Storage auctions in the UK?

charlies_mum

EssexGirl wrote: »

What channel is it on please? I can't find it on the planner.

Sorry, it must have finished. It used to be either on History or Bio at 10.00 pm Thursdays.

If you haven't seen it before, you can catch it on Sunday at 9.00 pm on Bio (channel 242 on Virgin, not sure about Sky)

bwhomeresponse

It looks to me as though the US and Canadian ones are staged, as in would you really pay $1000 for a storage unit you've had a look at in semi darkness for 10 seconds. how many units would you need to buy before you found something worthwhile. the more fools that are gathered around the unit, the more fools there are to bid.

soolin

bwhomeresponse wrote: »

It looks to me as though the US and Canadian ones are staged, as in would you really pay $1000 for a storage unit you've had a look at in semi darkness for 10 seconds. how many units would you need to buy before you found something worthwhile. the more fools that are gathered around the unit, the more fools there are to bid.

Whilst I am sure they are staged I do not agree that no one would pay $1000 for a storage locker they can't investigate fully.

A good working knowledge of area and location, as well as packing styles would be a vast help to a professional. Some buy based on the quality of packing boxes used on the basis you wouldn't pay X dollars for a new storage box to store junk.

I buy a few things unseen at auction, generally large boxes where it is physically impossible to get to them to completely unpack them. I go buy the first few objects I can see on the basis that these are house clearance items and if the top items are rubbish it is likely the rest is, but if i see somehting collectable on the top there is a good chance there will also be something else further down.

Also of course the scam auctions in the UK attract high bids even when they sell a sealed box- there are threads all over the internet of people buying a sealed box for hundreds of pounds and finding a couple of low cost items in there.

RFW

bwhomeresponse wrote: »

It looks to me as though the US and Canadian ones are staged, as in would you really pay $1000 for a storage unit you've had a look at in semi darkness for 10 seconds. how many units would you need to buy before you found something worthwhile. the more fools that are gathered around the unit, the more fools there are to bid.

Can't see why it would be worth them staging it. I'm not in that business but I can usually fairly accurately value a sealed pallet of goods in a couple of seconds, if I ever estimate it wrong it would be too low and not too high. I often get people not believing that I'm right, but I've been doing it since I was a kid so it's second nature now, I'm sure these storage guys are much the same.

princesspogo

Hi,

As a ex-Manager for the biggest chain in the U.K, i can tell you that it's pretty rare for anyone to default on their unit and takes absolutely months to get to a point that it would be sold on, as dependant on amount owed is more likely to go to court or if a lower amount owed would be offered to the highest of 3 quotes from a clearance company to recoup anything

bwhomeresponse

when I say staged I mean the goods are planted for the guys to find. there was one were they dragged a cupboard back to their lock up. and low and behold there was a harley engine in the bottom it. anyone with a bit sense would have wondered why the cupboard was so heavy. and looked inside it before moving it.
the other problem is they all seem to have friends who they know will buy whatever piece of tat they unearth(same as uk antiques programmes) the reality is you simply cannot sell everything you buy, you will always end up with thing that has all the profit in it. these programmes need to be viewed with a cynics eye, life is never simple, if the deal is too good to be true it is.

montyrebel

bwhomeresponse wrote: »

when I say staged I mean the goods are planted for the guys to find. there was one were they dragged a cupboard back to their lock up. and low and behold there was a harley engine in the bottom it. anyone with a bit sense would have wondered why the cupboard was so heavy. and looked inside it before moving it.
the other problem is they all seem to have friends who they know will buy whatever piece of tat they unearth(same as uk antiques programmes) the reality is you simply cannot sell everything you buy, you will always end up with thing that has all the profit in it. these programmes need to be viewed with a cynics eye, life is never simple, if the deal is too good to be true it is.

seriously, its a tv program it is there to entertain that what it does, leave it alone and let us enjoy it

bwhomeresponse

it might only be a tv program but people believe that there is easy money to be made, when the reality is much harder.

soolin

bwhomeresponse wrote: »

it might only be a tv program but people believe that there is easy money to be made, when the reality is much harder.

If they stopped showing all the antique/ car boot style TV programmes then the daytime schedules would be bare. Look at things like Bargain Hunt , making so called profits when all selling fees at auction are completely ignored. yes I think there will be some people who think this is easy money, but they only need to do it once to realise there a costs and pit falls that are not explored in the TV programmes.

I really don't have any problems with these programmes, except that they have pushed up some prices of things I used to source at auctions. If we banned all these then we had better ban all the motoring programmes as well (set up scenarios) Most Haunted (mainly fake) etc

RFW

soolin wrote: »

If they stopped showing all the antique/ car boot style TV programmes then the daytime schedules would be bare. Look at things like Bargain Hunt , making so called profits when all selling fees at auction are completely ignored. yes I think there will be some people who think this is easy money, but they only need to do it once to realise there a costs and pit falls that are not explored in the TV programmes.

I really don't have any problems with these programmes, except that they have pushed up some prices of things I used to source at auctions. If we banned all these then we had better ban all the motoring programmes as well (set up scenarios) Most Haunted (mainly fake) etc

Surprisingly no one mentions travel expenses on the storage programmes, these guys travel across the US, petrol is cheaper there, but not that cheap and the distances are further. On a recent episode of Auction Hunters they apparently drove from California to Florida, which is a few days drive at least.

I was surprised to see a few dealers on Dickinson's Real Deal keeping the items for themselves, an interesting way of doing business.

I don't think anyone ever does well enough on Bargain Hunt to make people think it is worthwhile. There's also a point that the auction houses always lot the stuff on Bargain Hunt when in reality a lot of them would not allow some of the goods bought to ever be listed.