How can you improve your odds of winning an online storage auction?

How can you improve your odds of winning an online storage auction?

Here's one way:

Take your time and make a spreadsheet of everything you see in the unit. Calculate the resale value of everything on your list. If you don't know what an item is worth, look on eBay or Craigslist to see what similar items are selling for. If the unit has lots of boxes or a large portion of the unit isn't visible, you can factor in additional value, although I wouldn't go crazy. Once you have a good idea of what you can resell the unit for, you'll be more confident when placing your maximum bid.

In the tri state area they are going for way too much money.  people are bidding on complete mystery and/or junk double or triple what they would pay on a normal run.  This is going to bubble as the prices can't be supported and unlike regular storage auctions this format will have less people just pop in to buy and take a shot. 

Right now its great for sellers but terrible for buyers.

i just picked up 6 unit online. 2 for $720 and 4 for between $200-$400. $2300 total. The big different for me between online in live(in my area anyways) is that almost ALL online are obtainable at a fair price, whereas you don't get any super deals like I do sometimes in the heat of a live auction. I've snuck a bid in live and gotten units for a tenth of what they'd go for online sometimes.

I think the prices fluctuate due to supply and demand. Take the DFW area for example. Hundreds of unit are sold online every month; however, 50-80 online units sold on one day. This is a great day to buy multiple units because your competition will be spread out.

I know it's a lot different for those of you who live in small to medium size towns where there aren't a lot of online auctions. Prices are probably ridiculous.

Here is another tip. SNIPE SNIPE SNIPE

Wait until the last 10 seconds to place your maximum bid, but be sure to refresh the page about a minute before the auction ends. I've noticed that on our competitor's site, there is an inaccuracy in their clock. I've had a page open for about 30 minutes, then I opened a second browser and there was a 20 second discrepancy. That could cost you the unit.