« Method to My Madness | Main | $1000/oz Gold! »
Any Spare Change? Nope
By JD Bluefield | March 12, 2008
If you asked me for change right now, I’d have to turn you away. Not because I can’t spare a quarter, I just don’t carry any. For the past several years, I’ve purposefully “engineered” my life to be as coin free as possible. There was a eureka moment where I discovered my pockets were lighter, dressers cleaner and car less jinglely over speed bumps. From that moment on, I set out to purposefully weed out coins from my life. An incident yesterday got me thinking about this fact and that it would be perfect for this blog.
On the way to a party, a friend offered to catch the bill for the hot dogs and soda to “get rid of change”. A gracious offer, I will admit, but in doing so revealed to me a copper, nickel and zinc treasure chest, the likes of which I have never seen. It also took more time to sift through this mountain for “exact change” than the other customers in line had patience.
Upon arriving at our destination, I immediately sequestered the wallet and dumped out her remaining change and went to town. The grand total came out to $8.96! “Wow, score!” she exclaimed and reached over to slide the coins back into the wallet. Before she could do so, I stopped her and told her to slide it into her palm instead. I then placed the now emptied wallet in the free hand. With this visual and tactile aide, she quickly realized that the shoulder strain from her pursed was partially the result of this coin-bloated wallet. “Well, if I don’t put the coins here what should I do?” she asked.
This brings me to why and how I got rid of (most of) the coins my life.
- Coins don’t accrue interest: Coins in a big jug don’t do anything except create an eye-sore and a coin-rolling headache. Don’t pay 8.9% to some coin sorting machine.
- Coins are easy to lose: There’s a reason you find them in every nook and crevice. They fall out of your pocket, drop under the car seat and disappear in the couch.
- First, cut off the source: I minimized the use of cash by primarily charging to credit/debit card whenever possible. No cash, no change! I started doing this as a way to accrue more cash-back/miles on credit cards, but morphed in the coin-killing system it is today. Disclaimer: This method requires a high degree of discipline. Keep in mind, if you don’t pay your bill in full every month or go wild charging non-sense it will negate any desired benefits of this system. I’ve become pretty frugal so this isn’t a problem, but it should be kept in mind.
- Next, organize the change before it piles up: Whatever gets by that first line of defense goes into only 3 places: my vehicle’s coin tray, my work coin tray and my dresser coin tray. All of which hold less than a handful of coins. This keeps the piles from building.
- Then, screen for real money: I shouldn’t put this out there, as it means less for me, but I screen for pre-1965 dimes made of 90% silver-10% copper. At the time of this post, with silver prices at $20/oz, these are worth around $1.45. Nothing mind blowing, but worth much more than face value. The easiest method is to check the side if you can see the copper center. You could also screen out pre-1982 95% copper pennies, worth around 2.5 cents at present copper prices, but is it really worth it? Also, the U.S. Mint made it illegal to melt down pennies and nickels for the purposes of obtaining their base metals.
- Last, get rid of it: The dresser is only a holding area for immediate pocket emptying and sorting. Quarters and some dimes go into the car for parking meters. Everything else goes to the office for the soda machine and group snack area. No need to roll coins, no going to the bank!
Coins are a necessary evil to some extent, but put it this way… There was more loose change in that wallet alone than I have total! This also leads to my next blog, which I’ll post tomorrow: What’s in My Wallet.
BTW: I later calculated, based on U.S. Mint standards the $8.96: $6 in quarters, $2 in dimes, $.50 in nickels and $.46 in pennies would have theoretically weighed 346.44 grams or approximately 3/4 lb. Food for thought, all bill denominations weigh, 0.3 oz or 0.01875 lb.
Topics: Engineered Living, Gold/Silver/Metals, Personal Finance |
2 Responses to “Any Spare Change? Nope”
Comments
You must be logged in to post a comment.
March 14th, 2008 at 12:59 pm
[…] looking at how to eliminate coins from my pocket I also thought about how I “engineered” my wallet. To set up this story, […]
March 28th, 2008 at 1:28 pm
[…] $25. This has simplified and expedited quick transactions like food service. By the way, by charging everything, these small bills not only earn miles/cash-back but eliminate the change/coins left over after […]