‘Might get lucky’: Man turns carwash change machine into treasure hunt for only $5

TikToker Life With Marz (@life.with.marz8) recently shared a “life hack”: With silver prices as high as they’ve been, stick $5 in a carwash change machine whenever you get the chance. As Life With Marz put it: “Maybe get lucky.”

So what’s going on here? Before 1965, quarters and dimes were 90% silver, compared to the clad change in our pockets today. Modern coins, as they say, are worth “face value” — 10 or 25 cents — but a 90% silver quarter or dime, minted before 1965, is worth much more based on its silver value alone. In 2026, with silver at about $80 an ounce on average, a 90% silver quarter is worth about $15 — not a bad investment for $5 in a change machine.

As Life with Marz put it in his TikTok post,

When silver is up, and you’re at a gas station, go ahead and put five dollars in. Get some quarters. Maybe get lucky. Maybe get some junk silver that’s worth more than five dollars.”

Why did the U.S. stop making silver coins?

The United States ended the use of 90% silver in most circulating coins in 1965 after rising silver prices and widespread hoarding created a national coin shortage. Throughout the early 1960s, the market value of silver climbed as industrial demand increased and supplies tightened. As the price rose, the metal inside dimes and quarters began approaching their face value, making them costly for the government to produce.

At the same time, many Americans started pulling silver coins from circulation to save or melt them for their bullion value, worsening the shortage of everyday change. Officials also warned that continued silver coinage could rapidly drain federal reserves of the metal.

Congress responded by passing the Coinage Act of 1965, a sweeping overhaul of U.S. coin production. The law eliminated silver from dimes and quarters, replacing them with copper-nickel “clad” coins designed to look similar but cost far less to mint.

It also reduced the silver content of the half dollar from 90% to 40%, a composition that remained until 1970 before the coin was converted to the same clad metals.

The new coins began entering circulation later in 1965 and gradually displaced the older silver issues, most of which disappeared from everyday use as collectors and investors removed them from circulation.

“Them car wash folks look through their quarters”

So technically, Life with Marz is right: There is a chance $5 in a change machine could make you some money, and if it doesn’t, you still have your $5 just in change. But as the comments noted, the odds are long you’ll strike it rich. With most silver change out of circulation, it’s unlikley you’ll find any, and even less likely you’ll find more than one.

Comments noted, “Trust me, them car wash folks look through their quarters don’t waste the time,” “The people who’d look first is the people who stock those machines btw, they aren’t fools,” and “you know they change them out every week right.”