Lookey Loos Part 10.....October, 2011

A new month is upon us and we continue to monitor the crowds, the lkrs and the prices !

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Last day of September (yesterday) I went to a single auction with 7 lkrs. Crowd was 25 or so with 6 regulars, 4 "new regulars" who have been around about 4 months, and the rest were new "newbies" never seen before...that trend seems to continue....some fall off to be replaced by new faces...oh well.

Lkr prices not TOO bad with a big tool "box" (empty?) lkr which also had 6 assembled bikes, about 15 loose wheels and that was it. I'm suspicious of what I call the "bicycle boys" who piece together bikes. Anyway, it sold for about $800 whih was $400 more than I was willing to gamble for the several tools boxes and one Sawzall...the last one I sold went for $25...down from $75 about 1.5 years ago. A nearby pawn shop visit showed these stacked 10 high and they were trying to get $65 for each.

Then a 10 x 20 lkr only about half full but neat looking with a Mantis soil tiller with what looked like a broken fuel tank, some older furn (nothing great), maybe 30 boxes and an oriental rug of some kind. Two "new regulars" took it up at $25 a bid after the $400 bid....sold for....drum roll.... $1,275. I would have given $500 or $600 to be safe on a profit margin.

Finally, another 10 x 20 even less full than the last one, but a couple of antiquey things showing, maybe 20 boxes, etc. Nothing jumping out except the bimbos in the vhs porn boxes. Interesting thing here was the OTHER two "new regulars" and their bidding. Once it got into the $600 range, one guy was just holding up his hand..."I'm going to get this lkr" written all over him. 

When his competitor glanced over and saw that, HE raised his bidder card too, as if to say..."My hand is higher than yours !" (or my "d**k" is bigger than yours).....had to laugh. Then it was fun to watch as the first guy's hand went down, then the 2nd hand went down and they started slowing down a bit. Sold for $925...again, I would have paid about $400 for safety's sake.

A "fun" day, but no score for me. At least at THIS auction, it was not a good start for October, 2011. 

that sounds as bad as one I went to last week. 2 weeks ago there were no auctions at all (not anywhere near by anyway) So i guess people that spent that week with no bidding had withdrawals or something. Lockers were going for triple what I (and other people that I see often) thought they should of. In fact, I won our "price is right" side game we had going on. I pretty much nailed the selling price of most of the units we played. Basically I would say: I would pay $300 for this, which means it will sell for $850-900... sure enough, final price was in the mid $800's. This went on and on for most of the afternoon. Lockers that you would have to pay me to empty were going for $200-300.

I hope it settles down some this week. There is not a whole lot scheduled, but there is a big one (37 units) on Wednesday.

Saturday, Oct 8, 2011

5 a.m. and getting ready for today's flea market and the reason we buy all those lkrs....aside from the fun of going through the stuff and trips to the dump !

Went to several auctions Thursday the 6th and crowd and prices were pretty good with just a couple of outrageous prices popping up. As I recall though, I only placed one bid and let the unit go to someone else.

Friday the 7th I went to three auctions by the same auctioneer and throughout the day the crowd ranged from about 25 to 40. This is an improvement on a few months ago but I still long for the pre-show crowds of 12 months ago. Coming up on one year in Dec since the tv shows started.

I placed a few high bids, starting one at $500 but quickly backing out as it then sold for $675. Just wasn't comfortable going on as the other bidder would have continued and it was marginal the way it was.

So, no luck on Friday, but....there are always more auctions !   

This coming week is auction week for my area it seems.  Small 3 unit auction tuesday, 7 facility caravan on thursday, 18 units on friday, and two different auctions on Saturday.  The friday and saturday auctions are places that only do auctions 2-4 times a year.  Taking off to hit thursday auction.  May be able to swing friday since working days and 2 nights this week.  Saturday is iffy due to my oldest niece b-day party.  Got to give my sister a call

Monday, 10 10 2011

If you lived in central California you could go to this one....along with 100 or more other people !

Will report on this later.

http://www.jmichaelsauction.com/Images/TracyPics/PP_Photos.2728JacksonAve.pdf

Monday, 10 10 2011

If you lived in central California you could go to this one....along with 100 or more other people !

Will report on this later.

http://www.jmichaelsauction.com/Images/TracyPics/PP_Photos.2728JacksonAve.pdf

I decided right away not to go to the auction shown in the link above because I knew the crowd would be big and the prices high. Later that day I heard that one of the 4 lkrs went for just over $5k.  Then today I heard that all four sold for a total just over $10K. 

I would like to have seen it, but it was 35 miles away and I found other things to do. I went to a different auction and got a 10 x 10 for $475 with some antiquey things showing and some boxes I thought were suspect....they were too new and fresh for the way the rest of the lkr looked. When I cleaned it out today (Tuesday the 11th) I was proved correct. This lkr was at least partially "set up" by the facility. It is coming out ok but I resent what they did.

As an example, a beautiful looking guitar was sitting out front. Today I found the case (empty) at the BACK of the lkr and it was under some other stuff. Can't tell me the facility people didn't get in an arrange things (and add boxes).

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I would have had that lkr for around $400 except that a newbie wanted to strutt his stuff. Later he bid on a 10 x 25 that opened at both ends. It was FULL (we thought) of boxes. Couldn't see over the top of them (about 8 feet tall). BUT THEN...they opened the other door and the back half was basically empty. I'll give them credit for that.

I didn't bid on it because it looked just too trashy (boxes WERE old). I saw old kitchen gear in about 3 boxes.

Today I saw the guy loading his 6 wide by 8 long trailer (with 4 foot sides expandable with stake sides). It was full to the brim and he said this was the 2nd load going to the dump.  Later I saw him loading the 3rd dump load.

He wasn't a happy camper though he beamed a bit when he said he had found $83 in change and bills. But then he stuck his foot in his mouth when the said..."that'll pay for the first 2 dump runs." Oh joy, the dump runs are covered.
His comment that it "was only $350"  sort of rung hollow in my ears; he forgot the tax he paid too....but at least 2 of the 3 dump runs were covered !

I had asked how many lkrs he had bought and he evaded that with "we've bought a few." WELL NOW, HE'S GOTTEN A REAL EDUCATION.

One auction, 10 units, average crowd (30) / prices ($1-$500). A perfect storm came up on the last unit, it was a mobile attic with a huge trailer parked next to the door obscuring alot of the view. It also started raining hard, so I fell on this unit for a buck! One dump run, but I scored a few yard sale items and two very nice items: A Fujitsu laptop that actually worked, and a really old record/am-fm/storage combo. Like an old furniture style piece where the top lifts up and reveals everything. Pretty exciting for a buck! Will post pics later.

Here's a few of the record player:

Has that location been known to "set up" units in the past? Has something changed with the management that might cause them to "set up" units? I have noticed in my area some facility owners are putting thier personal garbage or stuff they are trying to get rid of from other businesses in thier storage units and auctioning them. I have also noticed facility owners using their auctions for friends and family to sell off thier old stuff they would normally give away, throw away or try to sell at a yard sale. It's very obvious when certain people are following the facility owner/manager around but are not bidding, and smiling from ear to ear when the see how high certain units go for during the auction.

Has that location been known to "set up" units in the past?

Yes, they have set up units in the past. I actually haven't been back there for about 2 years because of it, but when I went there this time I saw the same "handyman" helper and a new manager. I'm sure HE is the one who educates the turnstile rotation of managers about this process.

A small 5 x 5 (if packed solid) is usually genuine since there isn't much opportunity there for manipulation (though they could unload the whole thing and repack it), but it seems the 10 x 10's and larger with some open space are what they work on.

The last one I bought there (2 years ago) had several spots that were dust-free from a lamp or other item being taken out and the dust pattern not brushed away or re-dusted.

The lkr I got the other day contained enough big antiquey items I was comfortable with it, and I already suspected the new boxes were plants, so I knew what I was buying into pretty much, but I have now decided again to give this place a wide berth again; not worth the frustration and possibly getting stung badly.

I'm glad none of my auctions to date have been like that.  Of course I was warned away from one of the late evening auctions by a few different regulars one week.  They said the place normally has plants in the crowd to drive up the price and the people running it don't know jack.  I even have one place that lets you go in the units to look around.

Fayettenam Man - I love $1 and $5 units.  It's easy to pick up a few nice items if you don't mind taking out the trash so to speak.  I would think your furniture could get $50-$100 easy.  Of course I know jack about furniture.  Good luck.

Caravan in the morning so I'm a little excited.  Is the same caravan I picked up 2 units in June.  While I've not made much real money back on the units both units were purchased for personal stuff and not really for re-sale.

Had a great day today......ended up with four lockers!  Went to a facility I normally go to that has an auction about once every three months.  Nice mellow crowd, about 20 people, most all regulars.  Facility had 20 units up for auction.  The lockers I bought ranged in size from 5x10 to 10x25.  The most expensive locker of the day was only(?) $321!  I bought that one and three others that went for $81, $119, and $131!  Just a quick check so far and I've got two nice washer and dryer sets, a kids bouncy house, a Mercury Marine prop, a meth house detection kit (no joke, the one locker belonged to a former cop) and some riot gear, stove/oven, some kind of fancy toilet......plumber guy pegged it as worth $300-$500, lot's of tools, line striper, lot's of furniture, etc.  I'm sure I'll find a lot more, just did a quick look through and haven't unloaded any of them yet. 

Not counting my chickens yet, but hopefully this is a sign of things to come regarding crowds and prices......but it seems like every time I go to a good one, the next two or three have large crowds with too much money burning a hole in their pockets!

Had a great day today......ended up with four lockers! 

Congrats on the wins and we can only hope the crowds and prices will settle down!

I went to two auctions today by the same auctioneer. Each only had about 10 buyers and only 3 or 4 of us were regulars.  I passed on a 10 x 15 that was really clean, but I just wasn't up to the moving of the big stuff for the distance away from home...it went cheap too...might be kicking myself.

I bought a little 5 x 10 for $5 ..... paperwork scared everyone off. Got an OK computer, new laser cartridge in box...should be worth $40 or so, office supplies, a digital camera....OLD !

I liked a 10 x 15 that had two rows of heavy-duty shelving, a lot of tools, cheap roll-away tool box, etc, etc.
One of the regulars started it at $200 and 3 or four of us were in it up to around $700 when most dropped out and then a new one came in. I was really at my max, but knew the regular would go for more, so took him up to $950 and let him have it. He's no pal of mine and one who likes to buy a lot...and the better ones.

Anyway, this was a MELLOW day too with a good auctioneer and a small, friendly crowd.

Nice Teacher - sounds like some nice units but funky prices.  Today for me was backwards.  Today was the 7 facility place where I purchased 2 nice units for myself back in June.  Well this day finds only 10 units, with 2 places with 0 units.  First facility of the morning has about 20 bidders which is pretty normal.  A few new faces but mostly regulars.  Both units here look pretty good with tools and such and go for $500 plus.  Second facility has 1 unit and all of a sudden we have 50+ people running around.  A few of the regulars headed out 1/2 way.  By the time we got to the last facility I swear we had 50-75 people.  In face one of the so-so units went for over $700 to one of the noobies.  Most of us was asking each other "who is this guy?"

Friday I have an auction that sounds like the company cherry picks stuff before the auction.  I'll go if work permits just to see.  Saturday I found out both auction locations are silent bids.  So I'm trying to figure out should I go to the 20 unit one or the 3 facility 42 unit place with one of the units near a high income community.  Both are at the same time

The "Funky Prices" were due to it being a silent auction...LOL.

I got lucky on the one I got for $321......second bid was $318!  I won it by $3!

The "Funky Prices" were due to it being a silent auction...LOL.

I got lucky on the one I got for $321......second bid was $318!  I won it by $3!

Lost one last month on a sealed bid by $1.