RIA auction Question

[sheepherder]

Originally Posted by Dave Sanders

I was able to find the items I bid on through the links above. Wow, was I way off.

If you based your bids on RIA's low/high estimates, they will be way way off. I've lowballed bids (as IthacaDave suggested) and bid hundreds over their high estimates and still been outbid, sometimes by a thousand or more. . And I consider my interests to be wildly different from the average collector, so I have to wonder if the 'house' doesn't take consignments with a 'reserve' and if that reserve isn't met, then the 'house' bids on it and is a 'winner'. I have been to auto auctions where that exact scenario is played out.

I still visit the RIA auctions and bid on items but I no longer have any expectation of winning anything. I just like to receive the big auction catalogs.