Anyone Profited from Investing in Old (pre-1933) U.S. Coins?

Many dealers promote old coins as INVESTMENTS. But some just sucker investors into buying overpriced coins unlikely to ever sufficiently rise in value to make a profit.

There is much to know about coin type, quantity minted, grading services, when it was graded, how many of the type have been graded by each service, and visual appeal. Also, at what prices have 鈥渋dentical鈥?coins sold for recently? One dealer points to heritageauctions.com as helpful in deciding whether a coin is a good buy. But since no two old coins are exactly alike, it is difficult to know to what extent past auction info. can be relied on as indication of your coin鈥檚 potential gain.

Can non-professionals successfully INVEST in old coins for profit?

I am asking to hear from anyone with experiences investing in old coins. Please advise on how to choose coins with good investment potential, where to buy at good prices, and how and when to sell for max. gain.

Serious responses will be greatly appreciated.

Muncie Birder gave a great answer. I will just expound on it.

As in any collectible field, knowledge is king. To be able to purchase lowest and sell highest, you must know more than others, especially when buying. The US coin field is fairly narrow, so it is harder to find bargains. They are out there, but take a lot of work and knowledge to find. Without that, to invest in coins you need to take a "position". I am a contrarian, having been around coins long enough to know different coins are "hot" at different times. I would look for a series that is not "hot" right now and buy high grade keys to those series. Then in a few years when it becomes hot again, your keys will go up in value the most. Sell, and look for keys to non-hot series again.

Now, if you want to acquire knowledge in ancient or world coins, then in the US bargains are everywhere. The field is so huge no dealer can be an expert in everything, so dealers always have stock that they really don't know the value of. It is somewhat harder, though, since ancient coins especially do not really have key coins, (with a very few exceptions), since it is so huge nobody can collect all types, therefor no one type is "key".

Also, if you know what you are doing, Ebay is great. Caveat Emptor is probably most appropriate there than anywhere else though!

If you invest in coins made of precious metals there is a huge opoortunity for substantial games. This site contains very good links on precious metals investing

http://preciousmetalsinvesting.blogspot....

It is a rather speciallized field. You do need a lot of knowledge in order to be successful. You have to know the market very very well. And it is very subject to speculation, more so than even the stock market, if you can imagine that.

There are however certain coins that over a long period of time tend to increase significantly in value. These are what are referred to as the "keys". Within the pennies, they are the 1877 Indian head penny, 1909 svdb Lincoln penny 1914d Lincoln penny. These are the rarest coins within the particular set. The set can not be completed without them. When buying the keys, it is safest and most profitable to purchase coins slabbed by either NGC or PCGS. There are other slabbing organizations but they tend to overgrade the coins that they slab.

It you invest in PCGS or NGC slabbed key or semi key coins you will have the best chance of not loosing money, but you still have to be very careful. As I said coins tend to draw speculators like honey draws bees. The price of a hot coin can go up 10x in a year and totally collapse overnight. It has happened time and time again.

Here is a link to current coin trends. Check it out and see what you think.

Here is a link to a site where you can bid on slabbed coins.

And of course there is always ebay. Do not bid on raw coins there. They are all over graded. Every one of them.