An anonymous Cleveland couple recently stumbled upon the surprise of a lifetime after deciding to renovate their home. The couple has been living in the home, which was built in the 1940s, for a few years now. The husband is a do-it-yourself remodeller and has already renovated the home's first and second floors. Next up? Renovating the basement.
Before they could really get started with the major work, they needed to peel back a dusty faux ceiling.
After pulling off a large chunk of the faux ceiling, the owner saw a small green tin box:
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The tin box had clearly been there a long time:
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The box was lined with pages from the the Cleveland Plain Dealer newspaper from Sunday, March 25, 1951. Under the paper were three wax paper-covered stacks of something amazing:
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According to the anonymous homeowner, all the bills were from 1928-1934. "Some of the bills were rarer than others. Some brown notes, a gold certificate and some star notes nearly uncirculated." In total they found $23,000 worth of bills.
It gets better.
A week after finding the first box, the high wore off and they got back to work on their basement remodel. Imagine their surprise when they removed another ceiling panel and were greeted by ANOTHER hidden tin box. The second hidden box was even heavier than the first one. Here's what they saw when they opened it up:
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Via branik12/Imgur
After consulting with a lawyer about the legalities of finding money in the home, they determined they were all clear to take ownership.
The total haul came to $45,000!!!
Some of the notes were rare enough to be valuable beyond their actual face value. Amazingly, 10 of the notes were so rare that they were worth 4x face value to collectors.
Also, by depositing the money and writing about this online, they now have to pay taxes on the find. With their after-tax proceeds, the couple plans to pay down their mortgage.As annoying as that may be, it might have been hard to avoid. Would local restaurants accept $100 bills from the 1920s as payment for dinner?
If you found $45,000 worth of bills from the 1920s in your basement ceiling, what would you do? Would you deposit the money and pay taxes? What else could this couple have done to launder their bills back into circulation so they could keep 100%?
