How A $53 Ounce Changes Barter, Budgets, And Bug-Out Plans

Silver’s leap to $53 forces hard choices for preppers on budgets. We weigh the barter power of junk silver against the opportunity cost of food, water, tools, and skills, and share a pragmatic plan to hold, trim, or wait.

• price surge from mid-30s to $53 and what changed
• why silver beats cash and gold for small trades
• junk silver use for stealth and divisibility
• industrial demand from solar and EVs driving the rally
• forecasts up to $60–$70 and what that implies
• when selling a slice makes sense and why shops pay under spot
• alternatives to metals including skills and consumables
• a cautious path for new buyers and fixed incomes
• personal stance to watch, hold, and protect essentials

Folks, if you want to reach me, Practical Prep Podcast at gmail.com on the Twitters, Common Sense Practical Prepper Podcast, or Prep underscore Podcast
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Chapters

• 0:00 Opening And Host Check-In
• 0:47 Silver’s Price Shock Explained
• 2:03 Why Silver Works For Barter
• 4:20 The Rally’s Drivers And Forecasts
• 6:05 Sell, Hold, Or Sit Tight
• 8:13 Skills And Alternatives To Metals
• 10:13 Personal Plan, Contact, And Wrap

Transcript

SPEAKER_01: 0:09

The National Members position is a mere thunderstorm in the morning. To the Common Sense Practical Prepper Podcast, where prepping doesn't have to be complicated or expensive. Coming to you from a well-defended off-grid compound high in the mountains. Coming to you from his Florida room in Richmond, Virginia. Neither off-grid nor well-defended, unless you count as chickens and cats, here is your host, Keith.

SPEAKER_00: 0:41

Hey all, this is Keith with the Common Sense Practical Prepper Podcast, October 16th, 2025. And like I said before, been kind of staying off social media because everything going on in the world is just an absolute poop show. Nothing has changed, and I just got tired of doom scrolling and getting depressed, to be honest with you, about everything that's going on. But something that kind of snuck up on me, but I have been keeping an eye on it, and that is the price of silver. As Slim Pickens said in the movie Blazing Saddles, what in the wide, wide world of sports is going on here? So silver, straight up, is an essential bartering item for any prepper. It's cousin gold is quickly building a case for itself, but gold financially is out of reach for a lot of people. The price of silver went up again today. So let's break it down, let's see where it's been, or see where it's going, and we'll see if it's priced itself out of the average prepper's hands. As of tonight, October 16th, silver is hovering around$53 an ounce. That's not pocket change for anybody. That is a serious jump from just a few months ago. So if you're just tuning in and you haven't been keeping up on the price of precious metals, you might want to check your app, you might want to check your website that you go to because it's gone crazy. Let's go back six months to April of this year. Silver was trading in the mid-30s. So let's just call it$35 an ounce on average. Fast forward through summer volatility, industrial demand spikes for green energy, solar panels, EVs, some political jitters around the world, and investors are piling in like it was 2008 all over again. In September, silver cracked$43 an ounce. And here we are in the middle of October, up 24% just this month alone. That's roughly a 50 to 55% gain over the last several months. So to put that in perspective, if you snagged an ounce of silver back in the spring for$35, that one ounce silver round is now worth closer to 53. So, all in all, not bad for what they call silver is the poor man's gold. But on a prepper's budget, that climb hits differently. So silver's not sleeping, it's actually sprinting, but does that mean it's leaving the average prepper behind? So let's get real about why preaching silver for SHTF scenarios is important. And I've been talking about this since day one. So in a collapse, whether it's economic, grid down, zombie apocalypse, or some mad max level mayhem, cash, paper currency, is just colorful paper. Gold, sure, but it's a huge big ticket item for big ticket trades. Try buying a tank of gas or a dozen eggs with this with a$2,000 silver chain. It's just not gonna work. That's where silver comes in. It's divisible, portable, and universally recognized. So just think about it. Junk silver coins, I spoke about this before. Junk silver coins, those are US dimes, quarters, and half dollars that were minted prior to 1965. A half dollar packs about 0.07 ounces of pure silver. At today's price, that's roughly$3.50 in face value, but holding$3.70 worth of metal. So it's perfect for small swaps, antibiotics, handful of dimes, might get you some gas. It's kind of stealthy too. Pocket change like that doesn't scream rich guy, not like a gold bar does. But historically, silver's been currency since ancient times. In a barter economy, I really think that silver is going to be much more popular than gold when it comes to smaller purchases. This increase, this rapid increase in price is a gut punch. So it's got me rethinking about my prepper playbook. Up 60% in the last six months is not a fluke. Like I said before, it's fueled by EV batteries, solar panels, and investors hedging against inflation that's still biting hard at the economy. Forecasts are bullish for silver. Some folks see it pushing$60 by year end, and some even say$70 by year's end. So that's great if you have a stack of silver coins and you want to go ahead and sell them. So if you purchased a silver round a year ago at$24, you can take that into a coin shop and sell it for maybe$47, maybe$48, the markup from the coin shop and their premiums. So they're not going to give you the exact price, the spot price, let's say it's$53, they might give you$45,$47, but still you've nearly doubled your money on that one ounce silver round. So there is something to say about taking some silver that you've purchased$25, even$35, and selling it. But I think what I'm seeing is not a lot of people are bringing their silver into the coin shops. Otherwise, and again, I'm not an economist, but I would think that the market would be flooded a little more with silver, and so the price would come down. And this is great if you already have silver stacked up. But for someone just getting into prepping on a fixed income, this may not be the way to go. So that ounce cost$20 two years ago, and now it's$53. Multiply that by 100 ounces for a decent starter kit, and you're looking at over$5,000. In my opinion, money better spent on rice, beans, a nice quality water filter, more firearms, more ammunition. So the trajectory of silver screams an opportunity. But if silver keeps climbing, it could lock a lot of people out, not just preppers, but almost anybody who wants to invest in silver. The trajectory screams an opportunity cost. If silver keeps climbing, it can lock out not only entry-level preppers, but entry-level investors. So maybe diversify copper, focus on skills that you can barter without metal, like medical know-how. We spoke about this before. If you're a mechanic, you're good with small engines, you can help repair people's vehicles. If you're a carpenter, you can make shelves, you can repair folks' generators, their lawnmowers. There's a lot of different things you can do. Other bartering items, consider tobacco, consider alcohol, obviously ammunition. Now I'm not saying ditch your silver entirely. I'm not saying go to the coin shop and sell all of your silver. But again, if you purchase silver at 20, 25, 30, even$35 an ounce, it may not be a bad idea to take some of that in and cash it in. It is profit. The coin dealers in the United States deal in cash. You hand them that silver, and then they hand you cash. So I really don't know what my play is at this point. If you haven't started purchasing silver for an investment, you might want to keep an eye on the market. I don't think it's going to go down anytime soon. There might be a retreat for a dollar or two here, but I don't see anything that leads me to believe that silver is going to start coming back down. So what I'm going to do, I'm just going to hold on. I'm going to keep a watch on the charts. I honestly don't know what I'm going to do. Like the little, the little bit of silver I have initially, you know, when I was growing up, my father had the silver, the silver dollars and silver hat silver half dollars. And he would give those, you know, I'd go mow the lawn or I'd do some chores and he'd give me one of those silver dollars. And I thought I was big time. Initially, when I first purchased some silver rounds, what I was going to do is just keep them for my grandbabies. If I have grandkids one of these days, and do the same thing. You know, they come over, they put the groceries away, they mow the lawn, whatever, help me bring in something from the garage. I would give them like a silver round. And you can imagine that nice, shiny silver round to a little kid, and they're, you know, they're rich. They think they're absolutely rich. Well, it's$50 stands, that's$50 sitting in their hand right now today. So yeah, that is a lot of money. But I think that's what I'm gonna do. I'm just gonna hang out. I I don't have the discretionary income at this point to go to the local coin store or go online and purchase five or six hundred dollars worth of silver because that's not that much. Six months ago, it was twice that much. So I'm just gonna keep an eye on it. And it it jumped quick, and I really wasn't paying attention. And I thought it was gonna correct itself and come down, but it doesn't look like it's going to at all. Basically, I'm priced out of the market now. I cannot see myself spending$53 on a silver round that several months ago I spent$25 on a silver round.$25 for an ounce of silver, kind of pricey, but$53. No, I'm just gonna have to go with what little bit I have, and we're just gonna have to see what happens down the road. Folks, if you want to reach me, Practical Prep Podcast at gmail.com on the Twitters, Common Sense Practical Prepper Podcast, or Prep underscore Podcast. If you guys have any advice, any pro tips you want to provide me on silver, investing in silver, precious metals, I am absolutely all ears because everything I've learned is just from word of mouth, talking with folks at coin shops, and then doing some research on the internet. All right, folks, thanks again for stopping by. And as always, be careful out there, take care of one another, and until next time.

SPEAKER_01: 10:52

Thanks for listening to the Common Sense Practical Prepper Podcast. Be sure to subscribe so you don't miss an episode. While you're at it, help spread the word by leaving a rating and review.