REA Losses
 

We always have threads about major auction house wins. This one is for losses. I really thought I had a good chance at the N142 Duke cabinet of George Davis, which happens to be his rookie card. It was at $1,000 at the start of the day. It went for $4,700 plus the premium/penalty. The next bid, with the premium and tax would have been $6,200, so I dropped out. I'll probably regret it tomorrow, but my wife's happy I didn't spend the money.

I have all the 57 Topps HOFer rookies minus the Brooks. I have been watching one of the PSA 7s. I ended up placing a bid of $1250. At $1250, with buyer's premium and taxes, it would come out to slightly over what the last few comps sold for on eBay. It was a nice example, so I was ok paying a bit over the comps. Enter the dreaded extended bidding. The card ended up selling for $1400. I stuck to my $1250. At $1400, with taxes, buyer's premium, shipping, $1850. I just wasn't willing to pay that much


I wonder if REA auctions in general realize higher prices for cards, just because as a well known and advertised auction house, it gets more foot traffic and consequently more competition as opposed to some smaller auctions, i.e., Sterling.

Yeah…i was eyeing that too and dropped out earlier than you. It had paper loss on his face. Still a nice tough card. Oh well. I did win the Nash.

Congrats on winning the Nash! I was surprised how close in price the Nash and Davis were early in the day. But they finished far apart.

Believe they definitely get higher prices on many cards. Well run top notch AH,
and to many bidders it’s an honor to win something with them. Validation they are playing in the big leagues.

Holy prices... The bids late day Sunday and into live auction to move the prices...my goodness

One Ruth 4k moved to over 20k

Crazy numbers again, just when you thought things were slowing

I see absolutely no signs of softening prices for the vintage stuff I collect.

All losses here. I need more money LOL....
.

And just because I don't want to feel left out here is an REA when from 4/1/21.

Bingo...you are paying an REA premium.

All loses here also. And interesting that many prices seemed low going into extended time and seemed low most of extended and they popped more than they normally do

Oh Well on to the next auction and so many there are this month

0 for 4. I thought I had a real nice T206 Mathewson white cap PSA 4.5 at well below market but just above what I could afford til about 12:30 a.m. Was feeling hopeful, but then, bupkis. I'll keep putting my bids out there because you never know when lightning might strike.

0 for 6 here.....

Bid on several of the T206 Lots - all went way higher than I was willing to pay

REA is pretty much always more work and $$ than it's worth

1952 Mickey Mantle Card in a PSA 5
 

I lost out on the 1952 Mantle card in a PSA 5 (early on!) but still tracked it. What I found strange was that the last bid on August 3 ended up being the WINNING bid. Does anyone have any insights as to why active bidding stopped 10 days before the auction ended? The card ended up going for $126,000 with buyer's premium. Thanks.

I was watching a Harry Heilmann single signed ball. Early Sunday bid was under a grand. PSA pricing for a single is $6500 so I expected it to go up significantly. I checked around 8:00 PM and bid was $1800. I never looked again until this morning to see the close. $42K. All I can say is WOW. It is rare but you can get a Ruth single in similar condition for that money. Two HOF single collectors with unlimited funds who had to have it must have gotten into a bidding war. I expect the underbidder may be happy he lost but who knows.

0 for 3 for me! Not even the bridesmaid for any…

Because no one else bid.
.

Might put up a Craiglist ad, to sell one of my kidneys, just to be able to finish out my low grade, Mantle, career run.

+1. The card got to its market-perceived FMV early and nobody wanted to pay more for it. I was watching the card and almost bid on it, as I thought it was very well centered. But ultimately, I did not like the surface issues and I want higher grade if/when I buy one. Ultimately, I the card sold in the (lower) range of where I comped it, and clearly at fair market value for itself. No shortage of 52 mantles out there.

I won one card, and I paid heavy for it. In general, I think prices were strong. A few good deals existed (the t206 green Cobb psa 5.5, for example), but most things ended at or above (and in many cases, far above) where I comped them.
Clearly the rare and high grade stuff is commanding significant premiums

0-6 on my end. Even the easier to find cards were going for a premium compared to recent comps.

The big ticket items went big, but I actually thought there were some fair prices on a lot of things. No deal deals, but fair prices.

I put in my max autobids, went to bed at a reasonable hour and was naturally outbid on all. My days of staying awake until stupid o'clock are behind me.

With this auction format, you tend to see one of two approaches:

1) everyone gets in an initial bid just to throw their hat in the ring, but nothing really happens until the last day, with most of the action happening in extended bidding. In these cases, the price often stays crazy low. You get to the last day and you get all frisky thinking you might pick up a great deal on it. Until that last day rolls around or even until the last minute when 2 or more bidders finally max out on what they’re really willing to pay. The price might double or even jump 10x in extended bidding.

2) a few bidders go nuts early. A couple of bidders decide they really don’t want to wait, so they start their bidding war when there are still days or weeks left on the clock. The price goes to the moon, and eventually one of those bidders gives up. Over the next couple of weeks, the rest of the interested bidders decide it’s just not worth going any higher. So it never moves again, and closes at that price.

While approach #1 definitely seems the most common from what I’ve seen, approach #2 happens maybe 2% of the time? I suppose there’s also a hybrid approach, when it looks like approach #2, but then in extended bidding, some bidders get their second wind and decide they can keep the party going a bit longer until there’s only one poor fool left standing.

Reminds me of the quote from Highlander: “There can be only one!”

Brilliant thread title and very apropos.

I am pleased to say that I lost out on a Goudey Ruth despite bidding very high. Unfortunately, though, I won a Mantle card.

Do we know who won the Doyle?

I won the green 5.5 and still can't believe it didn't trade for more!

As for losses, I lost on a few of the southern leaguer upgrades I was hoping to snag. They went very strong. Some deals out there last night but also some stuff that went pretty heavy, I thought.

I won 19 lots!

Although there was plenty of good stuff, there wasn't much on my primary wish list. I suppose that's more a function of my relatively narrow wish list than anything. My continuing desire to keep most of my powder dry could be another element.

I put in a couple of bids on pieces that I was interested in, but only at the right price. About a week ago they exceeded my price, and I cravenly scurried away without even making a token effort in extended bidding.

I also watched the Mick. IMHO the white specs in the blue sky background and possible slight paper loss on his face under magnification lead me to think the $126K is the max this card could be worth and did not command a higher price because it didn't deserve one. Any leaning toward a 150K+ on this one would have been purely based on buying the grade (5) and not the card and its eye appeal, which in this case, could have worked against its slotted value.

I won the Killer 49 Jackie Robinson SGC 8 I'm so pumped !!!!

Congrats Troy. That was a steal. I almost went after it purely for trade or resale bc it went so cheap. Now you may pass me on the registry!

Jeff, 19 lots. Wow. Congrats.

I thought I was a little crazy bidding 7K (before fees) on a SGC 1 1888 Goodwin Champions Cap Anson. It finished at 9K.

Mostly clean front, notable paper loss on the back...still, wow.

A PSA 3 went for $25,800. Phew...

Thanks! I thought so as well and expected to pay quite a bit more for it. I also stole the Demmitt PSA 4 although I don't love the card. I put a bid on it and it held. Didn't see that coming...haha!

As for the registry placement, I'm not smart enough to realize upgrading commons from 5s to 6s and 6s to 7s is a monumental waste of money and time. Maybe you can talk some sense in me so I don't keep buying commons...haha!

the 1 kelly was equally wow

That card is a BEAST!

Lost out on Andy Cooper. I was hoping 3-4K. Not close.

I wouldn't consider it a "loss", but I was interested in two lots of T206 raw offbacks that I thought had considerable breakup value. They ended up going for much more than I'd have spent.

Only 1 win for me, an Evers T205 Cycle. Its a nicer copy than I needed and I may have overpaid, but I've only seen 3 graded copies in my T205 survey, so I figured I may as well grab this one, because who knows when the next one will surface.

The only card I ended up picking up was the Exhibits Hack Wilson. I have been meaning to add a card of his to my pre-war HOF run and this was a nice example. Paid a bit more than I wanted to but it wasn't outrageously over what I had planned to spend. The Grimes though, that one shocked me, at $2400. I recently purchased a handful of 1921s HOFers directly from a dealer/collector in similar grades of the Grimes, 5s and 6s, for a fraction of what the Grimes went for.

0 for 31

Re: REA Losses
 

Won one small lot. Underbidder on the T3s. Was high with about eight increments to spare when I went to bed. Not even slightly shocked to get outbid.

Ed,

I was about to pull the trigger on a bid at 5k on the T3's at midnight, waited 10 seconds and the lot had moved two bids, waited a few more minutes and it had moved 3k, shut the lap top and called it a night, never even got a bid squeezed in between the fast moving action.

I was the high bidder on this J Wood Dorgan. I went in wanting to buy this and/or the DOGS HEAD. Both were a good deal I thought. I think I was 2nd underbidder on the DH.

I bid on other stuff that I didn't go after, which is not really losing. Losing is when you bid and bid and the other guy keeps bidding and bidding.

Mick
 

Had my eyes on the 1953 Stahl-Meyer Mick. Pretty scarce in that condition!

https://www.collectorfocus.com/image.../84746/mantle6

Nothing for me in REA, but I was the first under bidder on this Type 1 photo of WaJo on which I bid than I ever thought I would bid on a photo: https://bid.robertedwardauctions.com...?itemid=152849
I wanted this photo because it's an early photo of WaJo and because this photo was used for WaJo's Baseball Bats card and for WaJo's Fatima Poster (pictured in the Standard Catalog of Vintage BB Cards), both of which I have examples in my WaJo collection. The Fatima Poster shows all of the background that is in the photo, whereas the Baseball Batts card shows only WaJo's image. I'd love to find out who outbid me for this photo.

Thanks. But wow, i went to bed with the Delahanty at $24k, closed at $45k!! Hope that bodes well for mine, though i would like to buy the other two to complete instead of selling it any time soon.

Was going hard after the 1914 CJ Cobb, it went one bid over my budget.

https://i.ibb.co/cYzrYCr/Screen-Shot...2-13-26-AM.png

Ha, me too! The lot of 23, right? I gave some serious thought to a ~$5k bid a little before midnight as well, then thought better of it. It was at $8,500 just minutes later. If the buyer of that lot is reading this, I'm interested in the Walsh, Wallace, and Brown ;)

I did manage one pick up, the cheapest T3 'No Offer' of the auction, but missed out on many others.

Was after the D304 Wagner SGC 3. I maxed out at $9k and it sold for $11,700.

I'm surprised at the prices of the two N162 Ansons. Not long ago I picked up a PSA 2 for significantly less than the SGC 1.

True…but then i have been surprised at the card NOT appreciating more in the recent run in vintage given its beauty and difficulty.

And random thought, but The D304 Wagner is really an ugly card with a bad likeness, i love the set but not that card so much. Maybe I am just jealous that I dont own one!?

As you might expect, I went hard after the Exhibit Nagurski but it sold for 2x my high estimate and I just wasn't comfortable chasing it. I was high bidder until OT and out within an hour. I also missed out on the Wood cabinet card collection of 18 boxers. Went to about 2x my max.

I did snipe a 1973 Topps hockey set for break-up and resale. So yay for that.

Enjoyed the chase on some cool lots. I lost the bottom row items with some spirited OT bidding but out lasted some night owls on the top row. Glad to get a 1928 Lou Gehrig sheet for under 2k and the Wright N173 has been one of my favorites for a long time. I think the 15 minute per lot close works really well as most bidders are ready to bid come midnight Eastern Time.

Nice pickup on the Wright JC!

The SGC 7 last sold for $83k. This was an absolute steal!