Selling a collection

[KJQ6945]

If you list it for 70, 80, or 90% with no reserve, be prepared to take 70, 80, or 90% of its value. You can put a reserve on it if you choose, but be prepared to sit on it for six months or more.

Penny, no reserve tells everyone that this item will change hands in 7 days, with no bull****. It will sell, regardless. That brings in the real bidders, not the the deadbeats looking to steal something, like you'd thing.

Lets do a hypothetical, shall we? An HK 94 brings about $5k, on average. If I list it for $5k, I'll probably sit on it for six months. If I list it for $4.5k , it might sell for the 4.5k, if one guy puts a bid in on it. Probably sit on it for awhile though, because it's not a deal. Most people will skip over it.
If I list it for a penny, with no reserve, it will bring what ever the market will bear. It is guaranteed to sell, which brings out the real money. It won't sell for less than market value, because the other bidders won't allow it.

Most people are scared of a listing for a penny start, because they think they will get screwed. The gun buying public knows what the gun is worth and will not let it go for less.

 

[two70]

Any early bids always work against you.. Think about it an auction is 7 days long.. You place a generous bid early.. others bid it up and then lets say 2 days out you are in the lead near the upper end of your bid.. This is just you escalating the bid. Others may see your high bid and say this is outrages.. Then they take a second and 3rd look that maybe it is not so outrages... (you know the frog in the slowly heating water theory).. But if you save your fire till the end and dump it in all at once you ran under the radar and just maybe you may Shock and awe the other bidders.. and in this case all you need is 15 mins of shock to win.

I.E.. There are several rare guns I have bid on and lost.. and said well thats to much in the time.. But then later after the auction one laments maybe I should have bid more.. because you have never seen another...

You can't snipe on GB since any bids in the last 15 minutes of the auction automatically adds 15 more minutes so there is often a flurry of late bids. Bidders can and do get carried away in these late flurries, sometimes driving the price beyond what it would normally be otherwise. Rushed decisions are rarely the best decisions. The strategy of always waiting until the last 15 minutes can actually work against you some of the time by causing that flurry of bidding and driving the price up. Getting in early with your maximum bid can frequently work in your favor though. Usually you will have an early flurry of less than serious bidders and there is almost always some action late but it often discourages other prospective bidders when they look at the bid history and see that the high bidder has only made one bid and been in the lead for most of the auction. Plus, if two or more bidders are willing to pay X and only X for the item, the first one to get the bid in wins.

 

[Leadeye]

When my collection gets auctioned after my passing I told the wife to serve my liquor collection free to the bidders at the auction. She should do well.

 

[two70]

If you list it for 70, 80, or 90% with no reserve, be prepared to take 70, 80, or 90% of its value. You can put a reserve on it if you choose, but be prepared to sit on it for six months or more.

Penny, no reserve tells everyone that this item will change hands in 7 days, with no bull****. It will sell, regardless. That brings in the real bidders, not the the deadbeats looking to steal something, like you'd thing.

Lets do a hypothetical, shall we? An HK 94 brings about $5k, on average. If I list it for $5k, I'll probably sit on it for six months. If I list it for $4.5k , it might sell for the 4.5k, if one guy puts a bid in on it. Probably sit on it for awhile though, because it's not a deal. Most people will skip over it.
If I list it for a penny, with no reserve, it will bring what ever the market will bear. It is guaranteed to sell, which brings out the real money. It won't sell for less than market value, because the other bidders won't allow it.

Most people are scared of a listing for a penny start, because they think they will get screwed. The gun buying public knows what the gun is worth and will not let it go for less.

Agreed on a blind reserve, that is a sure way to ensure the auction will go a long time without selling.

Serious question for you, if penny auctions always work in the favor of the seller, then why do so many bidders even bother watching the auction? Most of the watchers on penny auctions are clearly not serious bidders and never even bother to bid. Even a lot of those that do bid are not really serious. They are the ones just looking for a steal. All the penny start does is bring in a lot of watchers, the vast majority of which are not serious bidders or in other words deadbeats as you put it. The higher priced the item, the higher the ratio of non-serious watchers to serious bidders is likely to be.

A reasonable but lower starting bid weeds out those "deadbeats" and leaves mostly seriously interested bidders.

Concerning the hypothetical of selling an HK 94, an HK 94 is a pretty collectible item with a fairly high demand. You are likely going to sell it and at full value no matter what you list it for, it's just a matter of how long it takes. Listing it at $4500 will get it sold pretty quickly and likely for close to or at $5000. Listing it for $5000 will likely require a lot longer for it sell but obviously you will get at least $5000. Listing it for a penny will guarantee it sells quickly and incurs little risk since the demand is high.

Now lets look at another hypothetical situation where you are trying to sell a Krieghoff shotgun like in the first post. They are quality made expensive shotguns but they are still being made and are not particularly collectible or in high demand. People buy them new for $7,000+. If you list it for $5500+, you will probably sell it eventually but it will take a long, long time. If you list it for $4500, it will sell reasonably quickly, possibly for more than $4500 but definitely not less. If you do a penny start, it will definitely sell but there is the very real possibility that is sells for significantly less than $4500.

I would gladly list an HK 94 for $4500 on GB if I had one to sell, would you seriously list a Krieghoff shotgun for a penny? Bottom line, you are telling me what you want to see as a bidder, not what a seller should do.

 

[DoggyDaddy]

I've bought a decent number of guns off Gunbroker and as a buyer, I'm a fan of penny auctions, no reserve. I hate blind reserves and if I'm not put off enough to just ignore the item, I'll message the seller and flat out ask if they can tell me the reserve price. Most of the time they have, but a few would not. On the other hand, I hate when there is a (non-penny) starting bid, say, $400.00 and then they say, "No Reserve!" Well, yes, there IS a reserve. It's $400.00. It's just not a blind reserve. Of the two, I prefer a non-penny starting bid right out in the open to a blind reserve. I just don't understand the logic of the blind reserve. If anything, that's going to bring out the tire-kickers just bidding to find out what the reserve price is.