How to Sell US Coins in Southern Oregon

A typical American coin collection is two things at once: a pile of pre-1965 silver that's worth its weight in silver, and a much smaller number of coins where the date, mint mark, or condition makes them worth meaningfully more than their metal content. Most sellers walk in thinking it's mostly the second category. The honest answer is that most collections are mostly the first — and that's not a bad outcome when silver is strong. The second category is real, it just isn't as common as collectors hope.

Here's what we're going to cover, in order:

1. The 1964 silver rule — which US coins are 90% silver, and which aren't.
2. The silver-dollar wrinkle — why Morgan and Peace common-date dollars feel weaker when silver is high, and why key dates still pay strong regardless.
3. Penny key dates — the short list of Lincoln cents worth pulling aside before your appointment, plus the common-date wheat cents most people overestimate.
4. Why we can't quote raw coins over the phone — and the two narrow exceptions.
5. The single most expensive mistake — cleaning a coin and what it costs you.
6. How to research a coin yourself — eBay sold-listings, the right way, including what eBay's fees and shipping economics actually take off the top.

Then a quick recap at the end so you walk into your appointment knowing what to expect.

The 1964 silver rule

This is the most important number to know about US coins: every dime, quarter, half dollar, and dollar dated 1964 or earlier is 90% silver. Not "might be silver." Is silver. It's the federal composition standard, by law, for those denominations through 1964.

• Dimes 1964 and earlier — Mercury (1916–1945) and Roosevelt (1946–1964) — 90% silver, ~0.07 troy oz each.
• Quarters 1964 and earlier — Washington (1932–1964) and earlier types — 90% silver, ~0.18 troy oz each.
• Half dollars 1964 and earlier — Walking Liberty (1916–1947), Franklin (1948–1963), and 1964 Kennedy — 90% silver, ~0.36 troy oz each. (1965–1970 Kennedy halves are 40% silver — also valuable, but at a lower number.)
• Silver dollars — Morgan (1878–1921) and Peace (1921–1935) — 90% silver, ~0.77 troy oz each. See the next section for an important wrinkle on how these are priced right now.

Beyond those: nickels are not silver except the 1942–1945 "war nickels," which are 35% silver (look for a large mint mark over Monticello on the reverse). Pennies are not silver — they're copper through 1982, then copper-plated zinc — but a small handful of penny dates have major collector value, covered two sections down.

The silver-dollar wrinkle: why high silver prices can hurt common-date dollars

Here's a quirk of the market most sellers don't know about, and we'd rather tell you up front than have it surprise you at your appointment.

Common-date Morgan and Peace dollars normally trade at a noticeable collector premium over their silver melt value. A common 1921 Morgan, for example, is worth more than the silver in it — when silver is at a normal price. But collectible value does not rise along with silver spot. The collector market prices these coins on rarity, grade, and demand — not on what an ounce of silver is trading for that week. So when silver runs hot, melt catches up to (and in some cases passes) the collector number, and the premium shrinks or effectively disappears for common dates.

Practically, that means: right now, with silver where it is, most common-date Morgan and Peace dollars are retailing close to melt rather than to a collector premium. That's not us undervaluing them — it's the market. If silver pulls back, the gap reopens.

Key dates are a completely different conversation. Rare-date and rare-mintmark silver dollars (1893-S Morgan, 1889-CC, 1894 Philadelphia, 1928 Peace, and others) price on numismatic demand, which doesn't move with the spot price. A key-date silver dollar in decent condition pays significantly more than melt regardless of where silver is trading. So even when common-date Morgans feel disappointing in a high-silver environment, the key dates in the same chest can carry the whole transaction. This is one of the reasons we evaluate every coin individually rather than weighing the bag and quoting a single per-ounce number.

Pennies: the key dates worth pulling aside

You do not need to memorize the Lincoln cent catalog before your appointment. We do that work in front of you. But if you want to pre-sort, here are the dates that matter most for US pennies. Set these aside in a small envelope or coin flip and bring them along with the rest:

• 1909-S VDB — The top of the pile. First-year Lincoln cent, San Francisco mint, with designer Victor David Brenner's initials V.D.B. visible at the bottom of the reverse (the wheat-stalk side). Mintage was only ~484,000. Counterfeits are common.
• 1914-D — Denver mint. Mintage ~1.2 million. Heavily counterfeited — sometimes the "D" was added later to a 1914 Philadelphia cent. Authentication matters.
• 1922 No-D ("Plain") — All 1922 cents were minted at Denver, but a worn-out die produced examples with no visible D mintmark. A 1922 with no D is the rare one; a 1922-D with a weak D is the common one.
• 1931-S — Depression-era San Francisco. Mintage ~866,000.
• 1955 Double Die Obverse — Look for dramatic doubling on LIBERTY, IN GOD WE TRUST, and the date. It's obvious to the naked eye on a real one; under a loupe on a fake.

Common-date wheat cents: probably not what you're hoping

This is the other half of the penny conversation, and it's the part most people don't want to hear. Most common-date wheat cents (1909–1958, the ones with wheat stalks on the back) are worth a few cents above face value, and that's it. A bag of mixed circulated wheaties from old change is not a hidden goldmine. We see this expectation a lot, and we'd rather tell you up front than have it land at the appointment.

What this means practically: we don't go through bags of wheat cents one at a time looking for rarities — the odds of finding one don't justify the time it takes, and that cost would come out of the price we could pay for the rest of your collection. If you bring wheat pennies, we buy them at a bulk per-coin price, not individual collector value. That's the honest math.

So if you have a big jar or bag of pennies and you want top dollar on the rare ones, the sorting is on you. Pull the key dates listed above plus any Indian-head cents (1859–1909) you find — those are always worth bringing for individual evaluation. The rest can come along too, just don't expect us to comb through them one by one.

Why we can't quote your raw coins over the phone

This is the question we get most often, and we'd rather just be straight about it.

Coin value is driven by condition. An 1881-S Morgan dollar in Good condition is worth its silver content. The same coin in MS-65 condition can be worth twenty times that. We cannot see the surface of your coin through a phone call. We cannot tell whether the rim has been bumped, whether the fields have hairlines from a long-ago polish, or whether what looks like “great” toning in photos is actually cleaning residue. Anyone who quotes you a number for a raw, ungraded coin sight-unseen is either lowballing on purpose or guessing.

Grading is the whole game. The coin market runs on a 70-point scale (the Sheldon scale) and the difference between adjacent grades is sometimes the difference between $40 and $4,000. We've been through hundreds of thousands of coins between our two locations. We can grade most circulated material in seconds and most uncirculated in under a minute — in front of you, on a calibrated scale and with the right lighting. That's not something we can fake over the phone.

Two exceptions, since it's only fair to name them: we can talk ballpark over the phone for (1) bulk pre-1965 silver priced by weight, and (2) coins already in PCGS or NGC slabs, since the grade is fixed and printed on the holder.

The single most expensive mistake: cleaning coins

Please don't clean coins. Not with silver polish, not with a soft cloth, not with vinegar, not with a baking-soda paste, not with anything. We mean this both as professional buyers and as collectors ourselves: a cleaned coin is a destroyed coin from a collector value standpoint.

Surface wear and original patina are part of how the coin is graded. Once you clean a coin you cannot put either back. The result is that the coin sells at melt value — what the metal is worth, full stop — even if it was a five-figure key date the day before you reached for the Tarn-X. We see it every year. We hate seeing it every year. If you have any doubt, leave the coin exactly as you found it and let us look at it first.

How to research a coin's value yourself: eBay sold listings

If you want to spot-check a specific coin before you come in, the most reliable free source is eBay's Sold listings filter — not the current asking prices. Anyone can ask anything for a coin; what matters is what coins like yours actually sell for.

• Search the coin (e.g. 1881-S Morgan dollar MS63).
• Open the Filters or Advanced search and check Sold items.
• Sort by most recent. Look at the prices the items actually sold for, not the strikethrough “original” price.
• Look for the mean (or median) sold price that matches your coin's actual condition. A 1955 Double Die in Fine sells at a very different number than the same coin in MS-64, even though both show up in the same search. Match like-to-like: same date, same mint mark, same approximate grade, same certification status.
• Check the sale-through ratio. If you see 100 active listings but only 4 or 5 actually sold in the last 90 days, that's a supply-demand signal. A low sale-through can mean the market is saturated and most sellers are priced too high — or it can mean the few that did sell had a specific feature (a key variety, certification, original packaging) that the unsold ones don't. Both are worth knowing.

What eBay actually takes off the top

A sold price on eBay is not what the seller takes home. By the time you factor in everything, eBay's all-in cost runs close to 20% of the sale price, sometimes more on lower-value coins:

• Final value fee + listing fees — eBay's cut of the sale price.
• Payment / merchant processing — additional percentage on top.
• Shipping with insurance — your cost of doing business. Coins require insured mail for any meaningful value. That's not an eBay fee; it's a seller cost that comes off whatever's left after the fees above.
• The risk premium you're carrying. Lost in transit, chargeback, “item not as described” disputes, return requests with a swapped-back inferior coin — these aren't theoretical, and on a $100 coin they can wipe out the entire margin.

Run a real example. If a coin like yours sells for $100 on eBay, you're likely netting around $75–$80 after fees — before you even pay for shipping and insurance, and before you've spent the time photographing, listing, packaging, and answering buyer questions. All said and done, most sellers do better selling directly to a reputable local shop, where the number you agree on is the number you walk out with.

eBay sold-listings are still the best free tool for spot-checking value. Just adjust the number you see by what eBay actually keeps, and compare the net to a real local offer. That's the apples-to-apples comparison.

One more honest caveat: this works well for slabbed coins where the grade is fixed. It's less reliable for raw coins, because two raw 1881-S Morgan dollars on eBay are not the same coin — the buyer is guessing at the grade. That's exactly the gap that drives people to a local appointment in the first place.

What to bring to your appointment

• The collection itself — loose coins, rolls, folders, albums, slabs, original mint sets, currency, the works. There's no minimum and no extra charge for evaluating additional items.
• Pre-sort your pennies if you want top dollar on the rare ones. We don't comb through bags of wheat cents looking for key dates — the time it takes isn't worth the long odds of finding one, and that cost would come off the price we could pay for the rest of your collection. Wheat cents brought in unsorted are paid at a bulk per-coin price. Pull the key dates listed above, plus any Indian-head cents (1859–1909) and anything that looks unusual, and bring those separately for individual evaluation.
• Any paperwork that came with the collection — old appraisals, purchase receipts, inventory lists, family notes. Helpful but not required.
• Photo ID. Oregon requires it for precious-metals transactions.

Beyond the wheat-penny pre-sort, you don't need to inventory the collection, sort by date, or know what anything is. That's our job.

Quick recap before you come in

In short, here's everything we just covered:

• Most of a typical collection is silver value, not collector value. Every US dime, quarter, half, and dollar 1964 and earlier is 90% silver and worth real money at today's spot.
• Silver dollars are an exception worth flagging right now. With silver high, common-date Morgan and Peace dollars are paying close to melt instead of carrying their usual collector premium — because collectible value doesn't move with the spot price. Key-date silver dollars still pay strong regardless, since they're priced on rarity, not metal.
• Penny key dates worth pulling aside: 1909-S VDB, 1914-D, 1922 No-D (Plain), 1931-S, 1955 Double Die Obverse, and any Indian-head cents you find. Common-date wheat pennies pay only a few cents each — go ahead and pre-sort them out if you have a jar.
• We can't grade raw coins over the phone — condition is everything and we have to see it. Slabbed PCGS/NGC coins and bulk pre-1965 silver by weight are the two exceptions.
• Never clean a coin. A cleaned coin sells at melt value only, regardless of how rare it was the day before.
• Use eBay sold listings (not asking prices) to spot-check value, match the grade and condition of yours, and remember eBay's all-in cost runs close to 20% off the sale price before you've even shipped the coin. The net you'd get on eBay is almost always less than a direct offer from a local shop.

That's the entire playbook. We'll go through every piece individually, show you the math, and make an offer. You're free to accept it, decline it, or sleep on it — there's no fee for the evaluation either way. If you would like a written appraisal, we can prepare one for a fee.

Ready to schedule?

Call our Ashland location at (541) 482-3715 or our Grants Pass location at (541) 955-2985, or use the contact form and we'll get back to you the same business day.

Coming in with world coins, ancients, or sterling flatware too? Bring those at the same appointment. See our category pages for{" "} US Coins,{" "} Foreign Coins,{" "} Ancient Coins, and{" "} Sterling Flatware for what we look for in each.