One Los Angeles family recently discovered one million pennies while cleaning out the home of their deceased father. But just how much are these copper coins really worth?
Initial plans included selling their coin collection back to Coinstar; however, that would incur an 8% fee; hence they listed their stash for sale on OfferUp at $25,000. So how much are these one million pennies worth?
What Do They Look Like?
One million is an impressive figure to witness up close, as its magnitude makes an impressionful statement about our world today. If stacked vertically, that amount would reach more than one mile high. Visualizing such an immense sum allows one to picture how heavy such money would be as well as giving an estimate for how many containers might be necessary to store such an immense sum.
Last year, a California family was lucky enough to discover an unexpected stash of one million pennies while clearing out their father-in-law’s home. Real estate agent John Reyes and his wife began finding loose pennies while clearing out a crawl space when they came upon crates, boxes and bank bags filled with copper coins worth far more than its initial $10,000 face value. Reyes quickly realized this treasure had more value than they initially estimated so put it up for sale on OfferUp website.
Early April saw Reyes receive over 300 offers for his collection of 1 million pennies. Although Reyes and his family had yet to agree upon an estimated value for this collection, Reyes wants it to go to a good home where its future will flourish.
Pennies don’t carry as much value nowadays since the United States ceased making them from copper in 1943 and began using zinc-coated steel instead. Still, some people hold onto their historic and sentimental value; it has become tradition to throw pennies into fountains or bodies of water as good luck charms.
One million pennies takes time and dedication to count. Doing it all at once would require approximately 160 hours, so having a large, sturdy container is key for collection purposes.
Stacking one million pennies might not be the most practical use for them, but it makes for an interesting display. To ensure their safekeeping, transport them via armored truck or another secure storage facility. Or consider using them in art projects for an interesting twist.
How Much Do They Weigh?
One million pennies may sound like an incredible sum, but in actuality they’re not that valuable; most penny have very limited purchasing power (you couldn’t even get an entire candy bar with one!). That said, rare or valuable pennies may have much greater worth; one family discovered one such coin while cleaning out their late father-in-law’s home.
John Reyes and his wife made headlines nationwide after discovering an estimated 10,000 copper pennies hidden within boxes, crates and bank bags at their late father-in-law’s California home last year. Reyes estimated his haul had at least that much value.
Although their discovery had an impressive valuation, cashing it in proved challenging for the family. First they attempted to bring the pennies into a bank; however, this institution didn’t have enough space for such large quantities of coins. Coinstar was another option but their 8% fee discouraged them.
Reyes and his family began by weighing and counting the pennies before using an online conversion calculator to convert their weight from grams to pounds – they found that Reyes’s collection weighed roughly 250 million grams or 550,000 pounds.
Rare copper pennies or collections of them can be worth millions, yet melting down these coins for profit is illegal in the U.S. Doing so would lead to scarcity of coins which would likely affect the economy negatively – thus many collectors choose not to sell their collection for scrap value.
How Much Do They Occupy?
California family was delighted to discover a mammoth haul of pennies – at least 1 Million! As they cleared out an elderly loved one’s home, they found dozens of paper bank bags filled with these fortunes in the crawl space – but were faced with the daunting task of determining what would become of such an immense sum of cash.
Initial thoughts included cashing out their coins, but soon realized it would be impractical or impossible to do so. A Coinstar machine could not process their large size; no banks accepted deposits that are worth thousands of dollars either. They decided instead to list them for sale on OfferUp but were unwilling to ask for more than $25,000.
One million pennies could form a tower three feet high – this height would equal that of Dubai’s Burj Khalifa building – but such an immense collection is impossible for most people to manage and would require enormous amounts of storage space.
Pennies would produce significant pollution if melted down for their metal content, due to the mining and refining processes which produce copper and zinc, both commonly found in pennies, which require significant amounts of energy, producing greenhouse gases in abundance and leaving waste materials that threaten local water supplies.
Apart from environmental impacts, there are other considerations associated with collecting such an immense sum of money. Transporting and melting coins would consume significant energy resources while their disposal would produce millions of grams of carbon dioxide emissions and contribute significantly to global climate change.
No matter your motives for collecting pennies – whether donating them or using them artistically – it is vitally important that a solid plan be drawn up before embarking on such an undertaking. Dealing with large quantities of coins can be expensive; thus it is imperative that preparation be made ahead of time in order to minimize challenges related to storage and transport costs.
How Much Are They Worth in Total?
Pennies might not seem like they hold much purchasing power in terms of daily grocery store transactions; yet rare ones can fetch hundreds, thousands, even millions in values; this was especially true of copper pennies found recently in California.
Real estate agent John Reyes made the astounding find while helping a family clear out the home of their late father-in-law in Los Angeles. Reyes discovered an astounding collection of pre-1980 copper pennies hidden away in boxes and sacks underneath the home, rather than the zinc plating now used on most coins.
Reyes and his family had no idea the coins were worth so much until they tried to cash them in, only to discover most banks didn’t want to accept such large quantities. So they used trucks to haul all those pennies back home – an arduous process that took several hours!
Once they reached Ontario, they started searching for any rare penny worth more than its face value and listing their collection for $25,000, more than twice its face value according to KTLA. Although this sum of money still pales in comparison with some of the more extravagant copper penny collections currently on offer today, it still represents a remarkable accomplishment from being found under someone’s house in a crawlspace!
Reyes and his family intend to give the collection to the Pride of Vista Lions Club if the collection remains unsold, who hope to raise $100,000 through cashing-in the coins for community groups and nonprofit organizations, with any leftover funds going toward rebuilding Vista American Little League’s ballpark that was damaged during flooding during last year’s storms.
As each penny weighs 2.5 grams, melting down 1 million pennies would take many months and numerous heavy-duty trucks would be necessary to complete this task; its combined weight would be enough to crush 17 cars! Also note that in the United States it is illegal to melt down pennies for profit.
