Is it common for dealers to buy from auctions and sell on the bay?

A lot of auction houses have all this talk of bringing top dollar, but I was curious is it common for dealers to buy from an auction house and then sell on ebay for a nice markup? The coin below is what got my juices thinking...

https://www.ebay.com/itm/1899-O-Morgan-Silver-Dollar-PCGS-MS67-CAC-Gorgeous-Toning-/293789230576?hash=item446733e5f0%3Ag%3AD%7EEAAOSw6zlfic1o

Auction price, notice the dates, only a couple weeks apart!
https://legendauctions.hibid.com/lot/73044069/-1-1899-o-pcgs-ms67--cac/
not a bad quick flip/mark up. how many coins end up going through this process??

 

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Yes. this happens a lot, and to be honest I have done it for lower-tier coins

 

Yep, sure is.
I've a friend who doesn't collect.
He buys at auction, generally get them slabbed (NGC or PCGS), then flips them on eBay.

 

Yes and it's also very common for dealers to buy on eBay and sell at auctions or in their stores/at shows

 

And very common to buy details coins crack them out and sell raw

 

Of course it is.

 

I’ve bought slabbed coins on eBay auctions that had recently sold on Heritage in the same slab.

 

When I used to buy slabbed coins on ebay I would also search for that coin elsewhere. Many times I would find it on ha.com or other websites.

They can't relie on estate sales, or individuals all the time. Even here many people are looking to flip coins. buy low (based on their perception and knowledge) and sell higher.

Over on FB the prices are out of whack higher from newbie collectors who get stuck in the bidding war and not the actual value of something. There are dealers here who now sell on FB to cash in on that phenomenon.

 

Does the Legend sale price include buyer's premium? Assuming the Legend sale price is 5757 before buyer's premium, this flip is relatively unimpressive after paying all the fees and shipping. The ebay seller only netted maybe ~5% (~$300-400ish). That is a fairly risky venture once you start considering the possibility of things like getting scammed, losing an item in the mail, or paying paypal fees/shipping on a return.

 

Sometimes I'll check Coin Facts for recent sales for a particular coin and grade and notice a nice coin that sold on Ebay for 20-30% lower than similar auction sales. Even with the sellers commission one could probably flip the Ebay coin for a nice profit. I see coins advertised on Ebay at a significant markup from what I saw realized at auction for the same coin. Some people can't wait to fill a slot in their collection and will pay more than most of us would. Me, I can usually wait but unfortunately, father time isn't making me any wealthier.

 

One point not covered, the coin listed at $7500 did not sell on eBay. Auction ended without a bid.

 

I rarely see higher priced items sell on the bay. Better safe than sorry in my opinion.

 

IMO those items are being advertised by the seller.
If they sell, fine.
But the seller is letting people know what he's got AND what he'd like to get for it.
But as those of us who attend shows know the first quoted price is a starting point for negotiations.
There is generally a lower acceptable price.

 

I know that David Lawrence sells the same coins on both eBay and its website. If you see something you like on eBay from them, just go to their website and pay 10% less +/-.

 

What is funny is some dealers list on ebay, but if you go to their online store you can get it cheaper without all of the fee's added into the final price. But EBAY has its place in the scheme of things. I also wonder if people really buy coins off amazon - those prices are even higher than ebay.

In an emergency once I sold some graded coins to the local shop. I did not expect them to list them on ebay, but they did. Not sure they made as much as expected, but all the coins were listed as true auctions. What was funny was not only did they sell them in three days, but a few were relisted on the 4th day with buy it now prices 20% to 30% higher. I only saw one of those sell. The rest eventually just stopped getting listed.

 

Yeah, I find this to be the case if you can figure out how to contact the dealer outside of eBay. Some dealers make it easy by their choice of eBay name, phone number, etc. Some make it difficult. Sending an email via the eBay system doesn’t always work. The eBay email bot is pretty good at detecting a go-around and may delete phone numbers or email addresses. It can often detect phonetic attempts at a phone number or email address.

I remember doing a go-around deal with a seller in the UK. An eBay email bot detected it, and eBay threatened to ban him. Poor guy was so frightened, I could almost see him shivering from California.

Cal

 

Funny thing, though -- that "fantasy money" coming in from eBay spends just the same as the "real world money" coming back from Heritage.

eBay is a market. You might not respect the people who buy there, but they are buying. A lot of the asking prices might be fantasy, but if an item sells, that's "real" enough for me.