I wouldn’t have announced this. At the very least I’d have moved to a non-income tax state and then quietly started selling. Better yet....how about moving to a country where they don’t figure most of what you’ve got belongs to someone else.
I agree. But with as many old gold coins as they found, they’d acquire a reputation pretty quickly as they started showing up in markets. It wouldn’t be too many years before the secret would be out.
Dummy that I am, I’m sure I would have done no better than they did. In my more calm and lucid moments, I like to think I would have gotten a lawyer on my side first before calling the cops.
When I was 14 and walking home from school I found a wallet laying at the edge of the road. I opened it and found $320 in addition to tons of stuff like papers and credit cards - all worthless to me. To a kid that was a fortune!
From his driver license I searched through the phone book, called his phone number, and left a message to call me if he had lost something. He called a few hours later and identified his wallet. We made arrangements for him to come to my house and retrieve it.
My mom stood with me when he came to the house (watching out for me). I answered the door, he grabbed the wallet and without a word turned and left. It soured me on the whole good Samaritan thing, but didn’t kill the sense of ethics my folks taught me.
In truth I don’t know what I would do if I dug up a treasure in my backyard. I do know that the last one on earth that I would want to profit by it is the government.
I kept making the same, second guessing, suggestions.
But.....they did seek professional advice.
AND....it’s a bit tough to unload 1427 gold coins, quietly,...one at a time.
Specially if one or more are worth close to a Million...
Any transaction of $10K or more gets reported.....so, maybe, they’ve done the smart thing.
Not a bad idea.
And how do you plan to get the coins out of the country and what would you do if they are found as you go through customs?
They announced it due to trying to make even more money buy selling the coins as part of the historic Saddle Ridge Hoard. Get it? They were giving the coins a brand to bring in more at auction. Own part of American history!!! Seems like they got this advice from a coin dealer.
I would have never done this...would have sold off quietly and gotten less money. The couples plan backfired. Now everyone wants a piece of them