Heritage BP increasing 0

[buttock]

36 minutes ago, Howling Mad said:

I have, and will continue to, never bid on Heritage Auctions. The fact that they now get 20% on the buyer's end, as well as 10% on the seller's end I believe, is ridiculous.

Tim, you're up.

[october]

7 hours ago, buttock said:

Tim, you're up.

It's like Whack A Mole up in here. 

[G.A.tor]

15 minutes ago, october said:

It's like Whack A Mole up in here. 

I think so few of those posting actually read the entirety of posts 

[tth2]

10 hours ago, DC|Marvel said:

The genesis of my post was from the sell side perspective. My instinct is that money is being left on the table in certain instances because of the BP; say for a more common key in the 9.0 - 9.4 range. I did not get a chance to log into my Heritage account to do some DD. But I wanted to pull a bunch of auctions for a IH 181, ASM 129, etc. and contrast end prices against CL and CC. If the prices are at par, then clearly seller is better served elsewhere.

This kind of got planted last month when I was looking up some 35 cent price variant auctions for Star Wars and a few other slabs. I was really surprised at the hammer price on several of them (meaning I expected a much higher price.) I would have actually happily paid a couple of the end prices.

 

 

From a sell side perspective, you're absolutely right.  Sorry, that wasn't clear from your original post.

On the other hand, as has been stated in this thread, very few sellers pay full freight to Heritage.  And if for some reason they can't get better terms from Heritage, then like you I would think that it makes much more sense for them to sell on CL and CC.

What bothers me about CL is that they are unwilling to negotiate on their seller's commission (at least they weren't willing with me).  I've never looked at consigning with CC so have never had the discussion with them.  

[entalmighty1]

9 hours ago, tth2 said:

From a sell side perspective, you're absolutely right.  Sorry, that wasn't clear from your original post.

On the other hand, as has been stated in this thread, very few sellers pay full freight to Heritage.  And if for some reason they can't get better terms from Heritage, then like you I would think that it makes much more sense for them to sell on CL and CC.

What bothers me about CL is that they are unwilling to negotiate on their seller's commission (at least they weren't willing with me).  I've never looked at consigning with CC so have never had the discussion with them.  

It also sucks that it's almost impossible to look at their past sales, since they don't report to GPA.  I have to put tracking bids on everything I'm even remotely interested in just to have a halfway decent idea of market trends on their auctions.  It's a lot of extra clicks, and I'm lazy.

[BAT MAN]

13 hours ago, tth2 said:

From a sell side perspective, you're absolutely right.  Sorry, that wasn't clear from your original post.

On the other hand, as has been stated in this thread, very few sellers pay full freight to Heritage.  And if for some reason they can't get better terms from Heritage, then like you I would think that it makes much more sense for them to sell on CL and CC.

What bothers me about CL is that they are unwilling to negotiate on their seller's commission (at least they weren't willing with me).  I've never looked at consigning with CC so have never had the discussion with them.  

I have done allot of business with CL over the years. But as a seller nothing of your caliber; most expensive books I sold on there ranged from $800-$1400 a piece. The only color I can add to your comment is that I know for sure there is a boardie who had a ridiculous high grade slab. Something you don't see often perhaps an HOS 92 9.8 or something freaky like that. He listed here in the marketplace and someone from CL reached out to him on here directly. I am not sure if it was Doug or who it was.

In that particular instance say where competitively speaking there is a huge value add from marketing/brand recognition side to be the one that lists "that slab" I could see them perhaps having flex on consignment fees (or not.)  But major kudos to you for at least asking/negotiating. Not many folks do that. 

You should try CC and see if that gets you anywhere. I sold some higher dollar slabs on there but this was well before they really blew up and hit critical mass. As a buyer I really like CL. Their communication is tight and Sean always gets back to me immediately. He knows that when I win auctions I want the maximum number of slabs allowed within the shipping cost quantity parameters. So if I win 6 or 7 slabs I will got hunting in the classifieds to get me to 10. And he will pull/combine what needs to be done etc. 

On the Heritage platform there is always a particular service for a specific individual; right so I get it from your perspective if you are dealing with say OA pieces or upper five or six figure slabs etc. A bid from the right bidder will make the premium moot. But putting those scenarios aside if you are dealing with more practical priced slabs that have stellar liquidity in the marketplace it really behooves you the seller to do your DD. As I mentioned to you previously, I pulled a bunch of listings in Heritage I was interested in just for a reference point. I was surprised at the hammer price on some and most likely this is happening because of the exact reason which you described in detail from the buy side perspective.

 

 

 

[HRCostigan]

It seems mostly probably true that buying on HA just got mildly more expensive.  The bid increments are fixed so I don't expect the average collector, savvy or mathematically literate they may be, to be able to reduce their pre-BP bid the same amount to offset.  Maybe on some items, but not on most contested auctions.

[tth2]

15 minutes ago, HRCostigan said:

It seems mostly probably true that buying on HA just got mildly more expensive.  The bid increments are fixed so I don't expect the average collector, savvy or mathematically literate they may be, to be able to reduce their pre-BP bid the same amount to offset.  Maybe on some items, but not on most contested auctions.

How hard is it to take the maximum amount you're willing to spend and now divide by 1.2 instead of 1.195?

[adamstrange]

51 minutes ago, tth2 said:

How hard is it to take the maximum amount you're willing to spend and now divide by 1.2 instead of 1.195?

I just enter random bids until I see a total I like.  Your method is probably faster.

[entalmighty1]

7 hours ago, tth2 said:

How hard is it to take the maximum amount you're willing to spend and now divide by 1.2 instead of 1.195?

 

[MrBedrock]

12 hours ago, tth2 said:

How hard is it to take the maximum amount you're willing to spend and now divide by 1.2 instead of 1.195?

On a scale of 1-10?

[goldust40]

On 6/29/2018 at 8:21 AM, tth2 said:

The best would be if Heritage had to start collecting VAT on all bidders from the UK and Europe.  It would be so great if they had to start from a 20-ish% hole. 

Impossible as the VAT would go to the countries' respective governments and not Heritage.

And even more impossible in the U.K. as comics here do not attract VAT or duty.

I look forward to Hong Kong enacting a new VAT on incoming American collectibles in the region of shall we say, 90%??

[tth2]

On 7/2/2018 at 2:17 PM, adamstrange said:

On 7/2/2018 at 1:24 PM, tth2 said:

How hard is it to take the maximum amount you're willing to spend and now divide by 1.2 instead of 1.195?

I just enter random bids until I see a total I like.  Your method is probably faster.

[tth2]

2 hours ago, goldust40 said:

On 6/29/2018 at 3:21 PM, tth2 said:

The best would be if Heritage had to start collecting VAT on all bidders from the UK and Europe.  It would be so great if they had to start from a 20-ish% hole. 

Impossible as the VAT would go to the countries' respective governments and not Heritage.

And even more impossible in the U.K. as comics here do not attract VAT or duty.

I look forward to Hong Kong enacting a new VAT on incoming American collectibles in the region of shall we say, 90%??

If the UK would start charging VAT just on the comic and OA purchases of yourself, Imran, George and John, it could eliminate the hole in the NHS's budget. 

[Crowzilla]

On 7/1/2018 at 9:57 AM, tth2 said:

What bothers me about CL is that they are unwilling to negotiate on their seller's commission

With all the money they spend on making sure they have the most user-friendly and up to date web platform of any auction house, I'm not surprised.

[goldust40]

1 hour ago, tth2 said:

If the UK would start charging VAT just on the comic and OA purchases of yourself, Imran, George and John, it could eliminate the hole in the NHS's budget. 

That Wonderworld 7 is a year's spending for most folks here.

Edited July 3, 2018 by goldust40

[G.A.tor]

2 hours ago, Crowzilla said:

With all the money they spend on making sure they have the most user-friendly and up to date web platform of any auction house, I'm not surprised.

Ouch

[Sqeggs]

On 7/1/2018 at 7:09 PM, entalmighty1 said:

It also sucks that it's almost impossible to look at their past sales, since they don't report to GPA.  I have to put tracking bids on everything I'm even remotely interested in just to have a halfway decent idea of market trends on their auctions.  It's a lot of extra clicks, and I'm lazy.

I do this, too, because your bid history seems to live on indefinitely, even after the auction itself has been dropped from the site.

[Sqeggs]

On 6/25/2018 at 3:43 PM, lou_fine said:

Sounds to me that if you are a collector sitting on say, $1M or $2M worth of vintage books in your collection, you will most likely have to sell it all in one or two shots on their terms if you want to get the Heritage fees back down to a reasonable level.  Now, if you wanted to dispose of your collection on your own terms over an extended number of years, then you are most probably out of luck if you go with Heritage.

Sounds to me like a long term collector would still be better off if they didn't want to cash it all out in one shot, and simply go with either CC or CL and parcel out their collection at their own desired pace.  Especially since any additional monies they might have gain from the higher profile and longer reach of the immediate Heritage listings would most likely not make up for the fact that your better books would hopefully increase enough in value over the years to make up any difference by the time you do decide to sell them. 

I'm not sure if I'm following you here, but Heritage is happy to spread a consignment out over multiple auctions, with all books consigned getting the same terms however many auctions it may take before they're sold.  Again, though, it may depend on the books and the negotiating skills of the consignor.  

To get back to the discussion of the Berk auction on CC, where most books were listed in a single auction, I think Berk left a lot of money on the table with that approach.  It may have been his choice, but with Heritage, the books could have been spread out over multiple, even many, auctions.  We are seeing that now with the Veryzl Church books and with another large consignment from a boardie.   Wrt to the latter, the books have been trickling out over several months worth of signature and Sunday night auctions. 

Edited July 5, 2018 by Sqeggs

[JLA Brad]

If we go on the assumption that HA's SP can be negotiated to be roughly equal to CC or CL, the question is whether HA can provide more visibility and has a better reach in order to bring in higher bids to offset the 20% BP that they charge and the others don't.  Even if you negotiate no HA SP (and doing this is not a given), there is still 20% HA BP vs. 10% SP CC & CL.

As a buyer, as many others have stated, the 20% is irrelevant as long as you don't make the mistake of ignoring the BP when bidding (which I'm sure has happened more than once).  It's really as a seller that you take the bigger risk of netting much less than through CC or CL.  Does HA really have that bigger a reach than CL or CC?  On average, are their prices hammering higher than CC & CL to more than offset the higher fees?