Vintage Currency

[jjone20]

Anyone know anything about old money? Going through my Dad's estate I found a wad of very old bills, of many different countries. Most in excellent condition starting around 1911 - German, Polish, Russian, French, in many different denominations - 10,000 Kronen for example. Some Yuan (Yen?), too. I'll probably go to a collector, but I was just wondering.

[id10t]

I need a good reference for old European coins... have some half pennies in great shape from early 1800s, lots of euro stuff from just after WWI (1919-23)

[on2wheels52]

Hopefully someone more knoweledgeable will chime in, all I know about coin/currency values I learned at my pawn shop. The easiest to sell is pre-65 US silver coins, there is some valuable US paper but it seems to be a specialized area of intrest, I don't deal in it.
Foreign money is an even harder sell, perhaps the bigger cities have a source for selling.
Check at the library for a World Coin Book, that should provide some information. Remember the prices posted are retail, don't be suprised to be offered 20% on that.
Jim

[jrdavid68]

Let me know if you have any old US currency in the pile, I can easily get you some value ranges. No help on the foreign stuff though.

[Zef]

When my grand father passed away...I found a old bill...It's a 50000 Mark...I went to the bank to change it for Canadian $...the bill passed trough several hands...and to several loud eyes...They finally told me that it was not current...I don't knew that if you keep money to long that it can become upsolete...!

[slodave]

Originally Posted by Zef

When my grand father passed away...I found a old bill...It's a 50000 Mark...I went to the bank to change it for Canadian $...the bill passed trough several hands...and to several loud eyes...They finally told me that it was not current...I don't knew that if you keep money to long that it can become upsolete...!

Like this one?

Wish it was in focus.

[WolfeMacleod]

My wife's grandfather had several thousand dollar worth of Confederate currency.

'parently it's somewhat worthless.

[Lil Black Car]

I have a couple of hundred thousand German Marks that were issued not to long before the Euro came out. There was a window open where you caould still trade them in for dollars or Euro's but it was closed about five years ago, so now all the money you have isn't worth squat. At least the German Marks aren't. The local paper in Frankfort ran an article about a year ago announcing that you could no longer trade them in, in Germany. You can find the things for sell at the flohmarkt every weekend, along with all the "illegal" World War II stuff.

[MRM]

I don't think the Confederate currency is exactly worthless, even though the government that printed it no longer exists. It's pretty collectable.

[Super_Dave_D]

Originally Posted by Zef

When my grand father passed away...I found a old bill...It's a 50000 Mark...I went to the bank to change it for Canadian $...the bill passed trough several hands...and to several loud eyes...They finally told me that it was not current...I don't knew that if you keep money to long that it can become upsolete...!

Its the US stuff thats highly collectable (silver notes, gold notes, etc) especially old old stuff when the paper currency was BIG - they call the large bills blanket currency. BUT there is no such thing as a US federal reserve note going out of date. You cold take an 1899 black eagle silver certificate to teh bank and exchange it for a buck - you would be stupid but you could still do it. Theres a reason you see the non-us stuff hanging on walls in restaraunts.

[Super_Dave_D]

My favorite old bill - 1899 silver cert

this one is valued at $9,000

[Porsche-O-Phile]

Mostly the value is for uncirculated. The same bill found in a cash register somewhere (even if it's in good shape) would be worth what - maybe a hundred bucks?

Collecting circulated stuff is a lot easier/simpler but the values tend to be absurdly lower. When you get into uncirculated items, it's more like collecting artwork than money - the stuff is printed/packaged with the intention of never being spent. It's not really "money" per se at that point, at least that's how I see it.

[pwd72s]

Hoot! Before Turkey changed it's currency, I had Evren mail a big bill to a friend who always wanted to be a multi millionaire. IIRC, it was a ten million lira note. About $20 to us...