Today’s Mail Bag question comes from Hanna J. who had a great question about Mint Sets. They write,
Hi,
I wanted to know if it is ok to open up a mint set when I buy it from the mint? I like keeping my coins in individual holders but I wanted to make sure I wouldn’t get in trouble. And is the same for proof sets?
Hanna J
Thanks Hanna for writing in and first, no, you will not get in trouble. There is no law preventing you from opening up a Mint Set or a Proof Set and individually storing the coins in them. However, the bigger question is how do you want to collect Mint or Proof Sets?
If you have a desire to have a set from each year, then you really have two choices. First, you can simply buy a Mint or Proof Set and store it and then work with your local coin shop or online to pick up the individual coins for that year in Mint or Proof state. That can be time consuming and frankly, can be a bit more expensive than option two in some cases.
Option two, which is what I do, is buy two Mint sets and two Proof sets each year. One set I store away as a complete set for each while the others I open up for individual coin storage. Now this has risks of course as you could damage a coin while getting them out of the holders (especially the Proof sets – those cases are touch to crack) but it allows you to have a full-on Mint and Proof set while also having the individual coins. Obviously this doubles your costs for these sets so you have to consider that too.
Ultimately Hanna it really comes down to what works best for you, your collection, and your budget. But there is no rule or law that says you can’t open up a set. Just be careful so you don’t damage the coins or yourself.
If you have a question about coin collecting, feel free to head over to the About page and leave a comment.