Heritage BP increasing 0

[entalmighty1]

1 hour ago, Sqeggs said:

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

I just wish you could actually see the books associated with the auction results after the fact.  They don't appear to archive their photos, or if they do, they aren't available to the public.  It would be nice to see the reason a particular book hammered higher or lower than normal.  Maybe there was a chunk missing from the cover, or the book had some scribbling on it.  Numbers are helpful, but they don't tell the whole story. 

[Sqeggs]

2 minutes ago, entalmighty1 said:

I just wish you could actually see the books associated with the auction results after the fact.  They don't appear to archive their photos, or if they do, they aren't available to the public.  It would be nice to see the reason a particular book hammered higher or lower than normal.  Maybe there was a chunk missing from the cover, or the book had some scribbling on it.  Numbers are helpful, but they don't tell the whole story. 

I think that for awhile, you can still see the book if you click on the link in your bid history.  Eventually, though, the links stop working when they take the listing down.  At least they don't purge your bid list, though, so you can still see the grade and prices indefinitely. But, yeah, it would be nice if the scans were still available, the way they are on Heritage and CC (although maybe CC pulls them too at some point).

[HENRYSPENCER]

On 6/30/2018 at 11:24 PM, tth2 said:

So please enlighten us on the point of your posts then, because you seemed to be criticizing high BPs.  If, as you claim above, you understand that one simply factors BPs (whatever the percentage is) into one's bid, then what's the issue?

If the BP goes up and bid increments stay the same, the final price will be inflated based on the new BP.  Then these items will be archived at higher prices realized than previous sales of the same amounts.  This gives the false appearance that the comic market is healthier than it actually is.  Dealers price based on GPA which takes into account the auction results with the new, higher BP.  Dealers think they can ask the same amounts as auction houses which charge a new BP of whatever amount they choose. From an investment standpoint raising BP to manipulate earnings is incredibly easy to spot especially since rates are still at an all-time low.

Edited July 6, 2018 by HENRYSPENCER

[lou_fine]

On 6/27/2018 at 8:25 PM, tth2 said:

I would suggest that you not make any assumptions about what you might or might not be able to get from Heritage and simply talk with them first.  You might be surprised.  In your particular case, because you're a well-known collector (with a great collection despite your best efforts to "aw shucks" everybody), Heritage might very well be willing to offer you attractive terms even without a large commitment from yourself in order to get you in the door. 

Boy, was I ever excited and jumping for joy when I saw your message here. 

Couldn't wait to contact Barry Sandoval only to be told that he was not available after they had asked me for my name.  Sharp as a needle, I decided to mention your name and presto, just like that..............Barry was all of a sudden available and I was patched right through to him.  Maybe I should think about changing my name or something. 

Unfortunately, after a couple of minutes of friendly conversation, I somehow got the distinct impression that Barry was starting to nod off after I had mentioned my minty fresh right off the newsstand copies of Adolescent Radioactive Black Belt Hamsters and my Spawn 1 which I had been carefully saving for the past 30 odd years.  He did seem to wake up instantly when I mentioned my high grade copy of X-Men #1 to him and he confirmed that Heritage would indeed be interested in auctioning off that book for me.  When I mentioned that i hoped the bidders would be as enthusiastic with the Jim Lee cover to cover artwork as I had been, the line suddenly went dead. 

Upon calling right back, I was then told that Barry would be out of the office for the rest of the summer convention season..............go figure that!!! 

 

Edited July 6, 2018 by lou_fine

[lou_fine]

7 hours ago, HENRYSPENCER said:

If the BP goes up and bid increments stay the same, the final price will be inflated based on the new BP.  Then these items will be archived at higher prices realized than previous sales of the same amounts.  This gives the false appearance that the comic market is healthier than it actually is.  Dealers price based on GPA which takes into account the auction results with the new, higher BP.  Dealers think they can ask the same amounts as auction houses which charge a new BP of whatever amount they choose. From an investment standpoint raising BP to manipulate earnings is incredibly easy to spot especially since rates are still at an all-time low.

You seem to be placing far too much importance to the Heritage hammer price when you should really be focusing on the final realized price which would already include the Buyer's Premium.  The HA hammer price is completely irrelevant in the marketplace except to the seller since both the BP and the SP would be calculated based upon the hammer price.

All Heritage auction results and sales are based upon the final price inclusive of BP and these are the previous sales dollar amount that dealers, Overstreet, GPA, etc. would be working with.  Nobody pays any attention to the HA hammer price because it is only an interim number that doesn't really represent anything in the marketplace. 

[entalmighty1]

5 hours ago, lou_fine said:

You seem to be placing far too much importance to the Heritage hammer price when you should really be focusing on the final realized price which would already include the Buyer's Premium.  The HA hammer price is completely irrelevant in the marketplace except to the seller since both the BP and the SP would be calculated based upon the hammer price.

All Heritage auction results and sales are based upon the final price inclusive of BP and these are the previous sales dollar amount that dealers, Overstreet, GPA, etc. would be working with.  Nobody pays any attention to the HA hammer price because it is only an interim number that doesn't really represent anything in the marketplace. 

@HENRYSPENCER

Also, the BP is going up half of 1 percent.  On a $5,000 dollar book, that's $25.  On a 1 million dollar book, that's $1k.  In short, who cares?

[HENRYSPENCER]

11 minutes ago, entalmighty1 said:

@HENRYSPENCER

Also, the BP is going up half of 1 percent.  On a $5,000 dollar book, that's $25.  On a 1 million dollar book, that's $1k.  In short, who cares?

 

I look at the whole picture.  A half a point increase on twelve to and eight million in total sales per event auction is a rather large number. 

 

[entalmighty1]

3 minutes ago, HENRYSPENCER said:

 

I look at the whole picture.  A half a point increase on twelve to and eight million in total sales per event auction is a rather large number. 

 

An increase in revenue for the owners of a for-profit auction house.  I don't see the problem here.

They're increasing their bottom line on a service that caters to people with disposable income bidding on collectibles.  I could understand your ire if we were talking about a pharmaceutical company quadrupling the price of insulin, but we're not.  We're talking about comics, coins, stamps, antique firearms, and other items people collect with their spare money for enjoyment.

It's all based on choice.  You're free to bid, or not.  This isn't the only show in town.  Heritage knows that, and feels they bring books to the table that other auction houses don't have, which justifies the cost increase.  They're probably right.

[Superman2006]

14 hours ago, entalmighty1 said:

Also, the BP is going up half of 1 percent.  On a $5,000 dollar book, that's $25.  On a 1 million dollar book, that's $5k.  In short, who cares?

Minor typo fixed in bold above. Carry on...

[entalmighty1]

10 hours ago, Superman2006 said:

Minor typo fixed in bold above. Carry on...

 

I don't foresee a million dollar real estate deal falling through over 5k.  

[Superman2006]

3 minutes ago, entalmighty1 said:

10 hours ago, Superman2006 said:

Minor typo fixed in bold above. Carry on...

 

I don't foresee a million dollar real estate deal falling through over 5k.  

I wasn't suggesting anything, just fixing a typo. I didn't really follow the exchange that closely, but my two cents about Heritage BP is that as a buyer, you should just consider that total price you'll be paying including BP, in which case a 0.5% increase in BP really has no impact as a buyer. As a seller, it might not have much or any impact either if you plan to negotiate SP / BP with Heritage anyway. 

[lou_fine]

On 7/5/2018 at 11:27 AM, Sqeggs said:

On 6/25/2018 at 12:43 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.  

 

On 6/27/2018 at 8:25 PM, tth2 said:

The other point I would mention is that Heritage will usually drop the entire SP straight away for any consignment that is Signature Auction worthy.  I sometimes think they have the SP just to have something to give away immediately during negotiations.  The real negotiation is on the BP.  So throw out all the 35%'s and what not, the 20% BP is the real starting comparison point with Comiclink and CC.

Hate to break the bad news to both of you, but the majority of us here (at least I do) do not have collections that are even anywhere close to the same ball park as Jon Berk's or John Veryzl's collections.  Without a doubt, those guys can call the shots on when and how they would want their collection to be auctioned off.

Although I may have a small handful of books that might hopefully be Signature Auction worthy if I am lucky, the large majority of my collection would most probably be relegated to the back pages of the Heritage catalogue or be pushed off to one of their lower profile Sunday auctions.  Strongly doubt that I would be calling the shots and having much say here when it comes to Heritage.

 

Edited July 8, 2018 by lou_fine

[lou_fine]

On 7/5/2018 at 11:27 AM, Sqeggs said:

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. 

My take on the situation for what it's worth is that unlike most of the boardie's here, Jon was one of the early true collectors who was passionate about the comic books themselves and never really got into it for the money.  Well, in those days nobody would ever dream that the books would be going for what they are going for in today's red hot marketplace.  Heck, although I always used to look at the Overstreet guide to rationalize to myself (and later to my better half) all those decades ago that my books would actually be worth money one day, I never really actually believe it.  Guess I must have been lucky to fall passionately in love with this hobby because look at where we are today. 

Remember that Jon is probably one of the most passionate collectors out there in this hobby as evident from reading so many of his articles in the pages of CBM back in the day.  From his recent interviews about selling his collection, I got the impression that he had reached a point where he was at peace in his mind with disposing of his collection and passing the books onto the next generation of collectors.  Like taking off a bandage, I think he probably found it much easier to do it in one quick shot as opposed to prolonging the agony and spreading it out over a few years, even though that would have made the most sense from a strict financial point of view. 

All I know for sure is that we as collectors should all thank Jon for being such an excellent caretaker and safeguarding these books over the decades and then giving us the opportunity to obtain some of them for our own personal collections. 

[tth2]

On 7/6/2018 at 2:11 AM, JLA Brad said:

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?

 

Brad, as others here have mentioned, getting the SP to 0 is only the starting point.  You can often get Heritage to rebate part of the 20% BP, so that your overall cost with Heritage is more similar to CC/CL's commission.

[tth2]

On 7/6/2018 at 7:49 AM, HENRYSPENCER said:

If the BP goes up and bid increments stay the same, the final price will be inflated based on the new BP. 

Why would the bid increment stay the same if the BP has gone up?

Now that the BP is 20% rather than 19.5%, guess what, my bids will be 0.5% lower. 

Higher BPs are enemies only of mathematically illiterate buyers.

[tth2]

On 7/6/2018 at 2:48 PM, lou_fine said:

On 6/28/2018 at 10:25 AM, tth2 said:

I would suggest that you not make any assumptions about what you might or might not be able to get from Heritage and simply talk with them first.  You might be surprised.  In your particular case, because you're a well-known collector (with a great collection despite your best efforts to "aw shucks" everybody), Heritage might very well be willing to offer you attractive terms even without a large commitment from yourself in order to get you in the door. 

Boy, was I ever excited and jumping for joy when I saw your message here. 

Couldn't wait to contact Barry Sandoval only to be told that he was not available after they had asked me for my name.  Sharp as a needle, I decided to mention your name and presto, just like that..............Barry was all of a sudden available and I was patched right through to him.  Maybe I should think about changing my name or something. 

Unfortunately, after a couple of minutes of friendly conversation, I somehow got the distinct impression that Barry was starting to nod off after I had mentioned my minty fresh right off the newsstand copies of Adolescent Radioactive Black Belt Hamsters and my Spawn 1 which I had been carefully saving for the past 30 odd years.  He did seem to wake up instantly when I mentioned my high grade copy of X-Men #1 to him and he confirmed that Heritage would indeed be interested in auctioning off that book for me.  When I mentioned that i hoped the bidders would be as enthusiastic with the Jim Lee cover to cover artwork as I had been, the line suddenly went dead. 

Upon calling right back, I was then told that Barry would be out of the office for the rest of the summer convention season..............go figure that!!! 

I literally can't post enough  in response to your post.

As I said, "despite your best efforts to 'aw shucks' everybody", those of us in the know know that you're a playah.

[tth2]

7 hours ago, lou_fine said:

 

Hate to break the bad news to both of you, but the majority of us here (at least I do) do not have collections that are even anywhere close to the same ball park as Jon Berk's or John Veryzl's collections.  Without a doubt, those guys can call the shots on when and how they would want their collection to be auctioned off.

Although I may have a small handful of books that might hopefully be Signature Auction worthy if I am lucky, the large majority of my collection would most probably be relegated to the back pages of the Heritage catalogue or be pushed off to one of their lower profile Sunday auctions.  Strongly doubt that I would be calling the shots and having much say here when it comes to Heritage.

 

Dean, my collection was nowhere close to either Berk's or Verzyl's collection, and I didn't have to make any commitments about selling my entire collection through Heritage to get very good terms that gave me a lot of control.  For example, one of my standard terms is that any auction I'm consigning to can contain no book that is within 2 grades of a book that I'm consigning, and they totally honor this term.  I once pointed out that the auction previews showed a 9.0 copy of a 9.4 book that I was consigning, and a day later the 9.0 copy was gone. 

If you're still so unconfident of your ability to get decent terms, you can always sell through a Heritage client who does have good terms.  You don't even need to ship directly to the Heritage client, just ship directly to Heritage with the client's account number.  Of course, the sale proceeds will have to pass through the client.   

[HENRYSPENCER]

2 hours ago, tth2 said:

Why would the bid increment stay the same if the BP has gone up?

Now that the BP is 20% rather than 19.5%, guess what, my bids will be 0.5% lower. 

Higher BPs are enemies only of mathematically illiterate buyers.

Because bid increments are independent of the buyers premium.  The BP is tacked on to the final hammer price at auctions end.  Knowing how Heritage computes their prices realized in their sold items archive might not appear so obvious because for every bid they lump BP in and show what you're going to pay in total, but in reality, you're paying BP on top of the final bid.  With the majority of the other auction houses there is a final bid, then they tack on a separate line item for the BP when you pay the final invoice.  Heritage does this differently.

[HENRYSPENCER]

2 hours ago, tth2 said:

Dean, my collection was nowhere close to either Berk's or Verzyl's collection, and I didn't have to make any commitments about selling my entire collection through Heritage to get very good terms that gave me a lot of control.  For example, one of my standard terms is that any auction I'm consigning to can contain no book that is within 2 grades of a book that I'm consigning, and they totally honor this term.  I once pointed out that the auction previews showed a 9.0 copy of a 9.4 book that I was consigning, and a day later the 9.0 copy was gone. 

If you're still so unconfident of your ability to get decent terms, you can always sell through a Heritage client who does have good terms.  You don't even need to ship directly to the Heritage client, just ship directly to Heritage with the client's account number.  Of course, the sale proceeds will have to pass through the client.   

It sounds like you got some favorable terms.  Perhaps you are underestimating the magnitude of your collection! One of their consignment directors told me over dinner at a convention negotiations for his division started around six figures.  I've never consigned anything with Heritage but have heard some horror stories such as promising uneducated sellers items will sell for $X and the item only selling for a fraction of the stated amount and refusing to take high dollar items without letting Heritage set the reserve.  I've never looked at the underwriting on one of their consignment forms to see exactly what it spells out. 

[adamstrange]

10 hours ago, HENRYSPENCER said:

One of their consignment directors told me over dinner at a convention negotiations for his division started around six figures.

The divisions are different, with, for example, the comic BP being considerably less than that of the art BP.  The comics division is very aware that they have two successful competitors offering standard 10% commission.