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Think finding a million pennies would be an awesome windfall or a total pain? The answer might be a mix of both. California realtor John Reyes and his wife Elizabeth looked into the crawl space of a home that had been previously owned by Elizabeth's father and found boxes and bags holding what they later estimated to be one million pennies. The coins had been tucked away by her father and uncle, who previously lived in the Los Angeles area home.

Even better, the pennies were copper, and not zinc, which the United States switched to in the 1980s. According to KTLA, Elizabeth Reyes' father and uncle would purchase copper pennies when the changeover began in hopes of building generational wealth for their families, anticipating that the value of the copper coins would increase over time.


But finding a bank to take them wasn't so easy. After determining Coin Star would take too much in fees, the Reyes called around to banks and found no one willing to take the coins. 


Thinking their local bank would accept the coins, the Reyes spent one day hauling the heavy bags out of the crawl space but again met with rejection. 


Finally, the Reyes listed the pennies on the resale site OfferUp for $25,000 hoping to find a collector. While the Reyes finally did sell the pennies, they aren't revealing the price they accepted. Even though they kept some of the coins to remember the experience, we're guessing they're just glad it's over.