An American couple living in California made an astonishing discovery of a stash of coins beneath the basement of their late father-in-law’s home. The coins were found in Los Angeles, according to BBC.
John Reyes and his wife came across bags filled with coins while cleaning out their late father-in-law’s house in late 2022. Initially, Reyes stumbled upon scattered coins on the floor when the paper bags containing them had torn. The couple then found several bank-stamped paper bags filled with one-cent coins (1 cent = 0.01 USD), some from banks that no longer exist.
“We had to take bag after bag out of the basement and load them onto a truck,” Reyes said. He mentioned that it took them an entire day to remove the coins from the basement.
The coins were made of solid copper and dated back before 1943. Nowadays, American coins are mainly composed of zinc. As the house was built in the early 1900s, the Reyes family believes that it may have once served as a boarding house.
The couple did not count each individual coin. However, based on the weight, Reyes estimated that there were around one million coins taken out of the basement.
Recently, when Reyes took the coins to a bank in Los Angeles, the bank staff refused to accept them, citing a lack of storage space for coins.
After discussing with the bank, Reyes stated that he and his wife would not exchange the coins for paper currency. Instead, they decided to sell the entire collection online for $25,000.