2 sterling bowls and the lid was over 300gr. Some cool plated pieces too.

Agreed. This is another "garage sale secret". Assorted silver plated lots often have sterling mixed in either accidentally or people just don't know what they have.

this just happened at flea market guy said that is all plated..I said plated is kool..what he didn't know was I found 3 sterling handle butter knives an got them all for 50cents

 

[Jeep]

Yep, some folks just don't know

Bought a bag of employee year/appreciation pins. Marked 10K and tested as such and all the stones were
real gems, small but real Ruby's, Diamond's and Emerald's.

Older military qualification and other badges are Sterling.

Love to find that stuff.

 

[cyberdan]

this just happened at flea market guy said that is all plated..I said plated is kool..what he didn't know was I found 3 sterling handle butter knives an got them all for 50cents

Had the opposite happen. Lady said her whole set was sterling (tray, gravy, sugar, creamer) and wanted hundreds. I looked everything said EPNS. I told her what that meant and she didn't believe me. Bet she still has that set.

 

[batcap]

Agreed! Some of my best finds came from checking over the "costume jewelry" and "plated" dinnerware. If they say there are no PM's, agree with them and say you're looking for the manufacturer's name.
Treasure does turn up this way. I had a nice string of beginner's luck in 2010, but in 2011 I worked for my finds. I learned to diversify away from just PM's; there's lots of treasure out there. My biggest strike was in latex, where a vintage enema kit sold for 49X my $5 investment.