$131.81. The Heritage Auctions buyer's premium threshold.
 

Hiccup. Feel free to do the math. Under $131.81, a $29.00 buyer's premium applies. Above $131.81 is 22%.

Hiccup.

Come on. A multi-million-dollar auctioneer resorting to this?

My apologies. I am stepping away from the computer for an outbreak of something I mentioned twice in this post. :D:p:)

I remember winning my first autograph from an auction house when I was 16, Robert Ripley. Growing up in the country, where there's country auctions, we didn't have buyers premiums. So imagine my surprise when the autograph I landed for 64 bucks, ending up costing me 100ish!

It didn't feel good then and it feels worse now!

I get the auction firm does the work, the catalogs, etc.

But there are so many fees! *cue the Grinch noise, noise, noise animation*

I'm all for them making their money for facilitating these auctions. But now they're making money in every direction!

The demand for the cards in these major auction houses is high . Honestly, the auction house could make the buyers premium 30%. The demand is still there, it’s as high as ever people will pay whatever it takes for the item they want.

Was the threshold raised? I recall that it was either $50 or $60 before.

I'm not sure what you are referring to as a hiccup. HA has it very clearly stated on each auction page "Buyer's Premium per Lot: 22% of the successful bid (minimum $29) per lot." HA simply has a minimum amount they want to make on each lot. You don't make money by doing stuff for free. They have had this concept in their rules for as long as I can remember. I'm actually more suprised other auction houses haven't done this as well. Regardless of how big the auction house is, with every auction, buyers have the obligation to read the rules and decide it they want to participate. If a buyer doesn't read the rules, they shouldn't complain about being surprised or blame anyone but themselves.

Again, AHs are in the drivers seat. 30 percent isn’t far off.

The problem isn't with the buyer's premium of 22% although it should be 20% for a company as rich as Heritage.

The problem is if you make an opening bid of $1.00 the buyer's premium at that point makes it $30.00. Talk about inflation. The threshold where the 22% kicks in as opposed to the $29.00 buyer's premium is $131.81. They are that desperate for a dollar? Come on. Smaller lots won't break them and they can serve as an attraction for first time bidders which can lead to a long and growing account of purchases. Oh, wait. That would be successful business. Never mind.

You say that their BP should be 20% since they're so rich (which I assume comes from some level of success) then say they can't be successful if they don't want to sell smaller lots. Which is it?

There are plenty of auction houses that are happy to deal with smaller/less valuable lots. Heritage doesn't want to be one of them. That's their business decision and it seems to work pretty well for them.

I haven't bought much from Heritage, but I everything I have ever bought exceeded the minimum BP. I don't know how many of their lots that doesn't happen with. Maybe others can weigh in on their experience of getting something so cheap from Heritage that they had to pay the minimum BP.

For me it's all really easy with any auction in any scenario :

When I bid X what does that add up to after all the dominoes of BP, tax, shipping and miscellaneous other costs are all added in?

I live in California, so while many might complain about a BP of 22% I am paying 24.2% due to being taxed on the total paid for the item inclucive of BP.

Is the item worth that much to me?

Yes? - bid

No? - don't bid

Easy

$29.00 on an initial bit of $1.00 is desperate. Just start off with a $30.00 minimum bid without a buyer's premium and then kick in the buyer's premium at $131.81 which they already do. The bids will rise $30.00 a bid for the first four bids instead of a dollar bill plus $29.00 charge. It's the same animal, but in a different presentation.

I believe the OP alluded to having a case of the hiccups in real life.

From this.:)

Butting in to give a positive shout out to the auction houses that clearly spell out your BP when you're making your bid.

I'd rather do no math rather than easy math, especially during "after hours" when personal budget vs number of items in play is more of a consideration.

My solution is simple: skip the cheap cards at Heritage and only use them when there is something really special there.

https://photos.imageevent.com/exhibi...ed%20card.jpeg

Does Heritage really have many items that sell below $130???

Yes. Many, many items every day of the year.

Never woulda guessed that.

I looked through the results of their auction that ended on September 7. There were maybe 15 lots out of 250 that were below $130 so less than 10%. Regardless, if the bidder takes the BP into consideration when placing their bid, it shouldn't matter if it's still the flat $29 or at the point where it's 22%.

NM

Glad I got this before the $29.00 buyer's premium jack. This guy had a famous match against Jackie Gleason outside the Miami Club on Clinton Avenue in Newark, NJ in the 1940s. Two ton was his nickname and included is an interview of Gleason by Rocky Marciano.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kq9MNX0nZQw

He was a pallbearer at my great uncle Carl's funeral. They were great friends. My Uncle was an undersized heavyweight who went 2 - 0 professionally before his wife made him quite because she didn't like the people he was around. Little did she know that Galento (who was probably among the "worst" in her eyes) was going to remain a life-long friend.

Galento also gave Joe Louis a scare. If he had ever taken ANYTHING seriously he could've been an all-time great in the Jack Dempsey mold. In fact Dempsey trained Galento for a bit seeing his potential, but got disgusted with his cavalier attitude toward training, even knocking him out in a sparring session.

And if they don't then it's their own fault.

Exactly, just like every other auction.

....unless you're the seller. $1 sale is quite different than a $30 sale.

True, but if you're consigning something that you don't expect to sell for that much, Heritage is probably not the AH to choose.

If there is no buyers premium then there absolutely is going to be a sellers premium. Auction houses don't work for free and they are going to make sure they get there minimum fee one way or another.