Am I crazy to save pre 82 pennies

[welsbury]

Have saved 82 and earlier pennies for quite a while with no regard for key dates or anything. Are there any that are more desireable and what would they be? Thanks for any help.

 

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[silvereagle78]

Well, minus the wheats, there are many different errors to be found pre 82. Check out the following websites they are great references.
http://www.coppercoins.com/
http://www.doubleddie.com/

As for just saving them for copper reasons? Why not as long as you can afford to do it. HH, SE

 

[Coins4Cheese]

I save copper pennies. I say go for it. Right now, they're worth above face. If copper prices drop, simply return them to a bank and get your money back.

 

[LemonThrower]

there is a whole forum for folks like us called realcent. btw, i buy pre-82 cents for 1.3 times face shipped.

 

[DigginThePast]

I think there are a lot of folks on this site that save them. Crazy? Well thats a whole seperate issue.

 

[welsbury]

I see I'm not alone for sure. Thanks for thoughts and comments and references.

 

[fistfulladirt]

I save copper pennies. I say go for it. Right now, they're worth above face. If copper prices drop, simply return them to a bank and get your money back.

They are worth more than face, in melt value? I don't get it, is there hope that the melt ban will be lifted sometime in the future? Is that why people are saving them? Just curious.... ffd

 

[extractor]

I think there are a lot of folks on this site that save them. Crazy? Well thats a whole seperate issue.

LoL

 

[Coins4Cheese]

I save copper pennies. I say go for it. Right now, they're worth above face. If copper prices drop, simply return them to a bank and get your money back.

They are worth more than face, in melt value? I don't get it, is there hope that the melt ban will be lifted sometime in the future? Is that why people are saving them? Just curious.... ffd

Right now, copper cents are worth about 1.3-1.5 cents each. If you can find someone that buys copper cents, than you can make a small profit without melting them. It's still illeagle to melt pennies, but I believe in acouple years, it'll be lifted.

 

[Shortstack]

KVM advised people to save every pre-1982 penny they could get their hands on because he foresaw their value going out of sight. That was just after the zincs came out. Whether he was thinking of the copper value or the collectors' value, he wasn't reeeeal specific. Either way would be valuable.

KVM advised it, that's good enough for ME.

 

[mts]

I've been saving them up too. I get a box from the bank about every two weeks and sort through them. I'm looking to get about $200 face value worth of coppers. The melt value of those pennies is over two cents already and people on eBay are paying around 1.5 cents for them in bulk. I figure that they could go up to 10 cents each before you know it. Hey... it could happen! They were up to 3 cents each last year.

I'm also buying up silver and gold for a rainy day. So why not get some copper too? If things go terribly wrong then I can melt the copper down (why would the government care at that point?) and trade it off in big blocks. It has value as a metal, albeit not as much value as silver and gold. It's just another means of diversifying. And the best thing about it is that you can buy it at 50% melt value right now. Why wouldn't you save some up?

Now I'm not advocating having 10 tons of the stuff at your house. But a couple of buckets full won't cause any major storage issues. You aren't going to get rich off of it. But it is guaranteed to hold it's value and could go up significantly even in the short term.

 

[Bayman]

I am crazy too. I save the 82's as well, knowing some are copper. I try to put away a few uncirculated rolls of the newer ones each year, especialy the new Lincoln reverses.

 

[Tattooguy67]

According to this site there is a $2.13 of melt value in a $1.00 worth of face value, not a bad investment in my opinion, also in my opinion the government has no right telling us what we can do with something we paid for in the first place, so theres that, although the problem I see in melting your own so to speak is then how do you prove the copper content with out an assay? I mean if I were a scrap dealer and you show up with a block of metal telling me it is 90% copper with out some proof am I going to buy it for top dollar? and to answer your ? further no you are no crazier then any of the rest of us asylum inmates!
http://www.coinflation.com/coins/basemetal_calc.php

Chuck.