Can You Actually Get Silver Coins From US Banks At A Discount?
I'll go ahead with the punchline...yes you can get silver coins from US banks for a fraction of the cost of traditional means of buying precious metal coins. I'm not talking about a typical purchase though...
Essentially, this is done by ordering a box of half dollars from the bank, hunting through them, and keeping only coins of certain years which still had silver in them. The main coin you would be looking for is the 1964 half dollar, which is 90% silver. The second most valuable would be the 1965-1970 Kennedy half dollar which is 40% silver.
The only two things needed to find these coins are a bank account, and at least $500 for one box of half dollars. Now it's important to note that is far from a get rich quick scheme. You could order several boxes and find zero silver coins. This is because people have been employing this strategy in one way or another for a long time now, which results in the most valuable coins being permanently taken our of circulation, never to be replaced. In economics, this process is known as Gresham's Law, which basically states that bad money(the non-silver coins in this case) will drive out good money(the silver coins).
This hunt for silver coins is inefficient for many people, as they don't have the time to order boxes and sift through them all, but for those silver stackers out there with more time on their hands, it can be a good way to acquire silver cheaper than direct purchases. Let's see how acquiring via this method compared with purchasing from a popular precious metals website.
http://www.apmex.com/product/5298/90-silver-kennedy-half-dollar-20-coin-roll-avg-circ-p-d
APMEX sells a roll of 20, 1964 Kennedays for $158.55, which equals $7.92 per coin. If you find one of these coins in a box ordered from the bank however, the cost is only the face value of the coin which is 50 cents. Quite a discount! Although the time it takes to order boxes and look through them is a bit of an opportunity cost.
Below is an interview with a guy who basically made a small business out of this silver hunting strategy. The thing is, he was selling all the silver he found immediately, and then using those funds to get more boxes of half dollars from the bank.
So there you have it, happy hunting!
Sources:
http://coinauctionshelp.com/Kennedy_Head_Half_Dollar.html#.WECyh33fe1s
http://www.treasurenet.com/forums/coin-roll-hunting/250218-have-you-seen-half-dollar-box-before.html
I have done this myself, my wife thinks I'm nuts but hey it's like a treasure hunt. I have even done this with pennies and found the average is 15 coins per roll are real copper.
Coin-roll hunting works, but you need a lot of volume to check... An alternative, as a way of making money, is trying to find perfect coins from newly minted stuff.
Example below (that will typically require more capital for Gold coins - but should be quite cheaper for Silver):