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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;kaparthy, post: 15589, member: 57463&quot;]Electronic auctions are successful because buyers are untutored.&nbsp; Buyers believe that they are getting a bargain, no matter what price they pay.&nbsp; Also, the final buyers (&quot;ultimate consumers&quot; in marketing jargon) are emotionally attached to the purchase. &quot;L@@k at what I just won!!&quot;&nbsp; Won.&nbsp; As if they actually &quot;won&quot; something.</p><p><br /></p><p>The dirty, unspoken truth is that for one buyer to get a great price, one seller must have sold too low.&nbsp; So, for the great buy the last person in the chain gets, that person must ignore the reality that their purchase is worth much less than they paid for it. Again, for the last buyer, it does not matter: they MUST HAVE that Morgan Dollar MS-65 PCGS or whatever. When they go to sell that Gem, they take a loss.</p><p><br /></p><p>Generally, and traditionally, dealers buy collections.&nbsp; The dealer is stuck with a lot of useless junk that sells at a lower margin in order to get the few items that sell much better.</p><p><br /></p><p>To buy and sell as you seem to want to, you have to get to the primary sellers, i.e., to heirs liquating estates.</p><p><br /></p><p>There are many, many, many. many other factors.&nbsp; Having the material that OTHER people want to buy is one key.&nbsp; In ancients, for instance, my passion is for small Greek silvers.&nbsp; But &quot;everyone&quot; wants Roman denarii of Nero, Julius Caesar, et al.&nbsp; In US coins, you can be hot for Seateds, but &quot;most&quot; people want Morgan Dollars.&nbsp; In Canadian, decimal coinage is the mainstream.&nbsp; And so on.</p><p><br /></p><p>I do not know who you are referring to when you talk of people with staffs of clericals, but &quot;most&#039;&quot; electronic auctions are one person affairs.</p><p>Staffs of clericals are more typical of the VERY established houses, such as Harlan J. Berk, or Sotheby&#039;s.</p><p><br /></p><p>One other note: While working on the computers of a commodities trader, I learned a maxim that most people sell into their misery.&nbsp; When you get the news that someone made a killing, you can be sure that they did not brag about their many losses.&nbsp; I suspect that there are astronomically more losses going on.&nbsp; When a collector brags about making a killing on an item, remember that they are sitting on a huge inventory of unsold merchandise.&nbsp; They are mute about that.</p><p><br /></p><p>We could beat this to death.&nbsp; We probably will.&nbsp; The bottom line is perseverence tempered by wisdom.&nbsp; In other words, success comes from staying with&nbsp; it through thick and thin... unless you cut your losses and get out.&nbsp;&nbsp; <img src="styles/default/xenforo/clear.png" class="mceSmilieSprite mceSmilie1" alt=":)" unselectable="on" unselectable="on" /> </p><p><br /></p><p>Michael[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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