Auction houses vs. Ebay

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Posted By: Anson

Do you feel that vintage cards realize better sale prices on Ebay or through auction houses? I understand that large specific lots and specialty items probably do better with the big houses. But, I'm looking at more on a card by card basis.

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Posted By: warshawlaw

Net: If an auctioneer charges you 15% and a bidder 15%, that is a 30% hit on the sale price. Ebay charges are well under 10%. So, the question is whether the auction house can deliver value in excess of the differential. IMHO on most items the answer is "no" for established sellers, "maybe" for unknown sellers. Everyone here devours ebay listings; it is rare for anything of real value to escape our attention unless it is misidentified, mislisted or hidden. Ebay has had many high-end card sales, so I would not hesitate to place individual cards there rather than in an auction. However, ebay is hit and miss, especially in crowded categories. I've had stuff I did not think would sell go for big bucks and stuff I thought would sell in a heartbeat sit there untouched.

Control: I am a control freak. I do not like handing my stuff over to a third party and ceding control to them. I like the control of setting my own timing, price, reserve and terms.

Time: Ebay is a do-it-yourself operation; you list it, monitor it, collect the money, send the card, deal with all the risks, etc. If you have a lot to sell, Ebay is a tedious process. What's your time worth to you?

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Posted By: Alan

I agree with Adam. Fortunately or unfortunately, ebay hasn't put 40+ auction houses out of business.

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Posted By: davidcycleback

My two fears with consigning to big auction houses is that the items won't align with their audience and that the auction house will group the items not to my liking.

More than half of the more expensive non-sport items I sell are bought internationally, and eBay is a good way to sell internationally. I might get a better international audience than I would consigning to Mastro. On eBay I sold a photograph to the founder of Sotheby's photograph department in London. I would guess he doesn't receive the Mastro catalog.

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Posted By: Harry Wallace (HW)

I agree with what warshawlaw said, except the numbers can be a little deceiving. A 15% buyer's and seller's premium adds up to 26% - if the items hammers for $100 the bidder pays $115 and the seller gets $85 which is 74%.

I would have a hard time giving up control of the item, but I certainly do not have the time to be running auctions on ebay by myself either. I guess it comes down to whether or not how active you want to be with the sale process.

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Posted By: JimB

I think it a lot depends on the card you are selling. If it is a high-end card in terms of value or rarity, chances are it will do better in a big auction house because a lot of the people in the market for those cards are not patrolling ebay. If it is a low to mid-grade T206 or something along those lines, then ebay is probably better for the seller. I think there are a lot of variables to consider and blanket statements tend to make black and white what is by nature grey. The big auction houses thrive for a reason. The buyers have the security that the items have been examined by real experts in the hobby and that if there is a problem found down the line they have some recourse. That said, some trusted names probably do well selling high-end cards on ebay. I am thinking of someone like Greg Busineau at Legacy Rarities who has been selling high-grade cards for years. He can sell PSA 8 T206s, etc. and get good prices for them on ebay. But for the super-rarities, I still think the major auction houses are the way to go. Look at the fiasco a few months back when the T210 Jackson was (sort of) offered. There were a bunch of insincere bids and nobody knew if the seller was even serious about selling. I am not in the market for a 100k+ card, but if I was, I would not want to have to deal with that sort of b.s.
JimB

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Posted By: Hal Lewis

Was the EBay T210 Jackson one of the two that is now up for auction??


I remember saying that I thought the seller had put it on EBay with a high reserve solely to "publicize" the card for future purposes...

so I wonder if this was indeed the case?

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Posted By: Zach Rice

No, the neither T210-8 Jacksons up for sale right now are the PSA 2 that was put on ebay. You can look at scans of the PSA 2, the one that was put on ebay, and compare it to the SGC 40 and PSA 5 and it is clearly neither of them. Personally I think the best looking graded one is the other PSA 2.