Posted By:
Fred CTalk about the house running up bids on auctions because of house reserves...
I remember a Superior Sports Card auction a year or two ago. They had reserves on many lots and they didn't bother to let anyone know about the reserves. Had I known about the reserves I would have bid on what was reasonable to me. Instead I bid on multiple lots. Some of those lots I was high bidder when the auction seemed to close. It was odd because in this particular auction there were about 180 lots that had cards that interested me. Luckily, they kept their bids on three or four different pages and I was able to save the closing bids on all the lots that interested me. Soon after the auction closed I figure about 50%-60% of the cards had zero dollar bids. Then shortly there after I found out it was because they had hidden reserves. I was a bit unhappy but I took the two cards I did win. I thought it was kind of cheesey that the auction house had you chasing a number. To me it would have been better if they just put up a minimum bid that was high rather than run the auction the way they did.
I don't know if the house bid up the cards but somebody did. Maybe they just let the bidders do the work and decided to just not sell what didn't meet the minimum price they put on the lot. Oddly enough, months after that auction the auction house consigned the cards to a few different ebay dealers. Most of the remaining cards were sold via that outlet.