Heritage Buyers Premium

[sb1]

It was on the top of their auction page listings a couple of weeks ago. Hard to believe no one commented until now...

[raulus]

Worth every penny, and a bargain at twice the price!

Hard to imagine many of the high rollers bidding there are scared off by the extra 2%.

Or will even be bothered to adjust their max bids downward by 2% to account for the extra juice.

[oldjudge]

At the end of the day it means nothing to buyers who can adjust their bids accordingly. Who might be impacted though are consignors who negotiated BP rebates before the bump. I wonder if they will see a 2 percentage point increase to their rebate to make up for this.

[samosa4u]

Originally Posted by sb1

It was on the top of their auction page listings a couple of weeks ago. Hard to believe no one commented until now...

People here normally don't criticise auction houses because they don't want to get the boot !!

[Lorewalker]

I did not notice but that is because I do not care. If a house wants to charge 72% I am fine with it. It all gets taken into account before I place my bids.

[oldjudge]

I think we all take the buyers premium into account when we bid but with a higher premium do we still end up pay more for cards--I think so. For example, let's say there is a card coming up that you want. Let's say you are willing to pay $1000 for it. The current bid is at $750 and the next bump is to $800, do you make the bump? At a 20% BP the total is $960, which is under $1000 so you bid. At a 22% buyers premium the total $976 so you also still bid, but now because of the change in BP you have paid (assuming you win the card) $16 more. Maybe at times the higher BP results in the bid exceeding the person's cutoff while the lower BP would have allowed for a bump. While theoretically possible I think most bidders have a little flex in their cap and therefore, I think in most cases the higher BP just results in more money spent on the same card. Because of this my preference is always to favor the auction house with the lower BP.

[calvindog]

Originally Posted by oldjudge

I think we all take the buyers premium into account when we bid but with a higher premium do we still end up pay more for cards--I think so. For example, let's say there is a card coming up that you want. Let's say you are willing to pay $1000 for it. The current bid is at $750 and the next bump is to $800, do you make the bump? At a 20% BP the total is $960, which is under $1000 so you bid. At a 22% buyers premium the total $976 so you also still bid, but now because of the change in BP you have paid (assuming you win the card) $16 more. Maybe at times the higher BP results in the bid exceeding the person's cutoff while the lower BP would have allowed for a bump. While theoretically possible I think most bidders have a little flex in their cap and therefore, I think in most cases the higher BP just results in more money spent on the same card. Because of this my preference is always to favor the auction house with the lower BP.

Of course this will increase the costs to bidders in the heat of the moment bidding, as we all know. But Goldin going to 22% ensured that other houses would follow. I think Heritage was the first to go to 20% and they haven't had an increase in about ten years is my guess. Of course, their gross sales have quintupled probably since then so I suspect they'd be fine without raising the BP 2 points.

[Exhibitman]

Originally Posted by calvindog

Of course this will increase the costs to bidders in the heat of the moment bidding, as we all know. But Goldin going to 22% ensured that other houses would follow. I think Heritage was the first to go to 20% and they haven't had an increase in about ten years is my guess. Of course, their gross sales have quintupled probably since then so I suspect they'd be fine without raising the BP 2 points.

Spot on, Jeff.

The buyers who are on a budget will adjust; the rest won't. The real losers here are consignors. I'd venture a guess that only a small % of card consignors actually pay a consignment % to the AH. With so much zero consignment fee stuff, it is a way of taking another 2% out of sellers' pockets. Makes sense that they feel good doing it given that the average eBay fees are creeping up to the point where DIY selling is nearly as expensive as consigning at 20% BP.

[Rhotchkiss]

I think this is 100% the result of consignors having leverage and taking larger and larger pieces of the BP. Over the past 3-4 years, for high quality stuff most AHs would give -5% to -10% of the hammer (a quarter to half the BP); really great stuff gets even better terms. I think in order to compete, that amount has recently shifted to -7% to -12% and now that’s being passed through. So I am not sure it comes out of the consignors pocket, but the AH certainly ain’t taking the hit.

Nobody says you have to consign. Plus, it’s noteworthy that the BP on almost every other type of auction is 25%…

[darwinbulldog]

Originally Posted by oldjudge

I think we all take the buyers premium into account when we bid but with a higher premium do we still end up pay more for cards--I think so. For example, let's say there is a card coming up that you want. Let's say you are willing to pay $1000 for it. The current bid is at $750 and the next bump is to $800, do you make the bump? At a 20% BP the total is $960, which is under $1000 so you bid. At a 22% buyers premium the total $976 so you also still bid, but now because of the change in BP you have paid (assuming you win the card) $16 more. Maybe at times the higher BP results in the bid exceeding the person's cutoff while the lower BP would have allowed for a bump. While theoretically possible I think most bidders have a little flex in their cap and therefore, I think in most cases the higher BP just results in more money spent on the same card. Because of this my preference is always to favor the auction house with the lower BP.

If the most I'm willing to pay for a card at Heritage is $1,000, the most I would bid is $1,000 -7% sales tax -$25 shipping -22% buyers' premium, so the most I would bid is $745. Previously (i.e., with a 20% buyers' premium) I would have been happy to place the $750 bid, but in this case I would not. But the key issue that isn't addressed in your post is that the high bids you're invited to top now will be systematically lower than they previously would have been because the other bidders are making the same calculations that I and the rest of us are, whereas it's just sort of implicit in your presentation that the identical $750 leading bid is sitting there waiting to be topped regardless of what the buyers' premium for the auction is.

[ullmandds]

Originally Posted by Lorewalker

I did not notice but that is because I do not care. If a house wants to charge 72% I am fine with it. It all gets taken into account before I place my bids.

While I feel similarly...you won't win many desirable cards with this montre!

[Ray Van]

Originally Posted by Lorewalker

I did not notice but that is because I do not care. If a house wants to charge 72% I am fine with it. It all gets taken into account before I place my bids.

If you did not notice it, you could not have taken it into account before placing your bids. Just sayin'

[Beercan collector]

show dealers with “ auction prices” Starting to look like bargains

[Balticfox]

Originally Posted by samosa4u

People here normally don't criticise auction houses because they don't want to get the boot !!

Don't count me among the wimps or faint of heart. Whoever gets my criticism whenever it's due!



Incidentally, has anyone on this board been blacklisted from an auction house for criticism? This is your opportunity to embarrass whichever!

I recall that Mastronet sent me one of their spam emails about how great/fantastic their next auction was going to be circa 2004. I responded with a sarcastic remark. Well William Mastro banned me from their bidding list in response. After a few years one of us was convicted of fraud and sent to jail.

[raulus]

Originally Posted by Balticfox

Incidentally, has anyone on this board been blacklisted from an auction house for criticism? This is your opportunity to embarrass whichever!

Pretty sure Snowman was recently banned after some posts around here about one of the major AHs, when the scan in the online listing didn't reflect the creases in the card he actually received.

As always seems to happen, things escalated quickly.

Somewhat differently, I had a rather public beef here with another major AH, when they sent me fakes. They didn’t ban me, but based on my experience with their leadership, I self selected out of bidding on their stuff going forward.

[Touch'EmAll]

FWIW - I just printed out my eBay report for last year. Selling costs plus eBay fees plus shipping amounted to 25.03% of gross sales plus shipping - more than I thought.

[Exhibitman]

Originally Posted by Touch'EmAll

FWIW - I just printed out my eBay report for last year. Selling costs plus eBay fees plus shipping amounted to 25.03% of gross sales plus shipping - more than I thought.

To compare different platforms for selling, I recalculate eBay's numbers to remove all of the shipping and sales taxes on both sides of the equation. I want to isolate the gross sales price received on the items and the net amount I receive to determine the % of my item that is being chewed up with costs. For example, I had a card sell for $68 and I netted $60.66. Those are the only two numbers I want. The rest is noise.

[tjisonline]

Memory lane with a 1933 160 Goudey Gehrig PSA 1. Snowman was 100% correct in this case. The card ended up being relisted in their infamous May 4, 2024 auction w/ proper + transparent pictures & description that time. Naturally, it’s sold for less the second time around ($3,763 vs $2,546)

Jan 11 2024 auction
https://memorylaneinc.com/site/bids/...e?itemid=80061

May 4, 2024 auction
https://memorylaneinc.com/site/bids/...e?itemid=82822

Originally Posted by raulus

Pretty sure Snowman was recently banned after some posts around here about one of the major AHs, when the scan in the online listing didn't reflect the creases in the card he actually received.

As always seems to happen, things escalated quickly.

Somewhat differently, I had a rather public beef here with another major AH, when they sent me fakes. They didn’t ban me, but based on my experience with their leadership, I self selected out of bidding on their stuff going forward.

[conor912]

Originally Posted by samosa4u

People here normally don't criticise auction houses because they don't want to get the boot !! m[/IMG]

Haven’t you heard? Getting banned for expressing a dissenting opinion is the new American way.

[Touch'EmAll]

Agree with the thought that this will tend to hurt consignors more than buyers - although everyone calls it a "buyers premium".

If most buyers have a max bid price in mind, they will simply lower their bid to account for the increase in BP. Ultimate loser is seller whose hammer price has now been lowered.