Anyone ever bid in a Kunker auction?

I am starting to collect ancients more and more and ran across an auction house called Kunker. Has anyone ever bid there before? And if so, what's been your experience? Any tips?

 

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They are a well known auction house. Top-notch coins. But it's very difficult to win in their auctions unless you bid very aggressively and have deep pockets.

 

Künker has a good reputation among European collectors. They are in business for about 50 years now, and Ulrich Künker is, if I recall correctly, also the vicepresident of the German Association of Coin Dealers (Verband der deutschen Münzenhändler). A serious, high-end auction house. Most of their coins are too pricey for me, though.

I bought a coin in their brick and mortar store in Munich two years ago and was very happy with the experience.

 

They are very professional with good communication and quick despatch. You should have no problems.

 

It seems alot of their site is in german, I'll have to do some more research to find out buyers premium and such.

 

Do the coins typically go a lot past estimate? Like multiples

 

I've bid with them several times. You can get lucky in their e-auctions
Their paper/live auctions are tough.
My most recent acquisition from their auctions:

LUCANIA. Metapont. AR-Stater, 510/470 BC Chr .; 8.01 g. Ear of wheat // Ear of wheat incus. Noë compare 188; Rutter, Historia Numorum 1482.
Very beautiful / almost exquisite

Estimates don't really mean much. The above coin went for 460 Euros on a 300 Euro estimate.

 

Good company, no issues.

 

Yes you can get lucky in their e-auctions, but e-auction coin quality can be markedly lower.

Their Spring and Fall auctions are very tough. They have a pre-bidding stage where all submitted pre-bids are secret until the phases closes. Then the highest pre-bid is taken as the starting price for the live auction.

Yes I've regularly seen coins I was interested in hammer for multiples of the estimate. Many multiples in some cases.

 

I was actually just going to post a similar thread asking about Kunker and other European auction houses

It looks like their buyer's premium for U.S. buyers is 20% (link).

 

Hmm, interesting strategy. Is that how their auction starting March 11th will pan out? (This coming monday). Also, if you have the bid in the pre auction, is the live auction then real time and can you bid online in it live?

 

It looks like live auction buyers premium is 20% and 15% for e-live auctions.

 

Kunker are top notch. The service is excellent and professional. I have bought from them a couple of times and always been very pleased. On one occasion I was using an agent to bid on a Kunker auction. I won my target piece and I wanted the catalogue from the sale. I contacted Kunker and within a few days I had the catalogue. I have not bid in their e-auctions so I cannot speak to those.

 

Kunker is a great auction company. I have won around 35 coins from their auctions, some ancient, more 1500-1900.
Their grading is very good. A US TPG MS-66 is a Kunker fast st. (AU) Stempelglanz are MS-67+/ I would rate them par with CNG. They usually have 5 auctions a year, they are listed on sixbid. I would rate them a perfect ten.
John

 

Unless you've submitted a very aggressive pre-bid, you should expect it to be exceeded during the live auction. Kunker will also disclose the starting price of each lot.

 

The upcoming auction has an insane amount of material, and lots of cool pieces. I'm betting some of the more common pieces go reasonable just because there are so many pieces of similar type. There are some great pieces in it. I'd love to have more cash for this one, but only just found it last night.

 

I'll echo others' positive comments on Künker - very professional auction house. There is an option to choose English on their website, though it doesn't cover everything. Another option: their sales are also covered on Sixbid, where I think you can find their terms of sale translated into English.

As for their live auctions: Künker does not (to my knowledge) offer internet bidding for their live auction. So, unless you plan to be in Germany for the sale, you either need to hire a bidding agagentarrange to phone bid or prebid aggressively and hope for the best.

 

Sorry, Carausius is right. There is no internet bidding for the live auction. So the best way is probably to submit an aggressive pre bid.

 

Curiosity got the best of me and I took a look at the Kunker Spring auction. Then I saw a Vespasian sestertius with an estimated price of 50,000 euros. That was the end of my curiosity. Good lord, 50,000 euros?

 

Yes, coins in their auctions often go for multiples of estimate. Estimates aren't always meaningful though. Check ACsearch and other sources to come up with your own estimate... and then add more .