Last month, my neighbor’s kid asked me how much is 700,000 pennies after his grandfather left him a massive collection.
The kid thought he’d hit the jackpot. What followed was a weekend of counting, sorting, and learning way more about pennies than either of us wanted to know.
How Much Is 700,000 Pennies Worth? Let’s Cut to the Chase
When you calculate how much is 700,000 pennies, the answer is $7,000.
Simple division gets you there. Take 700,000 pennies, divide by 100 (since that’s how many pennies make a dollar), and you land at seven grand. Sounds straightforward until you actually try moving that much change around.
My neighbor’s garage became a makeshift counting station. We had pennies everywhere. His wife wasn’t thrilled.
Why Am I Even Talking About This?
People end up with massive penny stashes for weird reasons. My neighbor’s situation was inheritance, but I’ve heard stories that’ll make your head spin.
Remember that guy in Georgia? His boss literally dumped his final paycheck—91,000 pennies covered in grease—on his driveway. Petty doesn’t even begin to cover it. The video blew up online because nobody could believe someone would be that vindictive over $910.
Then there’s collectors. My uncle saved pennies for forty years in five-gallon water jugs. When he finally counted them, he had close to half a million. Took him three weeks to sort through. His dining room table disappeared under mountains of copper for almost a month.
Kids start penny jars that become penny buckets. Those buckets multiply. Next thing you know, someone’s asking how much is 700,000 pennies because that’s what’s sitting in their basement.
The Real Problem: This Is A LOT of Pennies
Numbers on a screen don’t tell the full story. When you’re figuring out how much is 700,000 pennies, you need to understand what you’re actually dealing with physically.
The Weight Situation
Pennies aren’t heavy individually. But multiply that tiny weight 700,000 times and suddenly you’ve got a serious problem.
Modern pennies clock in at 2.5 grams each. Sounds like nothing, right? Wrong. Do the calculation and 700,000 of these things weigh 3,858 pounds. That’s heavier than most sedans. My neighbor tried loading a few boxes into his trunk and his suspension nearly gave out.
Older pennies from before 1982 are worse. They’re mostly copper instead of cheap zinc, which makes them heavier—about 3.11 grams each. If your collection skews older, you’re pushing 4,800 pounds total. That’s two full-grown horses worth of weight. Not something you casually toss in your Honda.
We had to borrow my brother-in-law’s pickup truck. Even then, we could only move about a quarter of the pennies at once without worrying about breaking something.
The Space Problem
Weight aside, storage becomes a nightmare. These pennies take up approximately 400 cubic feet of space. Picture a small bedroom with pennies stacked to your waist. That’s what we’re talking about.
My neighbor had them in old paint buckets, cardboard boxes, and even a couple of those giant pretzel containers from Costco. Still wasn’t enough. We counted 28 containers total, and they took up his entire garage plus part of the basement.
You can’t just shove this in a closet and forget about it. The question of how much is 700,000 pennies becomes less about value and more about logistics real fast.
So How Do You Actually Turn These Into Real Money?
Converting 700,000 pennies into usable cash isn’t as simple as walking into a bank. Trust me on this one. We learned the hard way.
Option 1: Take Them to Your Bank
Banks seem like the obvious answer when you’re wondering how much is 700,000 pennies and how to cash them in. But banks hate coins. Like, really hate them.
We called five different branches before finding one willing to work with us. Most said they’d only take rolled coins. Do you know how long it takes to roll 700,000 pennies? Neither did we until we started. Each roll holds 50 pennies. You need 14,000 rolls. Fourteen thousand.
My neighbor’s kids helped for about an hour before they got bored. His wife rolled exactly 43 before declaring she had better things to do. That left us rolling pennies while watching three seasons of Breaking Bad.
Some banks have coin counters. Those are your best bet. Free to use if you’re an account holder, and they’ll dump straight into your checking account. The machine at our bank could handle about 5,000 pennies before needing to be emptied. We were there four different days.
The upside? You get the full $7,000. No fees, no cuts. Just pure patience required.
Option 2: Coinstar Machines
Those green machines at grocery stores seem convenient when you’re trying to figure out how much is 700,000 pennies in actual spending money. They count fast and you walk away with a voucher in minutes.
Here’s what nobody tells you: Coinstar takes 11.9% right off the top. On seven grand, that’s $833 gone. My neighbor almost went this route until I did the math for him. Losing $833 for convenience felt wrong.
But there’s a loophole. If you take gift cards instead of cash, they waive the fee completely. My neighbor shops at Amazon constantly, so we considered it. He could’ve gotten the full $7,000 in Amazon credit. Not cash, but better than losing nearly a grand.
We ended up not using Coinstar because the machines have daily limits. We would’ve needed to visit multiple stores over several days anyway. Might as well hit the bank instead.
Option 3: Credit Unions Are Your Friend
This is what saved us. Credit unions don’t have the same hatred for coins that big banks do.
My neighbor joined a local credit union specifically for this. Cost him $25 to open an account. They had a commercial-grade coin counter that could process 10,000 pennies at once. The teller didn’t even blink when we showed up with boxes of pennies. Apparently they deal with this more than you’d think.
Best part? No fees. When someone asks how much is 700,000 pennies at a credit union, the answer stays $7,000 because they don’t skim anything off.
If you’re not a credit union member, join one before attempting this. The membership fees are tiny compared to what you’d lose at Coinstar or the hassle of rolling coins yourself.
Option 4: Hire the Professionals
We didn’t go this route, but I researched it. Companies exist that pick up large coin quantities, count them, and deposit the money for you. Armored car services do this regularly for businesses.
They charge fees, obviously. But when you’re dealing with 3,858 pounds of pennies, paying someone else to handle the logistics starts making sense. Your back will thank you.
Wait—Could Your Pennies Be Worth MORE Than $7,000?
Before you haul everything to the bank, you need to check dates. This part actually got exciting for us.
The Holy Grails of Penny Collecting
When calculating how much is 700,000 pennies, most people think face value. But rare pennies hiding in that pile could multiply your money.
My neighbor found two 1955 pennies in his collection. One was regular. The other had this weird double image on the date—a doubled die error. That single penny sold on eBay for $1,200. Took ten seconds to spot once we knew what to look for.
Here’s what we learned to watch for:
1943 Copper Pennies: These shouldn’t exist. The mint made steel pennies that year because copper went to the war effort. A few copper ones slipped through anyway. They sell for six figures. We didn’t find any, but we checked every 1943 penny three times just in case.
1955 Doubled Die: The one we found. Date and letters appear twice, slightly offset. Worth $1,000 to $1,800 depending on condition.
1969-S Doubled Die: Even rarer than the 1955 version. Goes for $35,000 or more. We got really excited when we found a 1969-S penny, but it turned out to be normal.
1982 Small Date Copper: The mint switched from copper to zinc in 1982. Some copper ones with a small date got mixed in. Those sell for around $10,000 each.
1992 Close AM: The letters “A” and “M” in America touch on these error pennies. Worth about $20,000. We found three 1992 pennies, but none had the close AM.
Out of 700,000 pennies, my neighbor found five coins worth more than face value. Total extra value: about $1,850. Not life-changing, but definitely worth the few hours we spent checking dates.
The Copper Penny Thing
Pre-1982 pennies are 95% copper. Post-1982 pennies are zinc with copper coating. The difference matters.
Copper has value. Each old penny contains roughly three cents worth of copper at current prices. You can’t legally melt them, but collectors pay premiums for pre-1982 copper pennies.
We separated all the older pennies. My neighbor ended up with about 180,000 copper pennies—worth maybe $5,400 in copper content. He can’t melt them legally, but he’s holding onto them separate from the zinc ones. Who knows, maybe Congress changes the law someday.
When determining how much is 700,000 pennies, checking for copper adds potential value most people miss.
Real Stories from Real People
The Andreas Flaten story pisses me off every time I think about it. Guy quits his job at an auto repair shop after they kept jerking him around about his final paycheck. Finally, his former boss dumps 91,000 pennies on his driveway—covered in axle grease.
The video went viral. People started donating to Andreas to help him clean the pennies. He eventually got his $910, but what a ridiculous way to get paid. Pretty sure that violated some labor laws, but I’m not a lawyer.
Then there’s the Louisiana guy who inherited 1.2 million pennies from his father-in-law. Took him eight months to sort through everything. He found enough rare coins to add an extra $3,000 to the face value.
These stories pop up regularly. When someone asks how much is 700,000 pennies, they’re usually not asking hypothetically. They’re staring at a genuine pile of copper and zinc wondering what to do next.
What About Taxes?
My neighbor asked his accountant about this. Turns out, yeah, you probably owe taxes.
Found pennies count as income. Inherited pennies might factor into estate taxes if the total inheritance was large enough. Someone gave you 700,000 pennies as a gift? That could trigger gift tax forms.
Selling rare pennies for profit? Capital gains tax applies.
His accountant told him to report the full amount as miscellaneous income. The rare pennies he sold got reported separately as collectible sales. I’m not giving tax advice here—talk to a professional. But don’t think the IRS doesn’t care because it’s pennies.
Tips for Actually Dealing With This
Want my honest take on handling this? Here’s what worked for us and what didn’t.
Sort Smart
Separate everything by date first. Pre-1982 in one pile, post-1982 in another. While you’re sorting, keep your eyes open for those rare dates.
We used a digital scale to speed things up. One hundred modern pennies weigh exactly 250 grams. Weigh batches instead of counting manually. Your sanity will thank you.
My neighbor’s biggest mistake? Not sorting by date at the beginning. We ended up doing it twice because we wanted to check for copper content after already counting everything. Learn from our pain.
Think About Transportation
You’re not moving 3,858 pounds by yourself. Physics won’t allow it.
We used my brother-in-law’s Ford F-150. Loaded the bed with heavy-duty plastic bins—the kind rated for 50 pounds each. Even then, we could only do about 1,000 pounds per trip without worrying about breaking something.
Made four trips total over two weeks. Gas money added up, but beats paying someone to haul it.
Get help. Lifting boxes full of pennies destroyed my lower back. I’m still doing physical therapy three months later. Seriously, get help.
Budget Your Time
Nobody warns you how time-consuming this gets. When researching how much is 700,000 pennies, you see the dollar amount but not the hours involved.
Sorting took us roughly 30 hours spread over several weekends. We had three people working most of that time. Solo? You’re looking at 60+ hours minimum.
Rolling pennies took another 40 hours. We gave up halfway through and just found a credit union with a coin counter.
Transportation and actual banking? About 12 hours total including drive time and waiting.
This became a part-time job for nearly two months. Plan accordingly.
Random Questions People Actually Ask
Can I just pay for stuff with 700,000 pennies?
Legally, yes. Pennies are legal tender. Practically? No business will accept them.
My neighbor joked about buying a used car with pennies. The dealership’s finance guy laughed and said absolutely not. There’s no federal law forcing businesses to accept any particular payment form. Most have policies against large coin amounts.
That’s why those spite-payment videos exist. Someone pays a parking ticket with pennies trying to make a point. The city doesn’t have to accept them, but sometimes they do just to end the situation.
How long would it take to count them all by hand?
One penny per second equals 700,000 seconds. That’s 194 hours. Almost 25 full workdays of non-stop counting.
We tried counting by hand for about thirty minutes before realizing how absurd it was. Then we bought a kitchen scale on Amazon for $20 and started weighing instead.
Should I clean the pennies first?
Regular pennies you’re cashing in? Clean them if they’re grimy. Makes handling easier.
Potentially rare pennies? Don’t touch them. Cleaning destroys collector value. We learned this after my neighbor’s kid tried “helping” by scrubbing some 1950s pennies with soap and water. Probably cost us a few hundred bucks in value.
My Final Take on This Whole Thing
How much is 700,000 pennies? Seven thousand dollars—but getting to that money requires work most people don’t anticipate.
My neighbor and I spent two months dealing with his inheritance. By the end, we were joking about starting a penny-processing business because apparently this happens often enough to make money on.
If I had to do it again, here’s the streamlined approach:
- Join a credit union with free coin counting before you do anything else
- Spend one weekend sorting by date and checking for rare pennies
- Separate the copper pennies from zinc pennies (pre-1982 vs post-1982)
- Make multiple trips to the credit union with a truck
- Celebrate when it’s finally done
The rare pennies my neighbor found made the time investment worthwhile. That extra $1,850 covered the cost of the truck rental, gas, boxes, and still left enough for a nice dinner.
Would I want to do this again? Absolutely not. But if someone dropped 700,000 pennies in my lap tomorrow, at least I’d know exactly what to do.
And for anyone curious about how much is 700,000 pennies without actually having them—be grateful. This experience taught me more about the U.S. Mint, coin composition, and the limits of human patience than I ever wanted to know.
Just remember: it’s seven grand. Real money. Worth the effort. But maybe suggest direct deposit next time someone wants to give you a large sum.