Rare error £1 coin sells for £378 on eBay – do you have an odd one in your change?

COLLECTORS go mad for error coins – usually because they are so rare to come by, but that doesn’t stop the average joe forking one out his change.

A £1 that’s been misstruck has managed to fetch almost £400 as it fits a similar description, and left bidders desperate to claim for themselves.

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The rare £1 coin sold on eBay for exactly £377.89 back in December, but not before it caught the attention of 11 different bidders.

Between them, they placed 36 bids that rocketed the value of the £1.

When the coin was listed on the online auction site, its starting price was actually lower than face value, at just 99p.

But it only took one week to rise by 378 times that in price.

When you look at the coin the strike of the design on both sides appears to be slightly off centre.

That’s meant there’s a nice domed effect on the obverse too, which would stand out from other regular more uniformed copies of the coin.

RARE COINS AND VALUABLE NOTES

It’s because the coin has been struck outside the collar, which is the retaining ring that makes the final diameter of a newly-struck coin. 

What’s happened is called a “broadstrike” which is where the design expands beyond the diameter of a normal coin making it look misaligned.

Something has gone wrong in the minting process for this to happen.

And it’s not uncommon either, as the Royal Mint manufactures between three million and four million coins a day, so mistakes happen.

That being said, they’ll still be produced in low numbers, making them rare and therefore in demand.

Could I be quids-in with an error?

Error coins often go unnoticed because they’ll still pass through people’s hands as legal tender.

A coin like this might have been spotted from the crowd though, down to its misshapen feel.

As it’s got one wonky side it might have been rejected from a vending machine or the parking meter – though gratefully as after its eBay discover it’s definitely worth more than a chocolate bar, or two hours in town.

So it’s definitely worth checking your own change to see if you have any odd ones that would peak the interest of a collector.

Sometimes bidding wars break out on the most highly sought-after copies so you could be quids-in.

Similarly faulty 50ps have sold for over £500 before, which shows just how much collectors will be willing to ramp up the price when they come across a coin with a misshapen design.

These, and other listing examples found on eBay, can give you a good ballpark figure of how much you could earn.

But remember that buyers can always pull out of sales, which means the coin advertised won’t have sold for what it says it has.

There’s fakes to look out for as well.

Usually you can determine if something is the real deal by the number of bidders who were willing to stake their claim on it.

But change experts like Coin Hunter or Change Checker will help you verify if it’s real too.

They can also help place a value on the coin if you’re looking to list, yourself.

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This post first appeared on thesun.co.uk