First off, you should actually research coin collecting before you begin doing it. A lot of beginning coin collectors waste a lot of time and money buying overpriced or completely worthless coins because they fail to do adequate research beforehand. At the very least, you should invest in a book of pricing information for the coins that you most want to collect, but you would also be helped along by books about grading coins and about the study, collection, and sale of rare coins in general.

Next, you should decide where you want to start collecting. Most collections are more valuable if they somehow make up a set. Whether your goal is to get all of the more common varieties of a particular coin or to buy certain types of rare coin varieties, you should be sure that you set buying and collecting goals that you can stick with, at least for a while. Until you know more about how coin buying and collecting works, you shouldn’t go off and buy random coins just because they look interested.

Now you can start to actually build your collection. You can find coins for your collection at flea markets, at pawn shops, and through professional rare coin dealers. Just starting off, you may have good luck at the shops and flea markets because you’ll still have a long list of coins that you need. As your list narrows, though, you may want to talk with a rare coin dealer, who is more likely to have a large collection of coins and who will also be able to get you in contact with people who may have what you’re looking for.

Finally, as you continue to collect, enjoy your current collection and look to how you can improve it in the future. Keep changing your list so that your hobby can be ongoing.