[Archive]

Posted By: Cat

It's worse than 20%. The total fees are often over 40% of what you receive as a consignor. The buyers premium is 20% of the sales price - $200 on a $1,000 item - and the consignors fee is 15% of the sales price. You will commonly as a consignor, if not negotiated down, receive 85% of the $1,000. Thus, as a consignor you receive $850. The buyer pays $1,200. The Auction House keeps the $350 (41.2% of what the consigor receives).

This has always made me stop, with great pause, in regard to what I offer people on high dollar items. I have had a great desire to own a Cobb with Cobb back. The last two at Auction Houses (that I know of) went for almost identical prices. The SGC 20 in Mastro (about a year ago) closed at $24,655. The buyer paid slightly less than $29,000 and the seller received slightly less than $21,000 (the 15% fee possibly negotiated down). So what's a fair offer to a holder of such a card? Well people tend not to take anything in the middle of what the buyer pays and the seller receives as a fair offer. I beleive that many people fail to realize that in order to reach a return of $29,000 or greater (in the above example), they will have to sell it for $41,000 or greater (including vig) at an auction house.

But after all is said...this Auction House cost topic is still very old news.