It is time to check your wallets and that loose change jar because you could be in possession of rare coins worth a whole lot more than their decimal value. That 20 cent coin in your wallet could be worth up to $1500. Rare features and printing errors on some Australian coins that are still in public circulation could make prospective coin collectors a small fortune.
There are a number of different coins across the 5 cent, 20 cents, one dollar and fifty cent denominations that could be worth thousands of dollars. I have listed below a couple to watch out for.
The 2007 Double Obverse (Head) 5 Cent
The first coin to look out for is the Double Header 2007 5 Cent coin. If you had this coin in your possession you would definitely recognise it. This coin was a product of a mint worker deliberately pairing two 2007 heads (obverse) dies and then running the press to mint several hundred or possibly even several thousand coins. If you happen to find one of these, they could be worth up to $1500+ to a collector.
The Year 2000 $1/10c Mule
The next coin, we have the valuable and well-known mule dollar. This will look like any other dollar coin so you will need to look closely. This coin is a result of an accidental pairing of a 10 cent heads (obverse) die and the normal mob of roos reverse die. It’s thought that between 5000-10000 of these coins were minted. Worth from $300-$500 even after circulating for 20 years it’s time well spent looking out for them!
The 1966 Wavy Baseline 20 Cent
This 20 cent coin is another coin you will need to inspect very closely as the flaw will be hard to find. The Wavy Baseline 20 cent dated 1966 is as the name suggests. If you look closely at the baseline of the number 2 on the tails side the is a quite obvious wavy baseline. Of course not all 1966 20 cent coins exhibit this feature but the very small fraction that do are worth $250 or more even. That’s even if they have spent more than 50 years circulating since decimal currency was released in 1966!
The Year 2010 Upset 50 Cent
If you ever come across one of these 2010 upset 50 cent coins you will immediately know that something is just not right about it. Sometime during the production run of 2010 50 cent coins the coin press operator installed the obverse or reverse die incorrectly. As a result, the obverse (heads) side of some coins is rotated 30 degrees from the reverse (tails) side of the coin. It’s thought that perhaps 200,000 of these coins were manufactured and each is worth $50 or more.
The Year 2000 Incuse Flag 50 Cent
The year 2000 Millennium 50 cent was released with a fairly difficult to spot die variety. Basically, the Cross of St. Andrew (the cross with a horizontal and vertical bar) on the Union Jack is incuse or sunk into the coin rather than in relief (sticking out of the surface of the coin) for the normal version of the coin. Worth $50 even circulated the incuse flag 50 cent will be a coin worth looking for.
The 1966 Round 50c
What? A round 50 cent coin? If you found one of these coins you will be quite confused. But in fact, the round 50 cent coin is not even really that rare. The round Australian 50 cent piece was introduced at the changeover to decimal currency in Australia in 1966. It was found that the coin’s silver value outweighed the worth of the coin, so it was withdrawn from production and replaced in 1969 with the dodecagonal (12 sided) shape.
1972 5c
Typically 5 cent coins hold little interest to most collectors, but there is one year that collectors are on the lookout for. The 1972 5c was the lowest circulation mintage year of all 5c coins with only around 8.3 million coins minted. Because of the low mintage, it made the 1972 5c one of the more rare coins and a little difficult to find in good condition. Expect to pay $50 or so for one of these coins if you find one in reasonably good condition.