Unsearched Coin Rolls: Scam or Valid?

            Many will tell you that the best way to go when starting out in a collection is with unsearched rolls of coins or as many call them “shotgun rolls.” People sell shotgun rolls with all types of coins in them including pennies, nickels, dimes, quarters, and half dollars being among the most frequently sold. But can people’s claims that the rolls are truly unsearched really be credible? Let’s take a look into these claims.

            First off, let me halt the assumption that it is difficult to roll coins with professional grade quality. It is actually not difficult for someone to personally roll coins and make the job look professional. While many might believe that rolling coins is an expensive thing to do, in reality, rolling coins is not expensive and does not require much experience as long as you have the right equipment to do so. The equipment, which is simply a coin rolling machine that does 95% of the work for you, needed for rolling coins usually costs anywhere from $500 to $1000 (US dollars). While that may seem like a lot at first glance, if you consider how much scam coin rollers make, it is not that expensive.

            Secondly, let’s consider the possibility for a scam business which sells supposedly “unsearched rolls.” Hundreds of collector who have bought these rolls before will tell you that their roll was simply invaluable and not worth the purchase. We have already determined that the ability and equipment required are not that expensive. In order to determine if the rolls have truly been searched, you first need to understand how the scammers operate. Scammers often put two good coins on the outside of the roll then only put a few more of the semi-worthwhile coins on the inside. What are the chances that nearly every roll that is supposedly unsearched has about the same quality of coins inside? Many have been tricked before. The scammers often buy many invaluable coins and buy some semi-valuable coins to peak customer’s interest. Putting only few semi-valuable coins in the roll (which just so happen to always be on the outside) and putting about 90% invaluable coins in the rest of the roll, scammers are able to make considerable margins, usually around 25-50% per roll. The claim that scammers make who sell “unsearched rolls” is that the rolls came directly from a bank long ago and were never searched. But this is practically impossible that nearly every roll that they are selling has semi-valuable coins on the outside for the customer to see and invaluable coins on the inside because the banks randomly roll coins. The probability of having a semi-valuable coin on the outside of every roll is too much of a coincidence.

            There is another concern about scammers who sell the “unsearched roll” that is tricky. Many will claim that those in the past have found incredibly rare and valuable coins in their previous lots sold. There are several ways to debunk this. Many could be just plain lying. However, most show customer feedback or email proof showing the validity that there truly were valuable coins in the rolls that they had sold before. But this can be easily faked. It’s not difficult to have friends lie online for you or have numerous accounts giving credit to one’s own self. Another route that many scammers will take is to buy rare or valuable coins on purpose and place them in their rolls at random. This strategy, allows for past customers to give the seller credibility and be completely truthful about it. Because they are receiving 25-50% margins adding in an expensive coin every couple of months is affordable.

            Let’s stop for a moment and consider that some sellers online or at coin shows are actually being completely honest when they say the rolls have never been searched to their knowledge. But in lies the possibility for another point of why these rolls are often a bad idea to buy. Hypothetically, if a loved one has passed away and someone with little knowledge of those coins inherits them, they will be telling the truth when they say they have no idea what is in the rolls. However, if that loved one who passed was a collector, they would most likely have already known what was in the rolls and separated the valuable coins from the invaluable coins when they came across a valuable one. It is common knowledge to most every coin collector that when you find a valuable coin you need to put that coin in a case or other safe place in order to maintain the quality and value of the coin. The loved one would have separated that coin from the rest and put the more valuable, rare coins into an alternative storage such as a coin album or case. It is not likely that the collector would have found a valuable coin and placed it back into a roll because it is common knowledge among collectors that paper rolls do not maintain the luster and value of the coin that an album or case can maintain. Therefore, valuable coins would have already been sorted out of the rolls.

            My suggestion for you is to consider your purpose in buying the “unsearched rolls.” If your purpose is to make a profit, then I would suggest you find another route because in the long run the seller will be making the profits, not the buyer. However, if your purpose in buying these rolls is for the pure joy and excitement experienced when opening the coin rolls for the first time and searching for valuable coins, then I would say have at it. Buying shotgun rolls is similar to playing the lottery. While it is not economical to buy a lottery ticket because it is improbable that you will win the lottery, many play for the fun of the game.

If you have any requests that you would like me to research and write about regarding coin collecting, I may have some expertise in that area. Please email me your requests at webuycoincollections@gmail.com