I used to get excited when I'd find change on the ground, so now I toss pennies and sometimes nickels in the hopes that some kid finds it and feels the same way.

Best score was finding a $5 bill on a shelf of shoes at a Payless when I was about 7.

I found $100 once while I was out running - two $50 bills just hanging out on the ground.

I assumed they were probably counterfeit, but they passed just fine when I eventually spent them.

When I was a kid, I realized that the ground at the bottom of slides in the park was basically a gold mine, due to poorly designed pants pockets.

I used to scoff at change, but this year I decided to turn my change into amazon.com gift card credits through Coinstar(which is fee free if you convert it to a gift card). I bought almost all my Christmas gifts with the money I got from my change from throughout the year. Now I do pick up change whenever I see it.

If you found 1 nickel a day, it would take you over 50 years to collect a thousand bucks. I'm calling shenanigans.

"I'm calling shenanigans." i lol'd

@Ninja007:
I'm not sure what would limit them to a nickel, or to only 1 piece of change per day.
But yes if for some reason they found a nickel, and then went home, that would take a long time.
That would be the equivalent of me sending one email each day and leaving, and the complaining that it took 500 weeks to get a project done.

Mum used to say "See a penny, pick it up and all day long you'll have a penny more than you would have had."

Go to a lazy river at any water park. I used to go through these wearing goggles and scooping up change when I was a kid - occassionally even a fluttering bill.

@Ninja007:
$2.70 average per day to make $1000 in a year. With four people that's 68 cents each per day. Not impossible but I would say the amount these people found is an outlier.

I found a fiver once, that was awesome.

However, I hope one day to make so much money that in the time it takes to stoop and pick up a quarter, I make more than a quarter.

@Oranges w/ Cheese: most I ever found was $15 when out walking the dog. Came one day after I gave some money at the supermarket to a food charity, so I figured it was karma saying "thanks!" = )

@moore850: Yeah like Bill gates, he can find a $100 bill and make more money in the time to pick it up.

@Kevin Carlyle: $2.70 is a lot of money to be finding day in and day out. The amount of time it would take to do this you could probably make 5-6 times that working a minimum wage job.

There is a line between picking up change that you see and hunting it down by taking "long walks" like the Humphreys.

I found a whole bunch of change at the local 7-11 (some paper money too!) It was sitting in a box right next to the register...hard to believe I was the first one to spot it! I think people were distracted by the picture of the cute kid right next to the box.

I always pick up change, but the most I've ever found is a dime. *sigh*

@moore850: Based on the assumption of 50 working weeks in a year and an 8 hour work day, just aim to make at or above $180 million per year after taxes.

The ChangePot blog is rather dull. And it isn't from the $1,000 family. This one has only earned $45.

@moore850: I also assumed that you are quick on your feet and it only takes a second (literally) for you to stoop and pick up a quarter.

They should've ended the piece with "....and then I found 5 dollars"

I always pick up change, and stash it away in one of those gigantic beer steins you find in Munich. My friends all laugh at me and think I'm nuts. My wife thought I was nuts until I cashed in the beer stein and took her out to dinner.

@calquist: Though if the worst outcome they get is merely to get off the couch for an hour of walking, that's still well worth doing.

@floraposte: True, and it really is just a seasonal sport. Too much snow covering the ground during the winter.

Some folks keep their eyes to the sky (not to mention a few stuck-up noses), I kept my eyes to the ground, picking up the change they left behind.

I had a waitress once tell me she took her kids to disney by saving the change she would get as tips. She said it took a few years but was already saving again for the next trip.

I thought that was pretty cool.

I found over 2000 dollars once, but it was in a purse that someone lost. Took awhile to track down the owner cause it was a poor german immigrant that just came to the states. Turned out that money was there savings. I felt pretty good about returning it.

I pick up every cent I see, unless it is near or in dogdoo. That's tough.

When I started walking after the Ex dumped me to lose some weight, I found a $20, a $5, AND a gold chain. This is in addition to the myriad of other junk I have found. But yeah, I will pick up change whenever I find it, and add it to my jar/bottle.

Forget the ground. We just collected about $85 from my husband's desk!

How long did it take her to collect the $1k? If it was a few months, fine. But if it's several years... meh.

@IH8M_SteveDave: You could turn that chain into change using cash4gold.com!

@C.S.M. Technophile: Well, given how slow Bill walks here, and the time it takes him to get up, I think we can assume it would take him 3 seconds to pick up a quarter.

@couldberunning: In general, if it's folding money I don't feel like it's mine for the keeping anyway; I feel obliged to put up a note or let the store know or whatever. But major good-for-you for keeping your integrity in the face of such a large sum--if I'd lost $2000, I'd be screwed, and it sounds like the rightful owner was in considerably more straitened circumstances than I am.

@Ninja007: Shenanigans, we have a call of shenanigans!

@backbroken: haha, well done

I found a folded $100 bill at a football game once. I picked it up and opened it I realized I had been duped into picking up a religious tract.

Boo-hiss!

@calquist: Trust me, I thought about it. With quality ads like theirs, and the free refiners return pack they send you, how could I go wrong! I mean, I had no idea my gold was worth so much money!

I once found something like $300 at the beach once, with no one around that it could belong to.

I enjoyed spending that found money greatly.

I always pick up found change. Goes in the trip jug.

my grandmother once found $20 in a flower pot in Santa cruz, CA

@calquist: I don't see a problem with this, they are exercising and making money while doing it, its a win win.

@semanticantics: I grabbed a $5 bill off the floor in Target a few weeks ago. Even better was the time when there were bills in the middle of the street... Got something like $25. My wife was so embarrassed when I put the car in reverse to pick it up (residential streets).

@Hooray4Zoidberg: I use CoinStar too. I usually save up until I get a quart-bag or so's worth, then trade it in and buy something.

I pick up found change too. One ironic thing I found when I was going to college is that there was change EVERYWHERE. There was always at least 5-10 pennies on one lunch table at least once a day. No one seemed to be picking it up either as it just sat there, so of course I picked it up. Some days there was pennies everywhere. It was probably like getting a nice bonus for the cafeteria workers at the times I wasn't around to clean up the change. Don't forget the vending machines too, people would always leave change in those, there would be at least 10 cents every time I stuck my hand in there at college. And yet every college student complained of either being in debt, being poor or not having enough money!

@RonnieDobbs4President:

Those fake bills make me think of Moe in an episode of The Simpsons. He's in a parking lot standing by his car, telling everyone passing by that he's not leaving. Carl drives by, asks him what he is doing, he replies "You know that moment when you get someone's hopes up and kill it? I feed on that."

Unless you're doing the giftcard thing, Coinstar is a ripoff. There still are banks that do free counting, even for non-members.

Some friends and I found $200 in at the doorstep of a shady pool joint, we casually grabbed it then made our was to a less shady pool joint.

@Brain.wav:
Commerce will do it for free. And if you don't mind waiting and want a nice pay-off, get one of those office water cooler bottles and try and fill that up.

do they raid the 'give a penny / take a penny' dishes at their local mini-marts?