“Coin roll hunting” is the act of acquiring rolls of coins through banks/credit unions and going through the contents in hunt of rare/valuable coins. Coin roll hunting for silver used to be very lucrative, although these days it is slim pickings. Even up until a few years ago I could occasionally luck out getting silver half dollars at the bank. In a way, coin roll hunting is the closest thing to an irl “unlimited money glitch” out there. The cost to procure the coin rolls is face value, and the potential to score a rare coin worth anywhere from a couple of bucks to thousands is there, BUT it is a major time sink.

And although coin roll hunting is such a time sink, that is part of the appeal to me. Sorting through a massive amount of coins brings the same therapeutic benefits as doing a puzzle while simultaneously scratching the same itch as busting open a pack of trading cards. It’s a good way to just space out and put things in their place, and there’s a sense of excitement whenever you do manage to pull a cool coin.

Sept 2024 - The First Nickel Hunt

Between difficulties in sourcing full boxes of pennies and a desire to change (no pun intended) things up a bit, I decided to try a new denomination and hunt nickels for the first time. I decided on nickels because a box only runs $100 and there's a lot of potential for variety. Dimes don't have much worth hunting for other than silver (which is a very rare pull) and quarter boxes run $500.



Not a bad haul, but I was hoping to maybe pull a buffalo nickel. The only coin of any collector value is the 35% silver war nickel in the top left.
While it was fun, I don't see myself doing another nickel hunt anytime soon. Out of the 2000 nickels I went through only 4 were out of the ordinary. I still prefer pennies as they have a higher value yield due to the copper and there's a lot more weird stuff that slips through into their rolls.


January 2026 - Returning to Nickels + An Amazing Find

A social club has formed amongst myself and a few friends where we embark on a weekly coinroll hunt. One of these friends has a business account, so therefore they can source rolls of everything pretty reliably and without much fuss. As a result, I have gotten back into hunting nickels, but in much shorter bursts so far.

Amazingly, despite only going through about $6 worth of nickels this year, I got incredibly lucky and scored this...



Along with my 1907 Indian Head find last year, this 1909 Liberty nickel was one of those near holy grail pulls that I always hoped for. The condition of the coin isn't the best and rarity/value wise, it's hardly much more than a couple bucks at most. But simply finding this coin, out in the wild after 117 years of circulation, is a remarkable thing. I am glad I was fortunate enough to pull this out of a roll, I think the rest of the group was about to abandon nickels entirely if it weren't for this...