Coins selling for well over face value regularly make the headlines - with one rare 50p Brexit coin reportedly fetching as much as £10,000. But how do you spot one likely to be sought after by collectors?
Some coins fetch higher prices because they were released for a limited time or celebrate a certain period of history. There might also have been a 'minting' error making them unique.
Glasgow Live spoke to an expert from Change Checker, who help find, identify, collect and swap circulating coins. She gave her top tips on spotting a valuable coin, where you can sell them - and the coins you can collect now that could be worth a small fortune in years to come.
How to sell your coins and why you should get it verified by the Royal Mint
Rachel Hooper, Product Group Manager for Change Checker has been working in the industry for five years, specialising in UK new issue coins and championing the hobby of change collecting. She said that when it comes to coins, they always advise to collectors is when it comes to valuing your coins, you have to bear in mind that "it is very subjective and it's dependent on a number of factors".
She explains: "You have a number of ways you can look out for rare coins and ways to spot why your coin would be worth a certain amount. We would always advise that if you had a coin in your collection you were trying to sell and another collector has been trying to track that down for a really long time, of course that collector would potentially be willing to pay above the odds to get hold of it to complete their collection.
"If another collector did have that coin already or didn't hold it to such value, you would perhaps struggle to get as much or that coin."
However, before you think about selling, it is advised that you first get it verified with Rachel explaining: "If you do think you've come across a rare coin, you probably want to get that verified by the Royal Mint because you're always likely to be able to get a better price for your coin if you have that certificate of authenticity that would explain what the error is."
She added that "it would be a real collectors piece if you could say I found this coin, the Royal Mint have verified it therefore it's genuine. After that, you can look at selling it from there."
Where can I sell my rare coin?
When it comes to where to sell it, Rachel says "eBay is definitely good shout. You have to pay seller fees with and there's no guarantee that the sale will go through but if you do decide to sell on eBay, look through previous sold prices for similar coins to get a better understanding of what you would expect to achieve for selling that coin.
"You can also look at Facebook coin groups as you tend to get more serious collectors and it's also really great place to get advice as well if you are looking for more information on coins."
"There's also the British Numismatic Trade Association and they have listed of dealers on there. So if you have lot of coins, perhaps you didn't want to have to go through each individual one, you could talk to one of the dealers they'll be able to get a price together for you or just advise you on the best places to sell that. So it's always a good idea if you did have a bigger bulk number of coins to sell, go and talk to a dealer there and they can give you some advice."
When it comes to selling them, Change Checker has done most of the hard work with sellers being able to use their eBay tracker. Rachel said: "Part of our six-point guide is to check our eBay tracker. This looks back at the median sold prices overs of the top ten coins and banknotes that you can find out there and it gives you information on its current market value.
"We look at trends and patterns so you can see an overall pattern for how desirable coins are at the moment and how much people could be willing to pay above the odds for them.
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How to spot a rare coin that could be worth selling
When it comes to your change, it can be hard to tell whether or not you have a rare or highly-sought after coin, especially if you don't know what to look out for.
Change Checker uses its own data from its swap centre looking at how often coins are swapped, how often they are listed as well as mintage figures for the circulating coins. Rachel said that determines how sought after each coin in circulation is.
She continued: "You'll notice the Kew Gardens 50p always seems to be at the top of that index and it's really the holy grail I guess of change collecting. It's certainly pretty hard to come by and there's only 210,000 of them out there which is really, really low especially when you consider where the next rarest 50p in circulation is the Beatrix Potter one which is 1.4 million. The Olympic ones are rare too.
"So it's a really big jump up from 210,000 to 1.4 million but it also means that it's really tricky to come by and especially when you consider a lot of collectors, if they found it, they've been keeping hold of that. It's currently selling on the second market for well over face value, sometimes you see listed for upwards of around £200."
What coins should people be looking our for?
Rachel has said that any of the Olympic 50p coins are really collectable. She said it was the coin that "kickstarted the craze and the nation's love of collecting".
She added: "Those were celebrating the London Olympics and the mintage figure of each of those are really quite low, they're sort of around the 1.1 million to two million mark which although it sounds like a lot, when you consider the population of the UK, it's actually a really small number.
"The Beatrix Potter are actually a lot rarer than first considered so they're definitely ones to look out for. Not only are they rare because of the mintage figure but because of the collecting theme around Beatrix Potter. They've almost inspired a new generation of collectors to come and join the hobby because of the Beatrix Potter and Peter Rabbit theme. They're synonymous with children's literature and it's been a way in for the younger generation to get excited about coin collecting."
When it comes to coins that people may not consider, Rachel stressed not to overlook 20ps. Although they don't have the different commemorative designs, they can have a fault making them highly sought after.
Calling it a "holy grail" for collectors, Rachel said: "The 20p's that were released in 2008 are ones to keep an eye out for. When there was a changeover of design, the coins got overlooked I think in the design process and some coins were accidentally struck without a date on them because where the date had originally been on one side of the design, then changed to another.
"One of the dies for striking the coins wasn't changed over and it meant that no date was stamped onto the coin, but only a few of them were actually stamped before the mistake was realised."
King Charles III coins - start collecting them now
As well as keeping an eye out for Peter Rabbit coins and those all important 20ps, Rachel has said that with a new monarch, now is the time to start collecting.
She said: "I think at the moment I would always be talking to collectors about the fact we have the new monarch changeovers. We've got the new King Charles III 50ps which entered circulation in December and although quite a large number eventually will enter circulation around the nine million mark, the fact that this is a Numismatic first I think it's going to be incredibly sought after - particularly in years to come so now is the time to start your King Charles collection.
"Make sure you've got the very first one and then be looking out for the others and build up a complete collection as you go."
