Add your thoughts about auction houses

[Coin]

The first thing some of the larger auction houses will tell you is to NOT put any reserves on your coins and then that it is ok for them to bunch them up into huge lots .

 

These make it easier for them to dump your coins , because ...as they say... the bidder's do not want to bid and have to pay shipping and buyer premiums on ten different lots versus one and it will sell better ....also the bidders do not bid on coins with reserves ....so it will be much better for you to not list any and the bidding will go higher !

 

(I bid on coins with reserves all the time?!)

 

1) Lots versus singles....well the shipping is going to be on a total basis anyway regardless of the shear number of lots won ( S&H plus Value for Ins) .

Buyer's premiums are based on numerical amounts so , the buyers may pay a little bit more on premiums for low cost coins , like low grade moderns when bought in quantities ....but then there can't be that much difference on three different high dollar coins ...not enough to make someone who wants them not bid anyway , (Is there?)

 

2) Reserves ...possibly true if you are listing a lot of low dollar modern low grades , but high grade or high dollar coins can be listed individually without reserves and produce results .....however ...if you do not want to let a coin go for next to nothing and do not mind paying the small listing fee to get it back if it does not bring what you want , place a realistic reserve .

I am not refferring to the "pot-head , pie-in-the-sky" reserves that you see on some of the coins that do not sell , but look through past sales results and come up with a reserve that 'trends' and you can live with ( if not then your coin probably won't sell if it is worth trend $50 and you want $600 , save your money and don't list it until the market goes yoru way or prepare for a loss) .

 

The auction houses just want you to provide the stuff that they sell .

 

They do not want to get into warehousing and maintaining stock ...that would be a coin dealer.

In order to make room for the next person's coins , they need to get the last person's coins sold for whatever and then , make their money on the FEEs both seller listing fees and buyer premium fees .

In order to keep this room available , they have to do whatever they have to , to ensure your stuff will move( out the way) ,, so your fees are paying for staff and advertising and overhead ( remember YOU are providing the product for them to sell voluntarily) .

 

Of course, some of the stuff they tell you that sounds good is true too...like they want your stuff to sell high ( they make money on the front end for listing , but also on the backend determined by premiums based on what the coin sells for....the higher the better=more money) .

 

Unless you have a one of a kind coin worth 4-5-6 digits in value , they will still list your stuff , but are not really going to make a lot from you ( off of you) , so you are not going to get the top treatment....basically , your coins do not draw a crowd to the overall bidding , so they are being nice and allowing you to provide basic product to fill in the auction holes. You are not going to get top attention and they are going to try to get you to agree on the best way for them to push your stuff through . That is why you will see your entire MS63-66 quarter collection all in one big lot , minus the 1932-D which might be strong enough to list on it's own in any condition .

 

Please add your thoughts /experiences . I have dealt (buyer & seller) with three major auction houses and all are great in their respective places , but they seem to operate on the same cookie-cutter methods of operation ....the only major difference I have personnaly experienced between them is different customer handling techniques. What say you?

 

-John

[MikeKing]

The last time I put coins up for auction with Heritage, and I mean the LAST time, they grouped a whole bunch of my Washington quarters (all very high quality but common dates) together without telling me. I guess I didn't read the small print in the auction agreement. They also did LOUSY write ups on some of my coins which I am fairly certain affected the outcome of the sale.

 

In addition to that, I had to haggle with one of their people over that whole buy back thing etc...

 

That was for $40K worth of coins.

 

It was such a BITTER experience that I will never, ever auction coins through them again.

 

I've had no such problems with other auction firms, though I know now what to put forward. In particular, my experiences with ANR (now Stacks), were fantastic. They actually treated me like a human being.

 

I've heard of other people having good experiences with Heritage, but personally, I've never been treated well by them.

 

edited to add: The auction firms generally lurk on the boards. How do I know? I've been contacted by three of them (including Heritage), with actually helpful responses to concerns I might have raised in the past. Perhaps Heritage could be more kind to their customers.

 

When I sold off my currency collection, I auctioned half of it off through Heritage and the other half (of equal value) I sold privately to a well known currency dealer. I did far better with the dealer than with the auction firm.

 

 

 

 

[Coin]

I see the quarters grouped into big Lots on a 'lot' of Heritage's different auctions .

I hope yours sold for what you could live with and not a loss , seems like grouped lots are only good for dealers looking for inventory bargains ...I do not see them getting more than 'low bid' wholesale ....and they do not show up in past sales results because the lots are all so diversified as they come into each auction .

 

I did have a similar heart attack moment when they listed some old silver commems together with some Frankies and some modern commem gold coins once , but I called and they immediately withdrew the listing and re-listed them individually in a later auction ....I missed out on the internet and live auction floor bidding at a major show and had to wait until these coins were re-listed later at a smaller show(Dallas?) , so I may have missed out on a hotter bidding environment ....but at least they were quick to react . I was beggining to think that they thought I was a complete *spoon* and didn't care what the coins brought at auction , until I called and they said it was a listing error.

 

I have had good experiences with them on the last 4-5 listings I've had , but Man-O-Man , you gots to wait forever after the auction ends to see a check in the mail-box..

 

A positive for them , since you brought Heritage up , they save me a ton of shipping fees by holding the coins I win/buy and then shipping them out later at one time with one shipping fee rather than several , but then I have been averaging a boxfull for the last few months .

 

You really can't go anywhere to read and learn about how to deal with auction houses without just sending less expensive coins to them and see how they act with those . Until you do that , hold onto the good stuff for the ones that you think are going to work for you , after all it is your product they need to make their incomes from.