Who is buying 40s

47thelement

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Greastart

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If you're willing to invest some time and a few $$ you can refine them yourself. I've done it. Pretty simple process. Some danger involved due to use of strong acid. But the end result is pretty cool in that you end up with a fairly pure (though un-assayed) button or bar of beautiful AG.

Pics of button from first effort, done very primitively. No melting crucible so I ground out a divot in some bluestone, and used that to melt. It worked....barely. Bluestone Crucible 002.JPG button 024.JPG

I used (3) 40% halves in this first button and ended up with 9.5 grams of AG. Some loss due to sloppy/primitive process and just plain not knowing what I was doing. Still, fun!

 

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ArkieBassMan

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I've never heard anything bad about any of the big metal exchanges (APMEX, Provident, etc), and last I checked they paid over 90% of melt if you had over a certain amount ($1000?). Its been a couple of years since I checked selling prices though. Things may have changed.

Ebay buyers typically pay more than melt, but fees are going to get ~13% off the top. A quick glance at completed listings suggested that bulk lots of 40% were selling in the $2.25-$2.50 per coin neighborhood. That would be about $1.96 - $2.18 after fees.

Craigslist might net you the most money, but there is the danger factor as well as the coins might take awhile to sell.

You're a charter member. Personally, my first attempt would be right here on this site.
 

Diggin-N-Dumps

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I ain't talking Schlitz in a paped bag either.


i have accumulated a nice stash of 40s over the last two years or so. My previous smelter isn't taking 40s anymore. Any suggestions

How many and how much? those are my questions
 

Liu21

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APMEX Buy Price*: $3.78 per $1 face, Are indications only for transactions of $10,000 or more. Buy prices will be less for smaller trades. providentmetals.com is at $3.88 per $1 face. best to find a local buyer willing to give you 4$ per 1$ face.
 

port ewen ace

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amateur collectors do not buy silver coins for melt, they pay numismatic prices. I routinely sell Q,D,N, and yes 40's and 90's for their collector raw coin value. if your 40's are beat to within a half inch of death, they are melt value. if they are XF to MS condition, then they are book value--or what a buyer will pay. if only some will accept that damaged/broken silver jewelry is worth melt and stop comparing jewelry to coins then maybe we can all agree that coins have greater value. anyone who talks about "melt value" in the same sentence as "gold coin" should be forced to spend a night in Hillary's bedroom
 

Greastart

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.... should be forced to spend a night in Hillary's bedroom

Shoot........Even Bill did,....once. Unless, that is he was smart enough to go artificial way back then!! Awwww, he was probably so drunk that time that he probably doesn't even remember the horrors of it. But, you can't look at what's her name and even begin to question who the daddy is. She looks just like him!
 

Spartcom5

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Didn't know this was a problem... Every coin store around my area pays $1.75 each as of a week ago, another place was offering $1.80 if it was like 100+ coins or so.
 

ArkieBassMan

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Didn't know this was a problem... Every coin store around my area pays $1.75 each as of a week ago, another place was offering $1.80 if it was like 100+ coins or so.

You're fortunate. My LCS wasn't paying $1.75 back when silver was in the $30's-$40's.
 

port ewen ace

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more important----what does the LCS SELL high quality 40% for? consider yourself to be a dealer without the overhead then figure the 8.9% cost with a basic Ebay store
You're fortunate. My LCS wasn't paying $1.75 back when silver was in the $30's-$40's.
 

ArkieBassMan

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more important----what does the LCS SELL high quality 40% for? consider yourself to be a dealer without the overhead then figure the 8.9% cost with a basic Ebay store

I couldn't tell you as I have had no dealings with them. The only reason I know what they were paying back then is that I had an opportunity to buy 4 rolls of silver quarters sight unseen (friend of a friend type deal) back when silver was @ ~$32 and falling. I called around locally, and the absolute best anyone in my town was paying was 8X face for 90%. I ended up paying 14.5X, which was ~$20 per ounce. He needed cash NOW. Good deal for me then, not so great now. But, there was a VF-EF '32S in the mix, so I'm still ahead in the deal.
 

retire05

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I just sold 100 of the 40s for $2.37 apiece. I looked at the 5 or 6 most recent eBay sales (not the "buy now" ones) and averaged it out. I threw out the top and bottom prices as that is what I was told to do in statistics a million years ago. The result came up to be $2.37 each. The guy I was working with thought that was a fair way to set the price and said ok. It was above melt value, even for the really crappy looking ones. This is the second time I sold him some; last time was 150 of them. We are both happy with the deal. If he didn't want to but them I would have just kept them until the price of silver finally goes back up a bit and then sell them. I guess it is dependent on how much you need the money. Just food for thought...Brad
 

greg23

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But most of the people in this forum are not paying numismatic prices, they are paying face value. Thats why the forums called coin roll hunting and not coin shop hunting.
 

fistfulladirt

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Shoot........Even Bill did,....once. Unless, that is he was smart enough to go artificial way back then!! Awwww, he was probably so drunk that time that he probably doesn't even remember the horrors of it. But, you can't look at what's her name and even begin to question who the daddy is. She looks just like him!
Ha ha nope sorry, just google pics of her dad Webb Hubbell.
 

norcalsteve

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I just sold 100 of the 40s for $2.37 apiece. I looked at the 5 or 6 most recent eBay sales (not the "buy now" ones) and averaged it out. I threw out the top and bottom prices as that is what I was told to do in statistics a million years ago. The result came up to be $2.37 each. The guy I was working with thought that was a fair way to set the price and said ok. It was above melt value, even for the really crappy looking ones. This is the second time I sold him some; last time was 150 of them. We are both happy with the deal. If he didn't want to but them I would have just kept them until the price of silver finally goes back up a bit and then sell them. I guess it is dependent on how much you need the money. Just food for thought...Brad

Happy New Year Brad!!!!
That is a great price for selling them right now. Almost 5 times face is a exceptional profit.
Good luck hunting in 2016.
 

Joe777Cool

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amateur collectors do not buy silver coins for melt, they pay numismatic prices. I routinely sell Q,D,N, and yes 40's and 90's for their collector raw coin value. if your 40's are beat to within a half inch of death, they are melt value. if they are XF to MS condition, then they are book value--or what a buyer will pay. if only some will accept that damaged/broken silver jewelry is worth melt and stop comparing jewelry to coins then maybe we can all agree that coins have greater value. anyone who talks about "melt value" in the same sentence as "gold coin" should be forced to spend a night in Hillary's bedroom

Crock of poop. Sorry but for 40%, 64's, and almost all 90% 1940+ you arent going to get much of anything above melt unless they are UNC. Maybe you can sell a single coin here and there to people looking to fill holes in their albums, but its hardly worth the time or effort in my opinion.
 

Joe777Cool

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If you're willing to invest some time and a few $$ you can refine them yourself. I've done it. Pretty simple process. Some danger involved due to use of strong acid. But the end result is pretty cool in that you end up with a fairly pure (though un-assayed) button or bar of beautiful AG.

Pics of button from first effort, done very primitively. No melting crucible so I ground out a divot in some bluestone, and used that to melt. It worked....barely. View attachment 1253323 View attachment 1253324

I used (3) 40% halves in this first button and ended up with 9.5 grams of AG. Some loss due to sloppy/primitive process and just plain not knowing what I was doing. Still, fun!



The problem is you are left with a blob of silver that nobody knows the exact purity unless you have it xrayed. I'd say that 90% of pawn shops and cash/gold places arent going to purchase that and probably about the same for the general public. You are taking a widely recognizable coin, that can be sold for above melt if you work hard enough at it and making it into something that very few will buy and then it will probably be for 85-90% of melt value.
 

Dozer D

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Hard to believe we used to throw the 40's back.

And to believe that back in the late 1968's nearly half of all the coins were silver. Wishing COULDA, WOULDA, SHOULDA been saving them ALL back then.
 

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