Quote:
Originally Posted by Craig T
This could not be written better, nor is there better advice.
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Except for the fact that it isn't completely accurate. You bet there are a lot of eyes watching for stuff and not only that they remember what is what. That said the real knowledgeable guys can not be every where and see everything.
Then there is the hesitancy factor in an auction where the avg guy says I just don't know about that and will err on the side of caution. There is where the guy with knowledge makes a score. Unless of course someone else knows to, then if is something that they both can not live without...they duke it out with one guy eventually coming to his senses. That is where prices are driven.
For instance in 98 Jeff Faintich auctions in St Louis had a Smith Registered Mag with an estimate of 1800 to 2200. I said I will give it a whirl an will phone bid on that..before I could get a bid in it had blown way past 2K eventually settling at 17000. I said what is wrong with this picture, as in what don't I know. Later from a major Smith collector I found out the catalog misrepresented the barrel length and it was a rare barrel length that two guys knew about. I said hmmmm sumthin is up wid those Reg mags and sure enough a little more than a year later Reg mags went 5X on the money. That is the back story there... From there it was only a matter of time before the postwar stuff started to climb, first the 5 screws, then the 4 screws and now the 3 screws.
The problem with the big auction houses is that the guys who write the descriptions know what is what and fill in the details (sometimes they miss things as well). They do it because a good percentage of their clientele is absentee or phone bidders and they want to inspire confidence in what they are offering so prices won't languish.
The big auction houses get in the big and long term collections of decades where the collector winnowed the dross out and kept the primo stuff. So the guys with the dinero who are savvy collectors do one stop shopping and the money flows like a river. That is where prices are driven. Also Dealers hit those auctions to buy inventory on anything that might go cheap...so chances are....you will get it for one bid more than a dealer will go. Which is still OK. Collectors Firearms in Houston is a big buyer at Amoskeag in NH. I have seen dealers fk up by paying too much to...
The big players are Julia's, Rock Island, Amoskeag, Cowans/Little John, Heritage Auctions and now Carol Watson in OC. . Sotherbys and Butterfields..ehhh. Then there are the regional or state auction houses that do a little bit of everything.
G Shows and Dealers are trying to sell you retail. Sales in a parking lots are for gang banger type of shyte. GB, G International and G America are largely dealer operations with some private party stuff. Then there is G Runner on line only auctions..he gets primo dinero for his stuff. There is the between collectors private party sales...where stuff never sees the light of day except for a transfer between one spoon room and another.
Then there is the great leveler of the knowledgeable and the newbie who does not know the muzzle from the butt end of a spoon...The Blue Book Of Spoon Values or the Standard Catalog of Spoon Values...the prices listed are good orders of value, but the real importance is the ability to identify by make, model, caliber, and SN which leads to a by condition valuation.