Foo - What collects your loose change?

Your hollow prosthetic leg? Backyard wishing well? Grandma's urn?

My change is piling up. I save up over the year and then spend it on food for a bike trip. Usually amounts to ~$150.

The ashtray in my car, and a wooden bowl I keep on top of the dryer.
I wait until they overflow and then transfer the contents to a 6 gallon carboy (cracked). Full the carboy will hold about $2,500.00

We don't intentional collect change ... it just sort of happens. Ours is collecting in the couch, kitchen drawer, dresser, closet floor, car ashtray, etc. I'd be rich if I weren't too lazy to go find it all.

My debit card creates no loose change.:(

Your hollow prosthetic leg? Backyard wishing well? Grandma's urn?

My change is piling up. I save up over the year and then spend it on food for a bike trip. Usually amounts to ~$150.

In the UK (where I spend most of my time) I have a coin sorter that, well, sorts coins. Then I put them in bags and put the bags in a box. When the box is full I take the bags to the bank (for US readers - instead of putting coins into rolls we put them into bags so where you'd have a $10 roll of quarters we'd have a £10 bag of 20p coins) and turn them into proper money.

In the US I keep what I call my bucket of money. It's an old milking pail that I throw change in. When it gets heavy (which takes a while) I take it to the bank and they use their super-fast sorting machine that also adds up the total, and give me paper money for it.

A plain 10 oz plastic cup in a cabinet where I keep my wallet and keys catches excess change when the weight/mass in my pocket says its time to empty. The cup gets emptied into an old bank coin bag. Eventually, the secret "mad money" gets spent on a toy of some kind; you know, something expensive.

Self checkouts at supermarkets, will take any small change and doesn't charge like Coinstar machines do, and a small tub by my PC for US, Canadian & Euro coins I seem to aquire

We have saving jars for pennies and silver... pennies go into the "PDX or Bust" jar and my daughter labelled the silver jar "Golden Retriever or Bust".

Before it makes its way there it usually ends up on my dresser and this reminds me I need to sort out a mountain of coins.

An old rubber band box at work. At home, it's a St. Bernardus Watau beer tin.

My wife and kids.

I used to save it in a jar. After I emptied it to buy a Kindle, I quit saving coins, and pay with exact change whenever I can.

Bank shaped like a monkey's head.

Bank shaped like a monkey's head.
The head of my bank is a monkey.

I saw someone take a handful of pennies one time and toss them into the recycling bin.

I keep the change down to what I need. It doesn't pile up.

Closet shelves, shoe boxes, drawers, car ash trays, German Beer steins, mugs. When its about $500 i wrap them up, go to the bank and order $500 in half dollars, then go through the halves and take out the silver ones, then spend the rest and get more change.

In an old coffee tin. We use the quarters to get water and save the rest for whatever.

My wife does.

For graduation, my high school gave out beer mugs imprinted with the entire classes' names. That's my change receptacle, but I wonder still at their thinking this was a good idea.

The mentality sure has changed. WI drinking age changed with me. From 18 to 19, I was already 19 by a few months. The same thing when it went from 19 to 21. Looking back at my maturity at 18 versus 18 year olds today...yeah, it's probably a good thing that it's 21 now.

After I bought my first house nearly twenty years ago, I was still going to the laundromat. Never bothered to buy a W&D. One of my sisters, a smart-ass, teased me about that saying I was doing that to meet the future Mrs.
She wrapped a big coffee can in construction paper and labeled it "My Washer/Dryer Fund"....and put a Barbie-sized washer/dryer on top. It worked. I didn't cash it in till it was full...~$600. Bought a used W/D that I used for the last dozen years. Left them in SC.

I need a new something for my change...something fitting.

I use it to pay for things at the till if there isn't anybody behind me. It doesn't take long for change to add up here what with One(loonie) and Two(toonie) dollar coins in usage in Canada. Yes, I know that according to some folks that makes us a loonie-toonie country. Today I paid a $23 bill with all the coins in my pocket and had a loonie and change left over for tomorrow.

My daughter gave me a huge clear plastic replica of a coke bottle that's a bank. It's about 3 feet tall. The chances of me filling it with the number of years I have left are slim. There's probably $30 in it now and it's basically empty.

At home a metal owl bank that I found at a thrift store. In my car there's a compartment on the dash and at work an almond can.

In a genuine 'piggy bank'. A ceramic pig shaped container. The rule is; when it is too full to fit a coin, then the kids get to count it up and split it for any purchase they wish.
It takes about 9-12 months to fill.

When I get home, I empty out my pockets on a corner of the desk. Wallet, keys and change. When I go out, I put these back in my pockets. At the store, when I pay cash, I try to pay any portions of the dollar in change. The only exceptions are when I know I don't have the change to pay it or when I am holding back enough for bus fare.

Getting 90 cents on the dollar from machines like Coinstar is just stupid when you get 100 cents on the dollar just by exerting the mental awareness of how much money you have and using your coins as you make your purchases.

If you keep loose change in an ash tray and there isn't a lighter where it's supposed to be, a coin can get jammed in there and short your electrical system. I speak from experience. :o

We have a ceramic jar on my dresser that has change...it's almost full so I need to take it to my bank. I think they still change it for free. The full jar should yield about 20 bucks.

In college, my GF (now my wife) and I used to collect our change and when there was enough, we'd turn it into paper money at the bank and go to dinner...usually about once a month. We lived in the Sunset District in SF and there was a family run Chinese place just down the street where we could get a great meal for about $12.

The coin operated laundry does a good job with the quarters.

At the end of the day, I toss any loose change into an old tin that used to hold cookies. After 5 to 6 weeks, I usually have enough to take to the coinstar machine and then have a good time.

What collects your loose change?

My neighbors 8 year old son. I began a couple years ago when he was just 6 by collecting my loose change at the end of each day in a Mason jar, and then having him roll the coins up once a month to learn to count, to understand the value of each coin, and to understand how to budget within his income. He learned that he had to meet his household responsibilities and to do good work for good grades in school to receive his allowance, and now he buys his own Legos, Ninjagos, Bionicals, etc. I could have continued to buy his Legos, Ninjagos, Bionicals myself and just given them to him as gifts, but he wouldn't have learned the math skills, money management skills, and about personal responsibility.

I'd guess that he is bringing in a couple hundred dollars a year through this arrangement, and this year he even took his mom out for Mother's Day dinner and will buy her his own birthday present for her later this year. This is the best investment that I have ever made.

http://i871.photobucket.com/albums/ab280/ahsposo/Change.jpg

When my wallet starts getting too thick I just start paying correct change. Seems to make my money last longer too.