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selling copper pennies

PostPosted: Sun Oct 16, 2011 6:01 pm
by stlouiscoin
hey guys,

Where should I sell my copper pennies? and btw, ebay and craigslist are to low. I could sell them on here( trying to get to 10 posts), or find a buyer in my area which is taking ALOT of work. Which would you guys suggest. I have about 100.00 face value of coppers and its rising daily.

Re: selling copper pennies

PostPosted: Sun Oct 16, 2011 6:43 pm
by NDFarmer
Like most people that get into sorting copper on a bigger scale and then you want to start selling them you are finding out it is not easy. If you sell on feebay with all the fees that you pay, they make more money than you do. And with the price of copper taking quit a hit lately there are some for sale here on realcent for 1.4 cents apiece shipped and they don't even sell. With all the work that goes into sorting I don't care to sell that low. So you ask a good question. Where should I sell my copper pennies? Until the price of copper gets back up over $4.00 a lb. and we get closer to getting 2X face like you really should have to break even and maybe make a little bit for your time. I guess I would just keep sorting and sit on them if you can.

Re: selling copper pennies

PostPosted: Sun Oct 16, 2011 7:10 pm
by HoardCopperByTheTon
As soon as you find out.. let us know. Perspiring minds want to know. Why is it the first thing new guys ask is "where do I sell?" As nice as some of us are, do you think we would readily give up that information? The market is extremely soft right now. Those of us with large inventories are not sellers at the current market price. As the price slowly drifts up more and more sellers enter the marketplace and keep prices from climbing too rapidly. You can sell all you want.. you just might not like the price. The price is determined by the lowest cost seller until that seller runs out of inventory and leaves the market. The prices on eBay and Craigslist aren't too low.. your expectations are too high. The market price is the market price. You are either a buyer, a seller, or a holder at that price.. or you can go out and develop new markets.

Do you happen to know where I can buy large quantities of ASE's below spot? :mrgreen:

Re: selling copper pennies

PostPosted: Sun Oct 16, 2011 8:03 pm
by mtalbot_ca
Like HCBTT, I think that this is not the time to sell and I would say that the development of new markets might be your best option (if you want to make $$$ from your hobby). Here are some ideas:

Sell rolls sorted by dates or coin condition.
Sell a set of consecutive years for young people to start coin collecting
Sell copper-penny (or you zincs) jars for decoration puposes etc...

Good luck.

Re: selling copper pennies

PostPosted: Sun Oct 16, 2011 9:00 pm
by stlouiscoin
thanks guys, I guess i'll keep looking.. and I know where to get ases for spot, wait sorry only one per household, just read the fine print.

Re: selling copper pennies

PostPosted: Sun Oct 16, 2011 9:27 pm
by everything
I collect my coppers with no intention on selling anytime soon, $100 is not a very large amount yet. Just hold on, be creative, and copper is supposedly going back up in price next year.

Re: selling copper pennies

PostPosted: Sun Oct 16, 2011 9:38 pm
by aristobolus
Now is the time to sell wheat pennies for 3x - 4x cents a piece. There was an insightful post on the silver bullion forum about how that in the late sixties mercury dimes sold for a premium over silver roosevelts. Today both varieties of commons sell for the same price. I believe that common wheats (40-50's) have topped out, and that a day is approaching when 60's/70's/80's memorials will sell at parity with the former based on the spot price of copper.

Re: selling copper pennies

PostPosted: Mon Oct 17, 2011 8:19 am
by newton7
I would think now would be a good time to hoard with the price of copper down nobodys takes a notice to what your doing. I keep sorting and keep stacking for the better times to come.

Re: selling copper pennies

PostPosted: Mon Oct 17, 2011 10:53 am
by fasteddy
stlouiscoin wrote:hey guys,

Where should I sell my copper pennies?


HoardCopperByTheTon wrote:As soon as you find out.. let us know. Perspiring minds want to know. Why is it the first thing new guys ask is "where do I sell?" As nice as some of us are, do you think we would readily give up that information? The market is extremely soft right now. Those of us with large inventories are not sellers at the current market price. As the price slowly drifts up more and more sellers enter the marketplace and keep prices from climbing too rapidly. You can sell all you want.. you just might not like the price. The price is determined by the lowest cost seller until that seller runs out of inventory and leaves the market. The prices on eBay and Craigslist aren't too low.. your expectations are too high. The market price is the market price. You are either a buyer, a seller, or a holder at that price.. or you can go out and develop new markets.


Aint that the dang truth....

your phone will never ring if you dont get out there and sell your product.

Re: selling copper pennies

PostPosted: Mon Oct 17, 2011 1:07 pm
by pennypanner
I found a buyer locally. He pays 2X face. I sold $66 face Saturday he paid $132. I took the $132 to my local coin shop and bought two ASEs and three silver proof state quarters and still had thirty bucks left to buy silver another day.

Re: selling copper pennies

PostPosted: Mon Oct 17, 2011 8:16 pm
by xpred558
Good to hear there are buyers out there.

Re: selling copper pennies

PostPosted: Mon Oct 17, 2011 10:01 pm
by Cent1225
My advice is that if you are in this for the money, you would make real money spending the same amount of time flipping burgers at McDonalds. By the time you figure your time collecting, sorting then disposing of pennies, let alone the cost of gas and the equipment purchases you need to make to do any volume at all; sorting copper is a hobby at best.

Re: selling copper pennies

PostPosted: Mon Oct 17, 2011 11:33 pm
by HoardCopperByTheTon
Too late.. I already have all that equipment. Wait.. I got that fancy big 6 burner BBQ with proceeds from the sale of a few CTU's this summer.. I can flip burgers too! :mrgreen:

Re: selling copper pennies

PostPosted: Mon Oct 17, 2011 11:43 pm
by GGerrands
*Disclaimer that I was not affiliated with this auction.*
http://www.ebay.com/itm/150654778557

I like to scope out what copper is selling for on ebay, then look at a seller's feedback on similar copper penny lots to see what kind of price they're getting. Man, those were the days. Well over 3x face makes those fees seem a little more "eatable."

By my calculations, assuming a 12% total fee with ebay & paypal, you'd need to sell $50 of copper cents for about $86.70 on ebay to get a return of 1.5 x face on your money (count that as $97.72 if you include free shipping with your order).

For $75 lots, you'll need a final price of about $129.34 (or $140.34 with free shipping) to get to 1.5x face. $75 ships for the same price as 50, so I'm thinking that's a better way to go. Did I understand correctly some of you guys fit $100 fv into a medium flat rate box? Must be in bricks of pennies, would be interesting to see. On a positve notes, there is the *possibility of making a 1.5 fv sale in today's market, as this recently ended auction shows:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/290618424382

My math is a little fuzzy here, I think I'm taking out shipping at the wrong point, but it's close enuf for gov't work. :?

Re: selling copper pennies

PostPosted: Mon Oct 17, 2011 11:46 pm
by GGerrands
Oh yea, in response to the original question posed, you might try http://www.ecrater.com for selling online. You can use paypal to keep it secure, and no fees like ebay. I've seen copper pennies for sale on there, but I don't know how successful it is as a way to sell your product.

Re: selling copper pennies

PostPosted: Tue Oct 18, 2011 9:32 am
by exbingoaddict
GGerrands wrote:My math is a little fuzzy here, I think I'm taking out shipping at the wrong point, but it's close enuf for gov't work. :?


GGerrands, here is a link to a ebay calculator to save your adding machine some work next time. ;)

http://www.newlifeauctions.com/calc.html

Re: selling copper pennies

PostPosted: Wed Oct 19, 2011 12:17 pm
by 1badmf
that depends if you are investing or trying to make income