Auction Rip Off's - 30% Commission buyer, 15% Commission seller! It has to stop?

[1817Karl]

I'm all for making money, but some auction houses are taking the preverbial. With 30% buyers commission (raising to 36%) if bidding through platforms! and 15% sellers commission (plus lotting fees and photography fees) the seller is only getting around 50% of the value of the coins (I know there's some VAT in there). Surely they are going to price themselves out of business or should be investigated by trading standards? And to add insult to injury, they won't pack and send the items to you, instead throw you at the mercy of the overpriced Mail Boxes ETC... 

Just my little rant for the day! Best of luck @AndreasAfeldt I hope you prevail and cause some disruption to this outdated and expensive industry... 

 

[Shinus73]

It can be a bugger to calculate, but as long as you only bid what you’re willing to pay in total, then as a buyer, it makes little difference.

[Clockpuncher]

At least Richard Turpin wore a mask!

[Guest]

Just for the record coins consigned via me to Heritage have a 20% buyers premium and 1% to 7% sellers premium according to the value of the coins consigned.

Good auction houses are not the devil! For nice coins they add value in a big way and achieve good prices for sellers more than a fire sale here on the forum quite often.

They also provide a marketplace for cheaper coins that are a pain to sell and require tons of YOUR time to deal with...

I think its fair to tell the other side of the story since this forum has a tendency to be a tiny mite anarchic at times.

[greendragon]

16 minutes ago, 1817Karl said:

With 30% buyers commission (raising to 36%) if bidding through platforms!

Too be honest, this is not too bad by auction standards

I buy a lot from general auction sales, and 48 % for buyers is the norm for a lot of auction houses

[BackyardBullion]

I think it ultimately comes down to what you want to achieve with your specialist coin. 

Selling something like the listing privately is going to be very hard, and the compromise has to be on the achievable price. You will likely get a higher price from the auction which should, in theory, offset the seller fees. 

The auction houses will bring the buyers - the interested buyers. I would rather list something on a specialist auction house than on another platform offering lower fees but no actual provenance for bringing those specialist buyers. 

I would take 5 very serious coin collectors over 5 million lay persons on eBay!

Each to their own and as long as the sellers are fully aware of the fees up front I don't see a problem here. 

[1817Karl]

19 minutes ago, Numistacker said:

Just for the record coins consigned via me to Heritage have a 20% buyers premium and 1% to 7% sellers premium according to the value of the coins consigned.

Good auction houses are not the devil! For nice coins they add value in a big way and achieve good prices for sellers more than a fire sale here on the forum quite often.

They also provide a marketplace for cheaper coins that are a pain to sell and require tons of YOUR time to deal with...

I think its fair to tell the other side of the story since this forum has a tendency to be a tiny mite anarchic at times.

Ahhh. Numi, never one to miss a sales pitch!😀

[Martlet]

Its down to the auction houses, they get trade as these rates, I suppose they are geared towards general antiques and bric-a-brac.  

Many seem to be in the dark ages, uninterested in the large online market.  I was bewildered watching one recent as about a dozen coins went at about spot (including fees), no information on delivery (or response to email) kept me from bidding.   

[Prophecy]

They're market makers in a very illiquid market so it's only fair. Where it wouldn't be fair is if they charged a fee just to list. If it didn't sell, they aren't doing their job.

[*tada*]

I was stunned by recent Heritage auctions (platinum night for example brings crazy prices for British coins). I guess now people are all online... The reason they are so big is because they bring strong prices on average for sellers.

For high value items (5 figures and up) Heritage usually offer no seller fees. The best deal I got before is 106% hammer but you need to have something they really want. They also promise advertisement which can be expensive. They def draw large audience. They can give you 50% estimate value as advance as well at 1% interest per month.

I’ve went through almost $150k+ selling on eBay this year mostly items in 1k to 10k range and got very nice buyers on that platform. It’s not a platform for 5 figure coins clearly but you need to have your comfort zone. Don’t know why people hate it. I enjoy reading the lowball offers and you don’t need to sell anything at a price you don’t like. The fee is a lot lower at about 9% total for seller (with a store subscription). And you get money immediately. Next year there may be a 3% fee hike on numismatic items under the new managed payment structure though.

Then we have the coin cabinet auctions which is quite successful in such a short period of time. Really well done. The 10% seller fee structure I’d say is closer to eBay+PayPal’s numbers and hope they can sustain that level for years to come.

If you ask me as a collector I do not like to buy from dealers at all apart from very few trusted ones. I find myself turning to more and more auctions to find deals. Some of the rare US coins the dealers always tell you that you need to hold a long time to break even. Why? Cause the mark up is crazy. Very distorted market, full of bull s**t and not for the uninformed.

 

[sovereignsteve]

It's best to use specialist coin auctioneers, the top ones don't charge sellers fees for items hammered at £1000 +

Hopefully sellers will continue to use TCC and Andreas won't start increasing fees as soon as he has developed a position in the market🤔