When you lose an auction lot by one notch … grrrr.

Is there any truth that some of these large auction houses like Heritage engage in shill bidding with their auctions.

 

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I have no idea, but it would be foolish to risk their reputation on a few more dollars made at auction.
I'm pretty sure they do alright with the way the auction platform and fee schedule is now.

 

When money is involved I don't put anything past anybody.
Greed is a human failing.

 

Legally I think any auction house has to state that they allow shill bidding. So to answer your question for a specific auction company you should pour through their documentation or ask them directly. From what I can find, Heritage has been sued a couple times over allegations of this, but I don't know the results of those lawsuits.

 

I don’t know if it’s really shill bidding, but if you read the fine print, most auction houses state that they can bid on coins. They may do this to add to their inventory but may do it to protect the interests of the consignor. It’s sort of like an unstated reserve. I had an auction house do this for me. They saw the coin wasn’t getting decent bids, so bid and won the coin at a low price and placed it in the next auction where it sold at a good price (for me) from an outside bidder. I got the hammer price from that auction.

For important clients, auction houses may bid and win for other reasons. I recall in one of the Pogue auctions, Pogue decided he wanted to keep a coin that was going up for auction. So, Stack’s Bowers bid it up until they won it and then turned it over to Pogue.

Cal

 

As long as the bidders know that there's auction bid manipulation going on , then I guess it's all good.

 

What's the point of an auction if "bid manipulation" is allowed?
It sounds illegal and should be. Look if the guy doesn't get the price he wants, that's why there is a "reserve".

 

I just went 0 for 5 in a Heritage auction. I came in second on four of them. I based my bids on the PCGS price guidelines, which are full retail and higher than almost all of the auction results in recent years. I had another lot where my bid was tied, but since I was the second bid received, I didn't get it.

There were no CAC approved coins among any of the pieces for which I placed a bid. They were far from the finest graded. In other words, there was nothing truly special about any of them.

I hate auctions. They are no fun. I have come in second constantly, and I am sick of it.

People think I'm crazy, but I'd rather pay more to a dealer and get the item than mess with an auction.

 

I always put my max bid in, if I loose by 1 bid, so be it.
Their are always others.

 

I don't think you're crazy. Auctions can certainly be frustrating and it's particularly so when one finds oneself to be the underbidder consistently. And I agree that there are some very good reasons to buy in-person from a dealer instead of an on-line auction.

But here's the way I get around at least some of that for on-line live auctions:

Decide what's the absolute most I will pay for the coin after doing my research. In other words, I decide before the auction how much over, if any, so-called "book" the coin is worth to me. That "book" is all of the pricing resources that are available for the particular coin.

While I will put in a proxy bid well before the live auction, that is only a place-holder to make sure I don't somehow miss it when the auction goes live. If I truly want a coin then I never put in a proxy bid and then don't follow up in live bidding. I'll do that for "meh" coins but I don't pursue those much anymore.

Then I follow the auction live. Now, this is a pain when Heritage, for example, has 500 or more lots to get through. And I understand why some people don't want to, or cannot, devote the time for this. But with genuine live bidding such as Heritage and Stack's conduct, you can almost never be outbid so long as you are willing to pay up the next increment or cut bid.

Then during live bidding, I stand alert and ready to make my bids quickly. My paper cheat sheet is beside me with the coin, lot number and maximum bid clearly written in the order they come up in the auction.

I also strategize my bidding depending on the priority of the coins to me which is particularly important since I usually have a total dollar limit for the auction.

 

John Milton I would watch future auctions for all of these second place bids.
Because if the same items come up again, then you are being jacked. And I would bid even lower than the 1st time.
The problem DWhiz by putting in your maximum bid, if someone wants it, they will snipe bid program it and you will lose by a dollar.

 

You only want to over pay for a coin that you MUST have and won't be able to get anywhere else for a long time. Otherwise you are being gouged.

 

It seems to me that the concept of "overpaying" actually only applies to the commodity trade. And, face it, most of the coins we collect fall into that category. Most are neither truly rare either absolutely or conditionally - we merely have to wait for the one we like to come along at a price we are willing to pay and for which sufficient market exists to establish that market.

But when you're trying to acquire coins that only appear rarely and for which the records of sale prices may be slim, difficult to acquire, years old or non-existent then the concept of "overpaying" doesn't apply at all.

 

If you are talking about early type coins in more affordable problem free grades, I know exactly how you feel. Oftentimes there seems to be plenty of high grade examples, and plenty of crappy details coins, but not much in between.

 

The trouble with coming in second is that you shouldn't kick yourself too much. You never know how much further the winner was willing to go. I had a problem with an auction where I had to have a bid withdrawn. The item eventually sold for less than I would have bid, but by then I'd enough of the whole thing.

 

I'll do Ebay... find something I like, make my best bid and move on. no time to sit and watch the clock run. too many snipers. Submit it and forget it. I win maybe 1 in 100 sometimes at the top of my bid, some times a bargain....... I miss the days of local coin clubs and groups of people who liked to trade. a way to fill a lot of the common holes. not in an area where that happens any more....

 

I've been to a couple local club meetings recently. They had a lot of auction lots for sale, but most of them were recent mint trash that sometimes sells for big money for reasons I can't understand. There were some lots from the World War II era, but nothing older.

 

That has certainly been my experience at local club auctions. However, a few years ago I traveled about 75 miles to attend a local club meeting and was amazed to find a 1793 wreath cent (around a G4, IIRC), being auctioned at a starting bid of about $1800, again IIRC. To this day I regret not bidding on it since it didn't sell.

Of course, I would have taken on the risk of a counterfeit since I didn't know squat at the time.