So...auction house endings....

Doug · #1 05-04-2009, 09:04 AM

Couldn't they just put an end time on the extended bidding? If the auction ends at 4 PM why can't they just say extended bidding ends at midnight or something like that?

martyogelvie · #2 05-04-2009, 09:07 AM

Weekends make perfect sense (Saturday preferred). I suppose if there were a item that I had to have, I would stay up as long as need be but to date, no such item has surfaced!!!

calvindog · #3 05-04-2009, 09:18 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Doug

Couldn't they just put an end time on the extended bidding? If the auction ends at 4 PM why can't they just say extended bidding ends at midnight or something like that?

The problem is that Rob wants to make money for himself and his consignors. I won an item that hadn't had a bid put in for three weeks -- and I put my bid in at 2:43 am, as last as possible for obvious reasons. And because I saw so many bids still coming in per minute I knew full well that the auction would not close before 3 am. If Rob closed the lots one at at time the problem of the late ending for the auction would disappear -- but so would a lot of money for him and his consignors and no one should expect that. The longest gap between bids during the extended bidding period was only 2 minutes I believe -- and that happened like once or twice at the most. So even changing to a 2 minute clock would still keep us up all night. He can't force people to bid earlier and to penalize late bidding would only harm him and his consignors.

I suppose one way to deal with this is to close all lots valued at say $2000 or less with a real 15 minute clock after midnight or so. Then at least we'd be able to focus on a significantly less amount of lots and perhaps the intense bidding would end more quickly if the "recent bid" information showed slower bidding. I can't blame the guy for making us all stay up late one night a year when you consider that he's running a business to make money and he's got a $10 million auction running.

Doug · #4 05-04-2009, 09:44 AM

The "will you make it to the end" poll during the auction was 29-26 for no, so there probably are some bids that aren't being placed by people that don't want to stay up all night. I hope someday there is a solution that works for everyone, but until then I guess I'll just have to keep going to bed with my max bids in place and hope for the best.

Exhibitman · #5 05-04-2009, 05:07 PM

I did not enjoy the endless bidding in REA. It gets a bit ridiculous, frankly, for 1500 lots to sit all night open for more bids, with everyone on pins and needles, simply because a few lots are competitively bid. If everything is open until the end, why bother having an extended period? Why not just set a firm closing time and be done with it?

Of all the systems I've seen thus far I've liked Heritage's the best. They had a firm ending time for the auction. If you were the sole bidder on the lot, it closed. All other lots closed 30 minutes after the auction close on an individual basis and only bidders who had put in a bid on it before the close could bid in the extended period. That way, if the lot had no more action after the initial close, it closed 30 minutes after the designated close time. If someone bid on it during the extended period, the lot extended again, but not the whole auction. I found that really helpful since I could watch my lots close in real time and on seeing which ones I got topped on, decide whether to make further incremental bids on other lots.

sox1903wschamp · #6 05-04-2009, 05:18 PM

Matt,

Thanks for clarifying that. As Jeff said, I am not sure the masses could understand this closing style but in theory it makes sense.

And I am not sure the auction would close sooner and could have the potential to go way past 3 or 4am if just one lot is vastly underbidded at 10am and the bidders "slow play" the lot through 25-30 bids after 10pm.

Matt · #7 05-04-2009, 05:21 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by sox1903wschamp

And I am not sure the auction would close sooner and could have the potential to go way past 3 or 4am if just one lot is vastly underbidded at 10pm and the bidders "slow play" the lot through 25-30 bids after 10pm.

Mike - I don't think that could happen - even if two competing bidders colluded beforehand to do that, what would stop someone else from coming in and becoming high bidder (especially if the lot was that undervalued)? (~~If that happened then only the underbidder could counter and the other fellow would be done.~~)

Actually I'd bet things wrapped up quickly with this method. To start with the pool of active bidders would only be those who were outbid in the last 20 minutes of the auction and it would dwindle from there as those people decided not to up their bids nor bid on other lots.

sox1903wschamp · #8 05-04-2009, 05:35 PM

Matt,

Okay, so the key here is only the underbidder has a shot....If your going toe to toe with someone and you are outbid and before you can place another bid, someone else who is qualified jumps in with another bid, then you are toast after 10pm even if 20 minutes has not elapsed. Correct?

asphaltman · #9 05-04-2009, 09:44 AM

I haven't seen any good reason yet not to have two extended bidding sessions. Again, end the auction on Friday at 4pm, start extended bidding...stop it at 12 midnight by freezing all lots. Start it back Saturday at noon or 4pm or whatever.

Matt · #10 05-04-2009, 09:46 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by asphaltman

I haven't seen any good reason yet not to have two extended bidding sessions. Again, end the auction on Friday at 4pm, start extended bidding...stop it at 12 midnight by freezing all lots. Start it back Saturday at noon or 4pm or whatever.

Dave - I think the reason is that no one would bid in the first one - everyone would probably hold their bid until as late as they can.

barrysloate · #11 05-04-2009, 11:53 AM

Fact is ebay has come up with the only system that allows auctions to end in a timely matter- that is ending at a predetermined time that is known to all bidders. Could this be implemented into a catalog auction?

Obviously Rob couldn't pull the plug at 1:00 AM or 2:00 AM arbitrarily because he would of course leave oodles of money on the table. But what if he instituted a rule that qualifying bids had to be in by 4:00 PM and the auction would automatically shut down at midnight? If everybody had that information, wouldn't every bidder be on an equal playing field? And couldn't anyone leave a ceiling before midnight if he still had some room left up to his maximum?

This would not be a perfect system, but either is one where bidding first begins to intensify ten hours after the initial close. No system is perfect, including the one presently in place.

Abravefan11 · #12 05-04-2009, 12:10 PM

The problem with the fixed closing time is the sniping. Most collectors would wait until the final moments of the auction and submit their max bid. This leaves no time for them to get swept up into the auction and bid beyond what their original max might have been.

I agree with Barry that no system would be perfect.

But if the auction has to end sometime, why not a decent hour?

I like the idea of freezing the auction on midnight Sat and then resuming it sometime Sunday with the policy that it could end at anytime.

barrysloate · #13 05-04-2009, 12:44 PM

Tim- agreed, it would cause a major logjam at the end. But ebay has done it since its inception, and it has worked fine. I know, however, that bidders would lose some flexibility and not be able to jump from lot to lot.

There needs to be a way to disqualify bidders who don't even start to bid until 3:00 AM. Maybe a rule that if you haven't placed any new bids between 4:00 PM and midnight you cannot bid after midnight. Anything to force them to start earlier would be a better system.