met another hunter at the pawn shop today

silvercop

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while i was visiting a pawn shop that is owned by a friend of mine (who knows i roll hunt) a guy comes in with 330.00 worth of 40% silver halves. i started talking to him and asked him if he had been saving those halves a while and he said no that he gets them from banks. i asked where he was from and he said he was from ****** (a town about 15 miles away). he then said he got all that in one week from the same town. right when i was getting ready to grill him with questions my friend the owner of the pawn shop comes over and says "hey this guy does the same thing you do" after that the guy clammed up and would not talk to me. he did not even want to discuss a price for the halves while i was around. so i quietly stepped aside and went my way. my friend at the pawn shop will fill me in later. all this will explain why i have never found anything in that town. either he got a hold of some very good boxes, did massive volumes, or has some tellers cherry picking for him. i tell you the competition in my area is dog eat dog. there are already 2 other monster hunters in my area that i know of and now i add him to the list. when i started hunting almost a year ago i was pulling at least 80-100 keepers a week out of 10-15 boxes, but now i am lucky to get 100 a month. i really think it is drying up fast as more and more hunters get in the game. at least it is in my area anyway. that would also explain my 3 dry road trips last week.(one of which was to his town).
as i think more about what this guy said he has got to have an inside somewhere to get that much silver in a week. i do 20 boxes a week here and i know they don't produce that much in a weeks time. and for him to know my friend at the pawn shop he has to be a regular seller. i don't know how much my friend is paying because i have not sold any silver that i have found, but if he is making the trip over here from where he is from then that tells me that my friend at the pawn shop must be paying good because the city where he is from is much bigger that the city i live in. anybody got any thoughts?
 

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golden silver

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Competition is spreading fast. It would seem the rules of CRHing are being ignored. Either that or more and more people are finding this website in efforts to find a hedge against the U.S dollar. There are a lot of people worried about their futures and retirement etc. If you are pulling in silver on the weekly basis I would be happy. Who knows what it will be like in a year. I am greatful for how well I have done up to this point and hope it continues but there is no telling when it will all dry up in my area. It has slowed quite a bit. Eventually people will give up when finds dry up.

Golden Silver
 

obediah

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He could not be too smart to sell to a Pawn Shop, they pay the least as all they will do is sell it too. Ebay, or a smelter if you have enough to sell to is best route to go.

P.s. I did 10 Boxes last week got 3 ounces 17 coins think it was, but did a road trip and found 171, 24 1/2 ounces.
 

obsessedwithsilver

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I agree that others will try it, but you really must enjoy it to make it work. Why else spend the afternoon driving around. And what about dumps? They are a total pain. Personally, I think you should try to canvas that guys territory and let him be afraid. Don't you think you've got him worried too?

OWS
 

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silvercop

silvercop

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i think the only way i am still pulling any silver is because of the volume that i do. i currently do 40K a month in boxes. if you were in my area and could not do alot of volume then you would probably be out of luck unless you had a couple of tellers on your side. and in my town i know of several tellers that cherry pick themselves. i am sure i have him worried because of the way he clammed up and would not talk to me. i sure wish i could get an inside person from his town. as far as i am concerned he can hunt here anytime. the only way you can get halves in my town is order boxes, i have never had a teller in my town hand me a silver half and i ask for halves all the time. my dump bank will not even sell the bags out of the machine to me. one time as i was dumping i filled up a bag and the vault teller came over to change it. when she took it out i could see multiple silvers in the bag and i could see the edges of several old silvers. i asked several times but she would not budge. she said that all of the bags had to be shipped off to the fed. well anyway to me this hobby is alot like fishing--it is fun when you are catching them but it stinks when your not. this hobby is alot of work too. picking up 20 boxes, taking them home, searching, and dumping. like i said the only way that anyone in my area can pull silver is ordering boxes and lots of them, sooner or later, probably sooner that won't work anymore. my totals this month are way down and unless i get some really good boxes thursday this will be my worst month yet
 

joad

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I stopped at a branch bank today that usually stocks boxes and they said they had called me to tell me the boxes I had ordered were in and I could pick them up tomorrow. I was thinking :icon_scratch:. Then I said okay I'll be back tomorrow. Thing is I didn't order any boxes and I never gave them my number. Some other hunter sqeezin the silver out of the boxes. I guess I should just let it go, but I am tempted to stop back by early and pick up those boxes.
 

maine_Jim

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Never met my competition but just missed one the other day. I went into a bank and the teller said she gave them all to a lady two customers back. There are six banks within five blocks on this highway and I was heading south with one bank left. I'm guessing the competition was heading north and was in for a run of the same answers! Getting tougher by the month - not really enough silver to sustain more than a couple hunters per area or one CRH monster :headbang:

Maine_Jim
 

Rich Hartford

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Nov 27, 2008
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This will cheer you up silver cop. April May and June's combined total 30 oz. That's not only road trips but I was doing Half boxes back then too.
Plus one of those months I did 30+ boxes of dimes. To top it off I had a family of skunks living under the porch that were teaching the babies how to spray. It was like one big SKUNKERAMA. :dontknow:
 

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silvercop

silvercop

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thanks rich. keep me posted on how your boxes go. i am very interested in knowing. if you start out like i did you will be pulling 100-175 keepers and then it will go down from there each month. kind of depends on how many are doing boxes in your area too. LJ often said she welcomed the help she got with other people ordering boxes, her theory was everyone gets to the bottom of the pallet quicker, i guess that is where the advantage of doing volume comes in. you get more from the bottom than anyone else. anyway let me know, you can pm me with the results if you want. good luck to you
 

fistfulladirt

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Never met my competion, altho at each bank they have customers asking for halves. I love the hobby, but as far as a money maker I'd do better collecting returnable bottles and cans out of the ditch.
 

obediah

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It is a matter of just being lucky to both get there before a fellow CRH'er and right after a Silver hoard[er] has dumped. Well there is also another variable that can help, diligence, you know hitting the Bank(s) more often.
 

SFBayArea

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Too bad you couldn't find out where he gets his coins from... if you ever do.. bring your dumps there.. it could frustrate him enough to stop.. there were many times after I'd gotten 5 skunks in a row that I stopped for a while (I know that it's not a record but can be frustrating to a new CRH).. I've talked to a teller at a bank once about other people ordering coins.. they said that someone would get one box per week and gave up after a while.. must've found some skunks like I did...
 

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