19 lucky people who bought jaw-dropping treasures for peanuts

These pricey treasures were bought for peanuts

We all love snapping up a bargain, but for these lucky people, a relatively thrifty purchase brought much more than self-satisfaction. 

From ancient artifacts to the US Declaration of Independence, click or scroll through the gallery to discover some of the most jaw-dropping treasures that were bought for peanuts but proved to be VERY valuable...

All dollar amounts in US dollars. Figures adjusted for inflation.

The misidentified Magna Carta

In 1946, Harvard Law School Library paid $27.50 – around $470 today – for a 'copy' of the Magna Carta, a medieval document signed by King Edward I to outline the rights of the British people under common law.

The artifact was initially misattributed to King Edward III in 1327. However, 2025 analysis has shown it's actually an original from 1300, when the Magna Carta (which was first signed in 1215) was republished. Though the library has said it doesn't want to sell its version, it's been valued at millions of dollars.

The Floyd Landis custom-built bike

Hoping to make a small profit, Kentucky resident Greg Estes bought a bicycle with flat tires and apparently broken pedals for only $5 ($7.50 today) at a garage sale in 2010. Further research revealed the pedals were not broken but a custom-made pair for professional cyclists.

As it turned out, the bike originally belonged to US road racing cyclist Floyd Landis (pictured) but was blown off a transporter and found on the side of the road two years earlier. Estes sold it for $8,000 ($12,250 in today's money).

The Picasso plate

In 1970, a woman bought a plate in Rhode Island for less than $100 (around $860 today), which sat above her stove for years. In 2014 she took it along to be appraised on US TV show Antiques Roadshow and was shocked to discover it was a Picasso-designed Madoura plate from 1955 worth in the region of $10,000, the equivalent of $14,100 today. 

The image shows a selection of similar plates by Picasso that went up for auction in 2021.

The Velvet Underground demo record

In 2002, music fan Warren Hill found an odd-looking acetate disc at a Manhattan flea market with 'The Velvet Underground' written on the label, and bought it for 75 cents (around $1.35 today).

The disc turned out to be a super-rare demo by The Velvet Underground. The demo was sold on eBay in 2006 for $25,000, almost $41,500 in today's money.

The Ilya Bolotowsky painting

Hunting for cheap canvases one day in 2012, Beth Feeback, a hard-up artist from North Carolina, made a beeline for her local thrift store and snagged a couple of oil paintings for $9.99 ($14.50 today) that she intended to paint over. Thankfully, before Feeback went ahead, a knowledgeable friend recognized it as the work of abstract artist Ilya Bolotowsky (pictured).

Feeback put the painting up for auction at Sotheby's not long after, where it fetched more than $34,000 ($49,500 in today's money).

The Russian brooch

When Thea Jourdan from Hampshire, England bought a pink stone brooch surrounded by what she believed were faux diamonds, for £20 ($40 today), she believed it was just "flashy old tat" for her four-year-old daughter's toybox. Her little girl loved it and wore it a lot.

When Jourdan was having a ring valued, the appraiser spotted the brooch, which turned out to be made of topaz and real diamonds and was thought to have once been worn by a Russian tsarina. It sold in 2011 for £32,000, around $66,250 in today's money.

The Vince Lombardi sweatshirt

During a shopping trip in 2014, Sean and Rikki McEvoy of Asheville, North Carolina paid $58 ($82 today) for a vintage West Point sweatshirt from their local Goodwill store. Not long after, the couple were watching a documentary on legendary NFL coach Vince Lombardi and spotted him wearing the sweatshirt they'd bought (pictured).

It sold at auction a year later for $44,150, around $62,200 today.

The Breitling James Bond watch

A very fortunate bargain hunter, who has chosen to remain anonymous, picked up an old Breitling watch at a UK sale in 2013 for just £25 ($50 today). The mock Geiger counter was a dead giveaway: the watch was revealed to be the timepiece worn by the late Sean Connery in the James Bond movie Thunderball.

The customized Breitling Top Time watch sold later that year for £131,000, around $264,400 in today's money.

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The Anne Boleyn bird

Eagled-eyed antique dealer Paul Fitzsimmons snapped up an antique wooden falcon for just £75 ($131 today) at an auction in 2019. The bird was later identified as belonging to Anne Boleyn and was made in 1536, just three years before Boleyn was beheaded on the orders of her husband, King Henry VIII. The king then removed all traces of the ill-fated queen from his palaces, making the item a rarity.

In excellent condition, the falcon still bears its original gilding and colors. Its true value, adjusted for inflation, has been estimated at $338,000. Fitzsimmons generously loaned the bird to Hampton Court Palace in London.

The original 1823 copy of the US Declaration of Independence

Enjoying a similar windfall, in 2006 Nashville resident Michael Sparks came across an old, rolled-up document in a neighborhood thrift store, which he bought for a paltry $2.48 ($4 today).

When Sparks unrolled the document, he couldn't believe his eyes – he'd found a copy of the US Declaration of Independence from 1823, which he sold the next year for $477,650 ($769,300 today).

The cracked teapot with huge historical value

A collector took a gamble on a cracked teapot at an auction in 2016, buying it for just $19 ($26 today). He then took it to Woolley and Wallis auctioneers, and ceramics experts established it was a piece by John Bartlam, who emigrated to America from Britain and was the first person to make porcelain in the US.

As a truly historical artifact, it went for auction with an estimated price of $25,280 but sold for more than 20 times that when snapped up by the Metropolitan Museum in New York for $580,255, the equivalent of $807,000 today.

The James Bond underwater car

With no idea what was inside, a couple from Long Island $100 (around $270 today) at a blind auction for an unclaimed New York storage unit in 1989. However, their risk paid off as inside the container, covered by old blankets, was a real treasure – a Lotus Esprit sportscar used in the 1977 James Bond film The Spy Who Loved Me as an underwater vehicle.

In 2013, the couple put their lucky find up for auction with Sotheby's London, where it sold for a whopping £616,000 ($1.24m today). The buyer, it was later revealed, was none other than Elon Musk.

A 26-carat diamond ring

This beautiful 26-carat diamond ring was purchased in the 1980s from a UK second-hand sale for £10, around $75 today. The ring is thought to have been cut in the 19th century, but the rest of its history is unknown. After years of being overlooked, the ring finally proved its worth when it went under the hammer at Sotheby's in London.

The impressive piece of jewelry sold for a whopping £656,000, almost double the auction estimate, in 2017. That's the equivalent of $1.2 million today.

The lost 13th-century chess piece

An Edinburgh antique dealer bought this chess piece for £5 (around $175 today)  back in 1964, not realizing its significance. It’s one of five lost pieces belonging to a set found buried in a sand dune on the Scottish island of Lewis in 1831. Experts believe it was made between the late 12th century and early 13th century somewhere in Scandinavia.

The other ‘Lewis chessmen,’ as they're known, are on display at London’s British Museum and Edinburgh’s National Museum of Scotland.

Made from walrus ivory, the piece was passed down through the dealer’s family before being sold at Sotheby’s in London for £735,000 in July 2019, a record for a medieval chess piece. That's around $1.3 million when adjusted for inflation.

The Martin Johnson Heade paintings

This still life was purchased for just $30 (around $77 today) in the 1990s by a factory worker from Indiana, who used it to cover a hole in a wall in his home. Several years down the line, the hard-up machinist was playing the art-based card game Masterpiece and spotted a similar painting by the same artist on one of the cards.

The picture, which turned out to be a notable work by American landscape painter Martin Johnson Heade called Magnolias on Gold Velvet Cloth, went on to sell for $1.25 million in 1999, around $2.5 million today.

Heade's work has repeatedly turned up in garage sales and other surprising places, which experts attribute to his popularity among middle-class buyers before he became acknowledged as a modern American master.

The Andy Warhol sketch

British tourist Andy Fields was on vacation in Las Vegas in 2010 when he hit a yard sale and bought five paintings for $5 ($7.60 today) from a man who claimed his aunt babysat the artist Andy Warhol when he was a child.

On his return to the UK, Fields discovered a sketch hidden behind one of the paintings. Experts believe it's an early sketch by Warhol of French-Canadian singer Rudy Vallée, worth around $2 million.

The 'new' Billy the Kid photo

In 2011, criminal defense lawyer Frank Abrams purchased this photograph for $10 ($15 today) at a market in North Carolina, having no idea that it was an image of Billy the Kid alongside the man who would later shoot him dead, Pat Garrett.

It wasn't until 2015 when he read about another photo of Billy the Kid, which a telecoms technician named Randy Guijarro bought for just $2 in 2010 and was subsequently valued at $5 million ($7.7m today), that he realized he might have a valuable item on his hands.

Experts concluded that it was taken between 1879 and 1880, just a few years before Pat Garrett captured Billy and shot him dead. It's believed to be worth millions.

The Albrecht Dürer drawing

This drawing by Albrecht Dürerwas was bought at a yard sale for $30 in 2017, the equivalent of around $40 today. The Virgin and Child (pictured) is a previously unknown artwork by the German artist and is believed to have been drawn around 1503.

Boston art collector Clifford Schorer was on his way to a party when he was asked to take a look at the drawing, which the friend of a friend had bought from an art dealer's son. Schorer was amazed to discover the drawing was "either the greatest forgery [he'd] ever seen or a masterpiece." 

It turned out to be the latter and has since been valued at $10 million.

The Third Imperial Fabergé egg

In 2012, a scrap metal dealer in the Midwest decided to do some online research on a blingy egg-shaped ornament he'd picked up for $13,000, around $19,000 today, which he intended to melt down. The dealer searched for 'Vacherin Constantin,' the name engraved on the ornament, and 'egg,' and realised he had bought the Third Imperial Fabergé egg.

Valued at $33 million ($46.5m today), the egg was purchased in 2014 by a private collector.

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Now discover the legendary lost treasures still waiting to be found