City Slicker or Country Bumpkin?

My dad and I will be going to our first storage auction this Saturday. We live in rural NC and the auction will be held here. We discussed that it might be more advantageous to travel to more populated areas, but still in NC (i.e. Raleigh, Charlotte). I wanted to ask the veterans if they have had better luck in urban areas than in rural areas. It seems that urban areas would have better stuff since the people there have convenient access to bigger, better stores. I would appreciate anyone's advice.
 Thanks - Melissa

My dad and I will be going to our first storage auction this Saturday. We live in rural NC and the auction will be held here. We discussed that it might be more advantageous to travel to more populated areas, but still in NC (i.e. Raleigh, Charlotte). I wanted to ask the veterans if they have had better luck in urban areas than in rural areas. It seems that urban areas would have better stuff since the people there have convenient access to bigger, better stores. I would appreciate anyone's advice.
 Thanks - Melissa

Not necessarily true. But with a small town you are almost gurantee to run into more than one whale. But in a populated location, you may not have any bidding against you. As far as valuables, it can go either way. Also keep in mind, the rich and well to do are starting to move out of the city and into the rural areas.

I hadn't thought about rich people moving out of the city. This is true, however, it seems that rich people would not fall behind on their payments, unless they lost their job or something. Thank you for the reply. We'll find out this Saturday!

I hadn't thought about rich people moving out of the city. This is true, however, it seems that rich people would not fall behind on their payments, unless they lost their job or something. Thank you for the reply. We'll find out this Saturday!

They do die. Sometimes family does not know (or care) about the locker.

I think sometimes the more rural you have older and more established families and the lockers can reflect this.Especially older and not new chain storage places.

The advantages to going to auctions in the larger cities is that there are a lot more auctions occurring every day.

The advantages to going to suburban and rural auctions is that the crowds are typically smaller; therefore you can typically buy a unit at a lower cost.

Sounds like we might be better off going to auctions where we are rather than in a larger area. I'm not sure what a "whale" is, though. Does anyone care to explain? Thanks for all the advice, guys!

Sounds like we might be better off going to auctions where we are rather than in a larger area. I'm not sure what a "whale" is, though. Does anyone care to explain? Thanks for all the advice, guys!

A "Whale" is a discription of a bidder in the storage auction business who exhibits certain traits. These traits can include, but not limited to:

1. Local auction buyer who buys high numbers of storage units per year.
2. Local auction buyer who always or nearly always wins the best of the best storage units that come up for auction.
3. Local auction buyer who protects their territory by "running up" the bids on which ever units the choose, making it dificult for other buyers to win units or win a profitable unit for low initial investment.
4. Regional auction buyer who has an operation large enough to attend auctions in different cities through out the week, and even have representation at different auctions on the same day.

Others can probably give other discriptions, but I think this gives you a good picture of who a "Whale" is.

One of the pitfalls of small town auctions are the small town "whales" who will bid anything to protect thier territory, very few people can do this effectively in larger cities, just too many auctions with too many units available.

Thanks for the clarification. Sounds like a whale is the storage auction version of an a**hole!

I attend all the auctions in the Charlotte a area, and have been to the ones in Raliegh and other areas. You are not missing anything special, I no longer travel more than 50 miles one way, just too expensive. Good luck with all yor auctions.

Thanks for the clarification. Sounds like a whale is the storage auction version of an a**hole!

 Pretty close....Our first Auction there was a Whale but now we call him Romeo was hitting up on another bidder... LOL Found out at our next Auction he bought 14 units out of 25  available.. He was a noobie with money to spend don't think we will see him again prices to high...Just go and watch and see what is happening. We went to the next closest Auction after our first to see who were the regulars.... Still no locker tho : ( Keep us posted on how it goes.

I believe you when you say there is nothing better in Charlotte & Raleigh but I live in the middle of nowhere, NC where there are few auctions going on. I would like to hit at least one a week at some point. I'm going to keep researching and calling around to find auctions that are close by.
I hope I don't run into a whale at the auctions. I got the idea to do this from my neighbor's boyfriend. He is dumb as a box of rocks and it's hard to have a conversation with him. With that said, I think, if he can make money at the local auctions...ANYBODY can!! Or in other words, the whales around here must be manageable.
I'll keep everyone posted on our first auction. Saturday isn't far off!

I would say city auctions just do to the volume of auctions going on. The more units you get to see the better

I finally made it to the auction. It was a total bust. After they had us lined up, they announced that they would be selling some items from each unit by the piece and then the rest of the contents would be sold as a unit. Some guy paid 6 dollars for a wooden barrel that contained a dry rotted water hose and a kid's sand shovel. Me and my dad just stood back and laughed at these fools. A mounted deer head was pulled out to be auctioned and the auctioneer looked at it and told the kid dragging the stuff out to "hold off on that". I guess the auctioneer is too lazy to shoot his own deer or maybe just a bad shot. I assume that after all the "good" stuff was out, the auctioneer wanted one of us to pay him to let us haul the rest to the dump. I'm disappointed but not daunted. I will find a good auction that doesn't involve false advertising and cherry picking.

Thanks for the clarification. Sounds like a whale is the storage auction version of an a**hole!

A "whale" is generally someone who has been in the business long before the storage auction shows popped up on tv and destroyed the market.
They have huge buying power and a lot of know-how.  They can buy 5 large lockers and have them cleaned out in 24 hours, and be back the next day and purchase 5 more.
I wouldn't quantify them as an ass hole just because they have a family to support and a business to run.