Guide · 8 min read
Most of the jar is face value. Two or three coins in it are not.
Most inherited coin collections are mainly common circulated coinage worth close to face value, with a small number of genuinely interesting pieces mixed in. The job is finding those without damaging anything. That's the honest starting point, and it isn't the one a dealer's blog opens with.
5 photos · no account · no card · we never buy and never sell
What a jar of coins is usually worth
An inherited coin collection is usually a mix of common circulated coinage worth close to face value and a small number of genuinely interesting pieces. US dimes, quarters and half dollars dated 1964 or earlier are 90% silver, so metal value often exceeds face value before collector value is discussed at all.
We'd rather disappoint you here than after you've paid us. A lifetime of loose change makes a heavy box, not a valuable one. Almost everything in a jar was spent, counted and pocketed by thousands of people before it reached a bedroom drawer, and wear is the enemy of coin value. Circulation is nothing but wear.
Now the other half of that sentence, which matters just as much. Interesting pieces are genuinely mixed in, and they don't announce themselves. A key date sits in a jar looking exactly like every other dime around it. Separating the few from the two hundred, without harming anything on the way, is the entire task. If the boxes only came out of the house last week, start with the first-week checklist before you sort anything.
Face value, melt value, collector value
Three different numbers describe the same coin. Heirs run them together constantly, and a buyer in a hurry has no reason to slow down and separate them for you. So here they are, apart.
Number one
Face value
What the coin says it is. A dime is ten cents at the shop and always will be. For a jar of modern cents this is the floor and the ceiling at once.
Number two
Melt value
What the metal is worth. US dimes, quarters and half dollars dated 1964 or earlier are 90% silver, which makes them worth many times face value as metal alone. That figure moves with the silver market, daily.
Number three
Collector value
What someone will pay for that coin, in that condition, because they want it. It sits on top of melt value, or it doesn't exist. Most circulated coins have none of it.
The gap between the second number and the third is where the confusion lives. A silver quarter is worth its metal in almost any state. Whether it's also worth more than its metal depends on the date, the mint mark and the wear, and that's a separate conversation with a separate answer.
What actually drives the number
Six things move the value of a coin. A photograph shows most of them plainly. One of them, condition, a photograph can only hint at, which is why we hedge on it in writing rather than quietly guess.
| Signal | In plain English | Why it moves the number |
|---|---|---|
| Date and mint mark | The mint mark is the small letter beside the date — S, D, CC or O — naming the mint that struck it. | The letter often matters more than the year. Same design, same date, different mint, completely different coin. |
| Silver content | US dimes, quarters and half dollars dated 1964 or earlier are 90% silver. | Worth many times face value as metal alone, before anyone mentions collectors. |
| Key dates | The scarce years inside an otherwise common series: 1909-S VDB cent, 1893-S Morgan dollar, 1916-D Mercury dime. | They look ordinary. That's exactly why they get spent, sold as bulk, or cleaned. |
| Errors | Mistakes made at the mint: doubled dies, off-centre strikes, coins struck on the wrong blank. | A real error carries a premium. Damage after the fact carries none, and the two get confused constantly. |
| Proof or business strike | Proofs were struck for collectors, not for change, and usually came in a sealed set. | Original packaging is part of the value. A set is generally worth more intact than loose. |
| Wear on the high points | The raised parts of the design go first: a cheekbone, a wing, the top of a wreath. | This is the one a photograph struggles with, and the one that swings the value hardest. |
That last row deserves a sentence of its own. The reference notes we examine against put it bluntly: wear on the highest points is what separates a $30 coin from a $3,000 one. Read that as an illustration of how much condition matters — not as a price for anything in your box. We don't know what your coins are worth, and nobody who hasn't seen them does either.
The do-not list for coins
Three rules. Each one is something people do while trying to be helpful, and each one is irreversible.
- Do not clean the coins. Any of them. Ever. Polish, dip, cloth, eraser, baking soda: all of it leaves microscopic scratches a grader spots under magnification, and a cleaned coin routinely loses 50–90% of its value. There's no way back. Why cleaning costs so much walks through the mechanism, including what a grader does with the coin afterwards.
- Do not remove coins from sealed holders or original mint packaging. A sealed mint case carries the coin's history with it, and a proof set is generally worth more in its original packaging than the same coins are loose in a tray. Leave the seal alone and shoot through the plastic, however scratched it has gone.
- Do not sell to the first buyer who offers for the whole lot. A sight-unseen offer on an entire collection is a bet that something good is in it, and that bet is being made against you. A dealer is still a legitimate route for bulk, which is worth saying out loud — the arithmetic on dealers, auction houses and eBay takes ten minutes and changes the conversation.
Photographing coins so they can be identified
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Both sides, filling the frame
Anything unusual gets two photographs, front and back, with the coin filling the frame. One coin per photo. A tray of thirty coins shot from a metre away identifies none of them, and the date is the first casualty.
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Diffuse daylight, never flash
Beside a window on a grey day is close to perfect. Not direct sun, not a flash. Glare hides exactly the detail needed to identify a coin, and it lands hardest on the mint mark.
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Through the plastic, every time
Coins stay in their holders. Shoot through the flip, the mint case, the cardboard 2x2. Scratched plastic is a much smaller problem than a coin you've taken out and handled.
Five photographs are enough for a first read on whether the box deserves a real examination. How the examination works covers the three passes and why every figure comes back as a range rather than a number.
What you're probably holding
Five things turn up again and again in inherited boxes. Here's the honest version of each.
Wheat pennies
Bags of them exist because people saved them by the handful. Most are common and worth little over face value. A short list of date-and-mint-mark combinations is different, and 1909-S VDB is the one everyone has heard of. Sorting by date alone misses the point: the mint mark is what you're looking for.
Silver dollars
Heavy, satisfying, and the piece families are surest about. Most carry real silver value. Whether one carries collector value on top comes down to date, mint and wear — a 1893-S Morgan sits in the same tin as coins that are worth their metal and no more.
Mint and proof sets
Bought new, kept in a drawer, never opened. Leave them that way. The case is part of what makes the set worth what it's worth, and a set is generally worth more intact than the coins are loose. Photograph the whole case, both sides, through the plastic.
A jar of foreign coins
Usually the quietest item in the house. Holiday change is holiday change. The two questions worth asking are the same as anywhere else: is there silver in it, and is any single coin old or odd enough to be worth a second look. Photograph anything that isn't obviously modern.
Buffalo nickels
The date sits on a raised shoulder of the design, so it's often the first thing to wear away entirely. Date and mint mark together are what identify the coin, which makes a dateless buffalo hard to place from a photograph and honest to say so about.
What a photograph can't settle
Here's the blunt part. A photograph won't settle a grade. At phone resolution it often can't show whether a surface has been cleaned, and it can't confirm that an apparent doubled die is a true mint error rather than damage or a worn die. Where a genuine key date is involved, authentication is an in-person job with the coin in someone's hand. So every value we state is a range, never a point, and an item we can't pin down carries no number at all — it says “worth a professional look” instead.
This page is wrong for one group of people. If you already read mint marks and grade surfaces, none of this is news and you don't need us. It's also wrong for anyone who needs a certified appraisal with a signature on it — an insurance schedule, a contested estate, a charitable deduction, a court. Part of what we do is tell you which coins are worth paying a real appraiser to see.
Checking costs a good deal less than guessing. The first look is free: 5 photos, no account, no card. A full report is $39 for up to 200 photos, or $79 for a whole household at up to 600, and what each tier covers is a short page. We charge a flat fee, we never buy, never sell and never take a percentage, so we gain nothing by talking the box up or down.
This is an informational estimate from photographs, not a certified appraisal. We tell you what is worth paying an appraiser to look at — we have no interest in buying anything you own. Values are always given as ranges, and where a photograph can't settle it, the report says “worth a professional look” rather than inventing a figure.
Questions people actually ask
Straight answers, including the ones that cost us money.
There's a jar of pennies. Is it worth sorting?
Worth photographing, yes. Worth sorting by hand for hours, probably not. Wheat cents are common and most are worth little over face value, but a handful of date and mint mark combinations are not, and those are the ones people spend.
Photograph a scoop of them spread out, then any coin that looks older or odder on its own, both sides.
How do I tell whether a coin is silver without cleaning it?
Read the date. US dimes, quarters and half dollars dated 1964 or earlier are 90% silver, and that's true whatever colour the coin has gone. Silver that has darkened is oxidised, not dirty.
Set those aside from the rest and photograph them individually. They carry metal value before anyone discusses collector value, so they're the first pile worth separating.
They're black and green. Can I clean them a little first?
No. A cleaned coin routinely loses 50–90% of its value, and the damage is permanent and obvious under magnification. That includes a gentle wipe with a soft cloth.
Photograph them filthy. Dirt in a photo costs nothing; hairlines cost most of the coin.
Where is the mint mark, and why does it matter so much?
It's a small letter near the date or on the reverse, depending on the series — S, D, CC or O are the ones that come up most. It names the mint that struck the coin.
It matters because mints struck wildly different quantities in the same year. Two coins with an identical date can be a common coin and a scarce one, separated by one letter.
Someone offered a price for the whole collection. Should I take it?
Not before you know roughly what's in it. A sight-unseen offer on a whole box is a bet that something good is in there, and the person making the bet has seen more collections than you have.
That doesn't make dealers villains. Selling bulk to a dealer for one cheque is often the right answer, and it's a real route worth naming. Just make it a decision rather than a default.
What does it cost to have the coins looked at?
Nothing, for the first look. Up to 5 photos, no account and no card, and it tells you whether anything in the box deserves a closer examination.
The full report costs $39 and covers up to 200 photos; a whole household, at up to 600 photos, is $79. If grading results come back later, or another box turns up, a re-triage is $9. You stay on the page and watch a live tracker while the examination runs, which takes a few minutes.
Find out which coins are the ones that matter
Five photos, no account, no card. If the honest answer is that the box is common coinage and nothing more, the report says exactly that.
We don't buy · we don't sell · we don't take a percentage