My Silver Stacking Strategy - From Pig Iron to Physical

• •Been seeing a lot of posts lately about folks just starting their stacking journey, and it got me thinking about my own.
• •My background's in steel – spent 30 years in various plants around Birmingham before retiring a few years back.
• •My initial goal wasn’t to get rich quick, but more defensive – protecting a decent chunk of my retirement savings from inflation.

Been seeing a lot of posts lately about folks just starting their stacking journey, and it got me thinking about my own. I've been in on silver for a good few years now, probably since around 2018 or so, when I really started looking for something outside of traditional paper assets. My background's in steel – spent 30 years in various plants around Birmingham before retiring a few years back. You learn a thing or two about commodities and industrial demand when you’re elbow-deep in pig iron and rebar every day, and that really shaped how I approached precious metals.

My initial goal wasn’t to get rich quick, but more defensive – protecting a decent chunk of my retirement savings from inflation. I’m sitting on about a $400k portfolio right now, and I’ve deliberately allocated about 10-15% of that into physical silver. Didn't mess with paper silver or ETFs much. For me, if I can’t hold it, it doesn’t quite feel like ownership. Started with some generic rounds and bars, mostly 1 and 10 ounce. Figured I'd get the most bang for my buck in terms of pure silver content. Slowly but surely, I’ve been adding to the stack, especially on dips – though those seem a bit rarer these days, huh?

Lately, my strategy's evolved a bit. I’m still buying generics, but I’ve also started picking up a few fractional pieces and some junk silver (90% constitutional coinage). The fractional stuff is for potential barter scenarios – hopefully never needed, but you never know. And the junk silver just feels right; it’s recognizable, and it’s been money before. The premium is higher on some of these, no doubt, and that’s a constant battle in my head. Is it worth the extra cost for the added diversification or liquidity? What are you all thinking about premiums on smaller silver items versus larger bars right now?

My biggest concern, honestly, is storage here in Birmingham. I've got a decent home safe, but as the stack grows, the thought of keeping everything on premises makes me a little uneasy. Been looking into safe deposit boxes, but the access limitations are a bit of a turn-off. Anyone around here have good local options they trust? Or is everyone generally comfortable with home storage for significant amounts? Just trying to keep my metal safe without making myself a target.