Auction Scene #8.....August, 2013

A couple of days late getting this started, but August isn't going anywhere soon, so here it is.

This month holds a fair number of local auctions for me and I'm looking forward to ONE that was put on hold two months ago due to a listing issue. I'm hoping some of my regular associates won't remember this one, but since 4 of us spotted this special unit when it first came up, hope is slim that they will ALL forget about it.

Bought a unit on Thursday. Had a dining room set perfect for college kids. 4 chairs and a bench. Should fetch $250 and be a quick sell with the kids coming back to campuses for the Fall. Other than that, I got some vintage glass. Lots of Pyrex, a nice 1950s  pitcher/vase, 1970s Polaroid camera with the rainbow stripe, 1970s Coke glasses, 1970s Schlitz goblet, nothing super high value.. But I should make about $500 when it's all said and done. Paid $160 for the unit. Lots of shelf filling.. had to buy 2 more bookcases and a media tower for DVDs to accommodate the new inventory.

A couple of days late getting this started, but August isn't going anywhere soon, so here it is.

This month holds a fair number of local auctions for me and I'm looking forward to ONE that was put on hold two months ago due to a listing issue. I'm hoping some of my regular associates won't remember this one, but since 4 of us spotted this special unit when it first came up, hope is slim that they will ALL forget about it.

Sounds like MovieMan is actually going to buy himself a unit! 

Wait a second, who are you and how did you get MovieMan's password? 

I went to two auctions on Tuesday the 6th with a crowd of only 15 at the first one and five lockers up for sale. Of the 15 buyers, five were regulars....all with enough money to make it a contest. Only one of the regulars bought a locker as the better ones (but not great) went for twice what they should have.

A promising 5 x 10 showed a guitar case up front, two old record players and neatly stacked boxes which might have held other older items. I would have gone $300 but it went for $575. Turned out the guitar was not in the case.

*****

Second place the crowd had grown to 25 with same 5 regulars in the mix. Six lockers with the best one saved for last. It had 3 interestings rectangular (larger than foot locker) boxes squarely wrapped in blue or silver tarps. Looked like they wanted to protect those from the elements.

A regular got it for $350 and was nice enough to let me watch him go through it.  The largest trunk revealed a top level tray with.....old linens but nothing worth selling. The bottom contained....more blankets, etc. I guess the tarp was to keep all this crap dry.  Also contained two large artillary shells with carved figures...."trench art" but they were from 1975 so perhaps not as valuable as WWI or WWII.  Small jewelery box contained....6 audio cassettes! So pretty much a bust.

Next wrapped box was a standard size footlocker which contained ..... not too much. One sterling sugar bowl, forget what else, but not valuable for the bulk.  Two more footlockers....nada.  One of those contained legal documents from decades ago...guess it was importnant to the former locker owner.

One large hand-made box with maybe 10 rolls of electrical cable of some kind with connectors on each end. Turned out it was for a solar system. There was a "disconnect" breaker box which takes the electric company panel out of the equation when the solar system is engaged. No solar panels in the locker.

Miscellaneous tools, chop saw, old washer/dryer....he'll do ok but I was glad it wasn't me that got the locker. The mystery boxes were a bust.

Today I talked to one of the regulars who also sells at the flea market where I sell. He told me he got stung for $1,300 at a Public Storage a few weeks ago. That outfit is honest in our part of the country, but apparently some renter set this up for one reason or another or just left all the trash behind but neatly stacked. It was all boxes and some other stuff. He didn't say how neat it appeared but when he got into it, it was a disaster.

It's one thing to get taken for a few hundered, but that 1.3K hurt !  It made him shy of buying a 1.5K a week or so later that actually turned out good with all WWII era stuff inside. Oh well, once bitten, twice shy.

can't trust anyone..

Today I talked to one of the regulars who also sells at the flea market where I sell. He told me he got stung for $1,300

left all the trash behind but neatly stacked. It was all boxes and some other stuff.

Not really sure why a regular would dump $1,300 on unknown boxes without visibly seeing anything else of value.

Not really sure why a regular would dump $1,300 on unknown boxes without visibly seeing anything else of value.

He buys far and wide (90 miles one way away from home), buys a lot, usually makes good buys...BUT he is also a bit of a gambler (and not just in lockers) and this time he got stung. He was free to admit it and as I said it scared him off his next big opportunity which was duked out by two other buyers to the tune of $1,500.

I have my eye on one in a week or so that I already think I would go to $1,000 on, but will have to wait for a second look. It was closed down on us a couple of months ago on a technical issue, but is coming back up. Hope the other guys have forgotten about it...or at least SOME of them.

Last week I bought 2 lockers…that makes my total count for 2013 a whopping THREE lockers.

After cleaning them out (and they were only 10 x 10s) I re-affirmed my interest in PICKING as a substitute.

They were cheap enough…$300 total for both, but marginal in return for the time spent working on them. Nope, if I buy anymore I’ll continue to wait for the good one that might cost me more but will definitely be worth it.


I actually suckered myself into these two lockers. I went to an auction where there were only15 people and I was the ONLY regular. I just couldn’t pass up the chance to be a winning bidder even though I knew better. Felt good to bid again ….  And to win, but then the payoff was another matter.  Oh well, lesson re-learned.

Bought a locker last week. The doors opened up and many walked away. There was a bedroom set in there. Queen sized. One of the regulars stuck around with me and another bidder. I opened the bidding at $50. When it went over $200, Tom says to me, "What are you doing? There's nothing but crap in there." I keep up the bidding and win the locker at $325. The bedroom set is an Ashley Furniture set, made in 2012, still selling today. Retails for $2k. I sold it for $1k over the weekend. Also got a bunch of clothes that were name brand and in good shape. The rest was tossed.

After I won the locker, Tom and I went into to inspect. It didn't take him long to give me an "atta boy". I don't understand why I was the only one to notice the furniture, but I'm glad I did!