My Ike plan

[DrDetector]

With all this talk on whether or not clad common-date Ikes and copper Memorial cents are worth holding on to, I've decided to list a roll of random clad Ikes on Ebay and a box of copper cents as well. I'm listing the cents today and the Ikes end tomorrow. I figure this way I can get a real idea of whether or not you can actually sell these coins for over face value. Anyone tried this or think it's a good idea? Here's the link to the Ikes:

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&ih=011&sspagename=STRK%3AMESE%3AIT&viewitem=&item=320137371541&rd=1&rd=1

 

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[fiatboy]

I sell mine for between a $1.05 and $1.10 to local dealers. Not much, but it's easy.

 

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[halfhunt]

Interesting topic. fiatboy do the local dealers actually want them at that price or do you just have a connection? How many do they usually take? Thanks

 

[LJ]

Sorry to hear that you didn't do better DD. This was a good informative thread....thanks. Wish you luck on the copper cents...which I think will do better in my opinion.

My take on these Ikes is this..........if you have them and can afford to sit on them......sit on them. Buying them for $1 at banks and sitting on them is okay too, but buying them to turn right around and sell just doesn't make sense to me right now. There just isn't a big market for the Ikes yet.

Who knows what will happen in the next 10 years.... Selling them for a 5 or 10 cent profit is a waste of time to me personally. You sell 100 of them for a $5 or $10 profit just makes no sense to me. Again, this is just my personal opinion.

Okay...back to my corner....lol.

 

[fiatboy]

Sorry to here about your loss. $2.35 isn't that bad. Could be worse, and at least you've learned about the Post Office's new shipping rates.

The coin shop I work at pays $1.05 apiece, any quantity. There are a few other dealers that sometimes pay up to $1.10 depending on their inventories, but they're not always buying. I've sold as many as a thousand Ikes at a time and as few as one. No difference in price. Year and mintmarks don't make a difference. Yes, 1973's bring as much as other years. To us they're rare, but to dealers, '73 Ikes are nothing special. (Similarly, 1970 halves rarely bring a premium.) The only Ikes that pay better are the silver ones.

...which brings me to a point I've made before, but I can't stress enough. When it comes time to sell, it's the silver that matters most. Any clad that's pulled from circulation probably won't bring much, if anything, over face value. Silver is where the cash is. It's in demand---every week people come in to sell silver, and every week, I ship off to the scrap yard bags upon bags of 90%.

...now back on topic...silver Ikes are pretty rare. Types 1 and 2 don't seem to matter much. "Brown" and "blue" type Ikes bring different prices, but only if they're in the original packaging.

What's interesting is that there are people out there who buy large quantities of Ikes (like 1000 or 5000 at a time) for more than face value. I have yet to learn what they do with all those Ikes.

 

[DrDetector]

Thanks for everyone's input on the subject. My idea was to see whether or not they would sell for enough over face to make up for shipping and fees. I accomplished that, for sure.

LJ- Thanks for your comments. I wanted to clarify that I'm not trying to make quick turn-around profit on these Ikes. I had got them from the bank for face looking for a few dates and varieties I didn't have, and maybe some older silvers, who knows. So afterward I'm stuck with all the common Ikes, and don't really know what to do with them. Thought I might try my luck selling them.

 

[LJ]

Thanks for everyone's input on the subject. My idea was to see whether or not they would sell for enough over face to make up for shipping and fees. I accomplished that, for sure.

LJ- Thanks for your comments. I wanted to clarify that I'm not trying to make quick turn-around profit on these Ikes. I had got them from the bank for face looking for a few dates and varieties I didn't have, and maybe some older silvers, who knows. So afterward I'm stuck with all the common Ikes, and don't really know what to do with them. Thought I might try my luck selling them.

DD - Have you had any luck finding the silver Ikes? I rarely ask for Ikes at banks so I don't know how common it is to find the silver. I understand what you were trying to do...that was just my take on Ikes in general.

(Similarly, 1970 halves rarely bring a premium.)

FB - Why is this? With such low mintage on the 70 it would seem they would bring more of a premium. Are they just not old enough yet?

 

[GMan00001]

Sorry to hear that you didn't do better DD. This was a good informative thread....thanks. Wish you luck on the copper cents...which I think will do better in my opinion.

My take on these Ikes is this..........if you have them and can afford to sit on them......sit on them. Buying them for $1 at banks and sitting on them is okay too, but buying them to turn right around and sell just doesn't make sense to me right now. There just isn't a big market for the Ikes yet.

Who knows what will happen in the next 10 years.... Selling them for a 5 or 10 cent profit is a waste of time to me personally. You sell 100 of them for a $5 or $10 profit just makes no sense to me. Again, this is just my personal opinion.

Okay...back to my corner....lol.

In my opinion a quick 5-10% profit is always good.

Take three scenarios, all starting with $100 Jan 1.

Scenario 1
You put all $100 into a bank account which earns 5% simple interest. At the end of the year you have $105 (plus you may get to pay taxes on the $5).

Jan 1 - $100
Dec 31 - $105

Profit = 5% (minus taxes)


Scenario 2
On Monday of each week you buy 100 Eisenhower dollars from a bank for $1 each (assumes you can find them)

On Saturday of each week you sell all 100 Eisenhower dollars for $1.05 each. (assume no gas/car costs as you sell them someplace you already go on Saturday of each week).

Jan 1 - $100
Dec 31 - $360

Profit = 260% (no taxes unless you choose to share this info with the government....)


Scenario 3
On Monday of each week you buy as many Eisenhower dollars from a bank for $1 each that you can afford with your original money + plus profits (assumes you can find them)

On Saturday of each week you sell all Eisenhower dollars purchased for $1.05 each. (assume no gas/car costs as you sell them someplace you already go on Saturday of each week).

Jan 1 - $100
Dec 31 - $1161.30

Profit = 1061.3% (no taxes unless you choose to share this info with the government....)

Note: If the selling price is $1.10 in the last scenario instead of $1.05, the value on Dec 31 is $13,752.20. Of course that requires finding, buying, and selling $12,502 in Eisenhower dollars the final week of the year at face value.


Now obviously this scenario is not feasible all year long, but I'll take the quick 5 to 10% profit every time I can get it.

Now just imagine if you could do this daily ($93,317,800,000,000,000 on Dec 31....well okay by the 141st day you have now purchased and sold all Eisenhower dollars ever minted 741,094,613 )....well I think you get the point, a quick 10% profit compounded is a good thing.

 

[ringding]

If anyone in Georgia has Ikes and wants to free up the money so that they have more to buy halves with, i'll buy them. One collector to another, I don't want to pay more than face.

 

[jrf30]

<<Scenario 3
On Monday of each week you buy as many Eisenhower dollars from a bank for $1 each that you can afford with your original money + plus profits (assumes you can find them)

On Saturday of each week you sell all Eisenhower dollars purchased for $1.05 each. (assume no gas/car costs as you sell them someplace you already go on Saturday of each week).

Jan 1 - $100
Dec 31 - $1161.30

Profit = 1061.3% (no taxes unless you choose to share this info with the government....)
>>

Only problem is that it takes TIME to get Ikes. To get and resell $100 per week would take maybe 10 hours to do. Sure, in the beginning it might not take that long, but banks don't GET that many Ikes, and after just a few weeks it would stretch out to a lot of work to get even 100 in a week.

SO, even though you make 1000% on your money, it is still only $1,061. If you could add two zeros on the end of that, and start with $10,000 on Jan 1, and end with $116,130, THEN it would be worth it. I'd gladly do that work.

It is not the profit margin. It is the amount hat you can get.

I used to buy some items that I could double on ebay in a week. And do it over and over again. But, I realized that even if at the end of the year it gave me a nice gain, it took TOO LONG, and the DOLLAR amount wasn't worth it. So I stopped.

I think the Ikes would fit into the same boat. Too much energy for not enough ability to gather them.

BUT ... if for some strange reason I was talking to a bank and they were complaining about all of a sudden having 10,000 Ikes, I'd do a one time deal and buy them ALL. Sell them, and at least cut the acquisition side to no time spent. :-) Same profit, but on a larger scale, and all at once? Worth doing, even if I had to resell them in smaller lots.

That's why I don't do any of this for a living. I buy land cheap and resell it and develop it, and do things that I can with it. And it is a large enough amount to make it worth the hard work. Same idea, but larger numbers, and therefore worth it. :-)

Have a great week.

John

 

[GMan00001]

<<Scenario 3
On Monday of each week you buy as many Eisenhower dollars from a bank for $1 each that you can afford with your original money + plus profits (assumes you can find them)

On Saturday of each week you sell all Eisenhower dollars purchased for $1.05 each. (assume no gas/car costs as you sell them someplace you already go on Saturday of each week).

Jan 1 - $100
Dec 31 - $1161.30

Profit = 1061.3% (no taxes unless you choose to share this info with the government....)
>>

Only problem is that it takes TIME to get Ikes. To get and resell $100 per week would take maybe 10 hours to do. Sure, in the beginning it might not take that long, but banks don't GET that many Ikes, and after just a few weeks it would stretch out to a lot of work to get even 100 in a week.

SO, even though you make 1000% on your money, it is still only $1,061. If you could add two zeros on the end of that, and start with $10,000 on Jan 1, and end with $116,130, THEN it would be worth it. I'd gladly do that work.

It is not the profit margin. It is the amount hat you can get.

I used to buy some items that I could double on ebay in a week. And do it over and over again. But, I realized that even if at the end of the year it gave me a nice gain, it took TOO LONG, and the DOLLAR amount wasn't worth it. So I stopped.

I think the Ikes would fit into the same boat. Too much energy for not enough ability to gather them.

BUT ... if for some strange reason I was talking to a bank and they were complaining about all of a sudden having 10,000 Ikes, I'd do a one time deal and buy them ALL. Sell them, and at least cut the acquisition side to no time spent. :-) Same profit, but on a larger scale, and all at once? Worth doing, even if I had to resell them in smaller lots.

That's why I don't do any of this for a living. I buy land cheap and resell it and develop it, and do things that I can with it. And it is a large enough amount to make it worth the hard work. Same idea, but larger numbers, and therefore worth it. :-)

Have a great week.

John

Is my example extreme....yes. My only real point was if its easy and you can make a quick 5-10% you should take it, because if you can repeat it often enough you can get a nice benefit. Do I think its feasible...no, not for any long term or volume thing, at least not with Ikes.

But if you are already at a bank looking for halves, the extra effort to ask for Ikes is almost nil and costs nothing other than a few seconds (assumes you have easy access to a willing buyer as well). Worst case you don't find many and decide to just use them for tips or spend them.