Road trip tips?

[fikys]

Hi, soon I'm going to have a long trip to Texas and back (over 1000 miles one way). On my way back I'll have plenty of time to visit banks. But my problem is that I never was able to find much on my road trips...just a few coins. Boxes were always much better... Maybe I miss something and need to ask differently? I normally just ask for loose or rolls of half dollars and if I get a large amount it is mostly somebody dumps... But I fill bad to ask questions like "how long you had these coins? or "Who brought them in?" Also, if I call banks in advance they normally say that they don't have any halves....Not sure if they even check... Could you give me your advice, especially if you had great success with road trips...

 

[obediah]

Hi, soon I'm going to have a long trip to Texas and back (over 1000 miles one way). On my way back I'll have plenty of time to visit banks. But my problem is that I never was able to find much on my road trips...just a few coins. Boxes were always much better... Maybe I miss something and need to ask differently? I normally just ask for loose or rolls of half dollars and if I get a large amount it is mostly somebody dumps... But I fill bad to ask questions like "how long you had these coins? or "Who brought them in?" Also, if I call banks in advance they normally say that they don't have any halves....Not sure if they even check... Could you give me your advice, especially if you had great success with road trips...

Have found it is ALL a matter of just getting lucky; those few Banks you can build a relationship with teller(s), and get their Coin Machine Bag are few, but have done it. It appears this time of year (winter), is not the best for finding Silver halves- dumps are everywhere though.

 

[coolpix9]

Get off the main roads,hit the smaller banks,stay out of NW Arkansas. The land of Wal Mart has a bank on every corner but you will waste a lot of time and gas for a few boxes of 93s. Shiny but totally worthless.For the most part,steer clear of the casinos, most of them on your trip have converted to all paper(coinless). Have fun and by all means,don't leave any coins or evidence in your car at night. JP

 

[Holmes]

Im pretty sure that a bank is not allowed to tell you whom brought them in ! You can ask how long they had them but i believe that most of the time its a big fat lie !

HH
~Holmes~

 

[jim4silver]

Im pretty sure that a bank is not allowed to tell you whom brought them in ! You can ask how long they had them but i believe that most of the time its a big fat lie !

HH
~Holmes~

You're right that they cannot say a person's name, but I have asked the tellers whether a "collector" brings in halves on a regular basis. Sometimes when I ask this they will say "yes", and that the person who brought them in "looks for all the silver ones", or something to that effect. This type of question does not violate any privacy requirements.

Of course, it is not uncommon for the tellers to want to get rid of the rolls and some will lie and say "we got them over time" or something like that. I have had that happen to me and once when I was leaving with the coins I could hear the tellers snickering with each other. When I heard that I stopped around the corner still in the bank and heard the teller say to another teller "did you like how I told him that and got rid of them?". I was not a customer there, or after I searched thru them I would have dumped them back on the bank.

I only ask this type of question when a bank says they have a few hundred or more in rolls on hand. I used to just take anything and look thru it, but with all the CRHers around here, it is just too much of a waste of time to look thru 500 bucks in skunk hand rolls over and over. In a box you never know what you will get, but when the teller says that a customer brought in all 500 bucks worth and they are in Brinks wrappers in an opened Brinks box or even in the generic wrappers, why waste the time I figure.

I don't do road trips hardly at all anymore, so I have learned what banks in my area have a regular CRHer dumping hand rolls all the time so I just avoid those banks.

Another bit of info I have discovered, is that banks that normally produce good hand rolls, will often produce good hand rolls over and over. And conversely, banks that produce skunk hand rolls, will produce the same over and over.

Jim

 

[fikys]

Thank you all very much for your helpful hints!

 

[golden silver]

They are right when they say stay away from big cities if you are limmited on time. You can spend a lot of time in traffic and not find much. Three main things you need to do 1. Plan your route and call ahead 2. Have access to a good chunk of change if you want to hit it big 3. Don't be afraid to go off the beaten path a little.

This is just a quick crash corse. Some here do not like to call ahead but it can pay off and save you time trust me. The reason I say that is that if they wanted to keep them for themselves they will have already gone through the halves. Many bank tellers could care less and will be glad to hand them over.

The pool of money is great because this is a numbers game the more you search the more you find just have a place to dump the coins you don't want. I recommend finding dump banks along your route with coin counting machines.

The Small town that lie away from the main roads often have half dollars that have been sitting there a while.

Good luck.

Golden Silver