You are right, Dan, you do need to ask. I got a 1934 Texas State Commemorative at a sale Sat. No coins were out. I asked if the guy had any old coins and the man said his kids had all taken them to school and been told the most valuable was only worth $5. He also said they were all gone now. Then he remembered that he still had the Texas Commemorative half. I asked how much he wanted for that. He replied $3, but it was in the house. I said I would wait if he wanted to go get it. It is tarnished, and though not free, still a steal. At another house no coins were out and I asked and the lady running the sale said she had some old foreign coins, but no one would ever give her anything for them. I told her I would love to at least look at them and would probably make her an offer. She came back outside with a couple boxes of coins. Most were just 30-40 yr old copper and clad foreign stuff, but I could see a Morgan dollar and an Ellis Island silver dollar in an acrylic holder. I told her I could see at least $40 dollars in silver melt. Another guy and his wife started nosing in at that point. The wife said, "Oh, this is the type of stuff you know about, you could help her.", to her husband. He started to pour through a box at that point. The lady having the sale went to wait on another person asking about a coffee table. I gathered everything up and said, "I asked her about these, she got them out for me. I am going to go make her an offer." And left those two standing there. I went over to the lady and said, "I am not going to get a chance to look at these alone, I have already told you I have seen at least $40 dollars in silver, will you take $60 for everything?" She agreed and said she just wanted it gone as the Nazi coins gave her the creeps. I quickly went to my truck at this point, I didn't want the guy and his wife causing a scene. There wasn't a ton more in the collection. There was about the $60 I paid in silver, there was some old clad and copper foreign coins, and some foreign paper. There was about 20 dollars in modern U.S. coins and another $11 in Canadian I converted at the bank. I kept the Euro dollars in change and the British pounds and schillings. I have a small pile of both, but haven't converted any yet, as I haven't found a bank that will do it for less than a $10 charge. I don't even have much more than that of each. LOL I did sell the foreign copper, paper, and clad to a guy who always picks it up from me for $15. I kept the five Nazi coins for now. Not sure what to do with them, have sold one once before for a couple of bucks to a guy at the flea market. I won't make a mint, but probably clear 40-50 dollars profit or so. In the end, I probably gave her as much as she would have gotten at any coin shop and definitely as much as anyone should expect to get at yard sale prices. Sorry, Dan, didn't mean to steal your thread, just wanted to give more examples of what can happen if you ask and reiterate your point that you do have to ask. Glad you are having success out there and as always, you are beating me, no free silver since late 2 yrs ago and that was a broken i.d. bracelet clearly marked sterling, but when I asked how much for this the lady said, "Well, it is broken, you can just have it."
T.
