RE: Heritage November Auction

[Bullet123]

15 out of the top 20 books in terms of $$ generated have not met reserve yet. What does that mean? Is it too optimistic reserves set on the part of the consignors, or is it simply a market dynamic that once you get over a certain $$ amount, say $10,000 the pool of buyers drops so dramatically that unless you have a grail book for someone, very few are willing to drop big $$ on books that are not the best of the bunch. Curious to hear from some of the people who actually spend those kinds of $$ either in a single grail purchase, or cumulative over the course of a year or two.

[JiveTurkeyMoFo]

or is it simply a market dynamic that once you get over a certain $$ amount, say $10,000 the pool of buyers drops so dramatically that unless you have a grail book for someone, very few are willing to drop big $$ on books that are not the best of the bunch.

 

I think you hit the nail on the head. The levels of resistance that I've encountered traditionally seem to be $1,000/$5,000/$10,000.

 

There is also historically a high level of dealer purchasing in the high end GA market, but it seems dealer inventory might be high enough to withhold some dealer money in this auction. Bill Hughes, for instance, consigned a number of nice GA books to both the recent Comiclink auction as well as this one (I believe the Marvel Mystery # 2 and Batman # 6 are his, among others). He might be in more of a selling than buying mode?

 

Besides, this has been a banner year for Heritage sales (the Crippen collection comes to mind), and the market may be a little dollar poor right at year's end. Add in a weakening economy, and some of the mid-tier collectors might be sitting this one out.

[sacentaur]

Personally, there are too many irregularities with Heritage for me to even consider attempting to purchase a big ticket item from them (regardless of what the book is).

 

High reserves, too many areas of concern, and a 19.5% buyers premium on top of a large dollar item can easily = "No Sale".

 

A good question, bullet - it will be interesting to see the final auction results.

 

STEVE

[jimm94]

I think it's probably a healthly dose of both. The most surprising book to me is the Tough Squad Kid # 1. You'd have to be a serious high-grade Timely completist to bid that much, and even at $65,000 the reserve is still not met! Without naming names (I only know, or know of a few of the biggest players in that circle), I'm wondering if it's going that high because of who owns it, or who wants to own it.

[Silver Surfer]

No reserve on the books I bidding on but there has also been no activity on them either for the past week. I think a lot of collecters are probably tapped out for the moment as it has been a great year for selection.

[Filter81]

I think its a case of the reserves simply being set too high, especially when you consider that many of these books started out as considerably lower grades than they are today. I just don't think you can ask a premium over guide for books that most people know have been improved as much as one or two full grades to begin with. As more and more people catch on to the reality of the market, I think you will see less and less books selling for a premium through sites like Heritage, and eventually the asking prices are going to have to be corrected.

 

With that said, I think between now and the end of the auction, at least some of those books will hit reserve.

[Filter81]

I think it's probably a healthly dose of both. The most surprising book to me is the Tough Squad Kid # 1. You'd have to be a serious high-grade Timely completist to bid that much, and even at $65,000 the reserve is still not met! Without naming names (I only know, or know of a few of the biggest players in that circle), I'm wondering if it's going that high because of who owns it, or who wants to own it.

 

Is it possible that $65,000 price is a mistake? Tough Kid Squad 1 is a book that is very very hard to sell for guide in my opinion. I had a restored 9.0 that I sold for less than 3% of the asking price on this book. A reserve price of $6500 would make more sense. Do you think someone at Heritage goofed and added an extra zero?

[jimm94]

Apparently it was, because it has since been corrected on their site to $6,500.

[tth2]

Apparently it was, because it has since been corrected on their site to $6,500.

[ciorac]

I think it's probably a healthly dose of both. The most surprising book to me is the Tough Squad Kid # 1. You'd have to be a serious high-grade Timely completist to bid that much, and even at $65,000 the reserve is still not met! Without naming names (I only know, or know of a few of the biggest players in that circle), I'm wondering if it's going that high because of who owns it, or who wants to own it.

 

Tough Sell Squad

[ciorac]

15 out of the top 20 books in terms of $$ generated have not met reserve yet. What does that mean? Is it too optimistic reserves set on the part of the consignors, or is it simply a market dynamic that once you get over a certain $$ amount, say $10,000 the pool of buyers drops so dramatically that unless you have a grail book for someone, very few are willing to drop big $$ on books that are not the best of the bunch. Curious to hear from some of the people who actually spend those kinds of $$ either in a single grail purchase, or cumulative over the course of a year or two.

 

certainly true Bullet, but also Heritage can be their own worst enemy in this area. They consistently bring to market (auction) big dollar book after big dollar book. At some point the supply is going to outweigh not only the demand, but the financial ability of even those who play at the "top of the market".

 

I think I have paid more than $20,000 on a single comic book only once or twice in my life, and certainly couldn't do it 4 or 5 times a year.

 

Total for the year for me has been less than 40k, so to even consider buying multiple books of five figuures would be lunacy.

 

Now collections, that is another story.....the limit gets stretched a bit there...

[sacentaur]

I think it's probably a healthly dose of both. The most surprising book to me is the Tough Squad Kid # 1. You'd have to be a serious high-grade Timely completist to bid that much, and even at $65,000 the reserve is still not met! Without naming names (I only know, or know of a few of the biggest players in that circle), I'm wondering if it's going that high because of who owns it, or who wants to own it.

 

Tough Sell Squad

 

Very good...

 

STEVE

[jkrk]

15 out of the top 20 books in terms of $$ generated have not met reserve yet. What does that mean? Is it too optimistic reserves set on the part of the consignors, or is it simply a market dynamic that once you get over a certain $$ amount, say $10,000 the pool of buyers drops so dramatically that unless you have a grail book for someone, very few are willing to drop big $$ on books that are not the best of the bunch. Curious to hear from some of the people who actually spend those kinds of $$ either in a single grail purchase, or cumulative over the course of a year or two.

 

 

Much of the answers have already been given. Some books have

 

1) Moved up in grade

2)Aren't key books

3)Have been pushed up on price vs. prior auctions

4)Are priced on the offer

5)Buyers are waiting till the floor auction. Heritage seems to attract late bidding (as does E-Bay).

I was confused by the large early bids on CL's recent GA auction. It didn't fit the pattern I've been accustomed to see.

 

If the books In the Heritage's auction were priced below market and didn't sell It would be noteworthy. My intuition is that Heritage's "suspect reputation" by some on this board will have little to do with the final sales results.

 

Are some of the big ticket books placed in the auction to simply "dress" up the listings? A number of high priced books create the illusion that this is a major auction and tends to attract more bidders for the other books. Are the books there for show or will we see the real money arriving late? Too early to tell.