Local Gun Auction...Nuts?

S

Sniper66

Member
Joined
Jan 22, 2012
Messages
3,476
Location
NE Kansas
Went to a gun auction yesterday. Wondering what is happening in your area. This auction was in Emporia, KS. The sale had 160 firearms, a mix of shotguns, rifles, and handguns....some ammo too. I knew I was not likely to find a bargain when they opened the gun portion of the auction with a Bushmaster 5.56. It came with a few loaded 30rnd mags and sold for $1500....ouch.
There were a bunch of fine collectibles...NIB Colt and S&W pistols. The Colt Python .357 sold for $3300. a pair of the older Browning semiauto .22s (can't call the model) but they are that petite model that is popular among collectors...They sold for $2050 and $2000, respectively. The S&W revolvers sold for retail or higher. Nary a bargain in the lot.
I hoped to buy a NIB Remington 700 VLS .204. The guy who wanted it much more than I did started the bidding at $1,000. I didn't bother to bid and neither did anyone else. Oh well.....
Just wondering what is going on in your neck of the woods?
 
Sounds like most of the local auctions I’ve been to and that’s why it’s been a number of years since going to one. Last one I went to was a FFL going out of business and estate sale. Prices at the auction were at least 10 to 20% higher than another shop just a mile down the street.

All the fees associated with Online auctions are annoying but at least you can stay at home and sit at your computer.
 
Live auctions can be nuts. The excitement of that caller combines with egos to push some bidders well over the common sense line. $800 dollar guns selling for 2K is the result.

If you really want to see some buyers remorse go to a dinner auction with a pre-dinner cocktail hour. A buddy of mine, in concert with Jack Daniels and Adolf Coors, ended up in a bidding war over a very nice looking but proprietary Lazzeroni 8.59 Titan rifle. He walked away with it when it pushed North of $4,200 (45? Somewhere waaay up there.) He was proud as a peacock the rest of the night.

The next day he realizes that buying ammo for that mule-kicking blaster would be almost impossible, plus there were limited opportunities to actually need to use it, but he was stuck with it.

He later tried to trade me straight up from my CMP Rack-grade M1 Garand, I said no thanks.

So yeah, auctions are not often the sources of gun bargains anymore.

Stay safe.
 
I hope my wife takes my advice and auctions off all my guns and fishing gear when I die. I went to an estate auction a few years ago with the hope of picking up a couple of (what I thought would be) obscure low-demand guns. The opening bids were higher than my predetermined top bid.

I managed to buy a tackle box full of lures for $40 + buyer’s premium. It was a modest bargain at best. If she sells my stuff at similar margins she will be able to get a very nice vacation out of the deal. Or a nice new car.
 
Yeah people are stupid at auctions.
I sawill a parts kit grade m1 garand go for a thousand, once of those Chinese AKs go for 700 and and a parts bin import M1 carbine like mine go for 900.
They came with no ammo and minimum to no magazines.
 
The online auctions are crazy too. Been watching a Fajen stock for a Winchester model 88 on ebay: Auction ends today. Logged on this morning to discover that someone had bid $203. Oh, well.
 
The place was packed, so lots of interest. I do understand premium prices for the hard to find items, like the Python and some of the S&W pistols. But, even Stoeger shotguns were bringing over retail, And here's another puzzlement. They sold some coins too. Kennedy 1/2 dollars selling for $17.50? Seriously? Oh well, I buy sculptures that just sit around my house. Different strokes, eh?
 
One local gun and knife auction had Instant Reserve Prices.
If the bidding petered out at a low amount, the auctioneer would look over at the seller:
"You want to take that, Bob?"
"Nope"
"No sale. Next item is..."

Another time, if bidding was not high, the seller would bid and buy his own gun back.
It was a charity auction, the receipts were going to the seller's alma mater anyhow.
 
Different agendas. You were looking to find a steal, I am looking to fill a hole in my collection or scratch something off my wish list. You just need to decide how bad you want it. That said, there have been lots of bids I’ve dropped out of, didn’t want it that bad.
 
I’m seeing the same in Arkansas. I watch the on line auctions. Guns and ammo tend to go retail and way more. However, I have picked a couple of black powder bargains.
 
N555 said:
Yeah people are stupid at auctions.
I sawill a parts kit grade m1 garand go for a thousand, once of those Chinese AKs go for 700 and and a parts bin import M1 carbine like mine go for 900.
They came with no ammo and minimum to no magazines.
Click to expand...
I bought a Norinco MAK-90 for $550 at a live auction. Was fun! probably paid too much, but loved the 90’s thumbhole stock, 10rd mags, and 200 rds. of Walmart Tula ammo in plastic baggies
 
I've only been to one auction, a crowded police auction of seized weapons. People were bidding higher than new prices to get their own used guns back. I left.
 
Seems since the pandemic when all the free stimulus money was given out the prices went through the roof. It was common for people to continue to work under the table while getting the 1K a week unemployment stimulus. That turned into play money.
 
I've been seeing this for at least the last 8-10 years. In the not so distant past, an 870 Wingmaster could be had for $300 at a local auction, but even the 870 Express is bringing $500 these days. Panic buying has driven these trends well before viruses and virus freebies. The Commie virus and the obscene reaction to it has contributed to turbo-bidding. Scary
 
There is a live auction coming up this weekend nearby. As the auctioneer hold them 3x a year I usually go but despite having ~300 firearms I'm just not seeing anything on the list that I'm interested in so I'm probably going to wait until their June sale.

While prices seem to go somewhat higher at the sale, for this Auctioneers live auctions there's no sales tax or buyers premium, which is true for most of the auctioneers in the area, so even if the sale price is a bit higher sometimes it still ends up cheaper overall. Online auctions are a different matter as those usually have a 10-15% buyers premium attached.

The main issue I see is that there are several "professional" buyers in the area that I see at nearly every sale and they won't let any of the firearms sell cheap because if it looks like they're going that way, they'll buy them to take to a show or such. I was talking to one of them one time and he was "bragging" that he had bought the first 30 firearms off of one auction. While I don't know if that's true I have seen him buy 10-15 at some of the sales that I've been at.

Every once in a while something slips through the cracks and goes lower than expected. I got my daughters Marlin 30-30 at an estate sale for $275 several years ago when they were usually selling in the $400-500 range. Fortunately for me there was another large firearms auction going on the same day about 15 min down the road (~200 firearms if memory serves), so most of the big buyers were likely at that one. I did deliberately go to the smaller estate sale for that reason.
 
People continue to go to auctions and pay exorbitant prices for the same reasons people go to casinos and dump their money into a figurative toilet.

The thrill of “winning” no matter how fleeting or false gets the endorphins flowing.
 
Live auction? LIVE auction? Like, with auctioneers who talk really fast, and people yell out bids? Did you finally fix that broken time machine of yours? There hasn't been a live auction of any kind, guns, cars, estate sale...of any kind...in my area in decades. I haven't personally been to a live auction since 1980.
 
alsaqr - a quick looks shows several more on ebay still at or slightly under $200, but they're certainly not Fajen! Must be something special about that 88 if you want a Fajen stock on it. Mine still sports the original post-64, though I have refinished it. Put a Boyd's pepper laminate on a Win100 due to a broken stock. Boyd's website doesn't show either of those model's in their option list now.

ETA - Apologies for hijacking the thread. To bring it back, I haven't been to an auction in decades. Mostly for the reasons already mentioned.
 
D.B. Cooper said:
Live auction? LIVE auction? Like, with auctioneers who talk really fast, and people yell out bids?
Click to expand...

The auctioneers around here only switched to mostly online auctions post 2020. I have to admit it having it online does beat standing around all day waiting for them to get to the one item I'm interested in even with the extra 15% fee.
 
About 5 years ago I was at an estate auction and there were some serious bargains.
I wish I would’ve had $20k to blow but that wasn’t the case.
I did buy a 1953 Win 94 30/30 for $375, a Win 94 Antique model for $350, a 1968 Marlin 39A for $475 and an old Colt 1911 for $700.
Same place had another auction a month later and the word must’ve got out because the bargains were gone.
Another time I drove 30 miles across town at night to attend an estate auction and after about 30 minutes the heir decided the bids weren’t high enough and he told the auctioneer to stop the auction.
I don’t know how that one worked out because the auctioneer had invested a lot of time and money moving all that stuff to his shop.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

S
  • Locked
Gun Crazy Auction??
2
Replies
35
Views
2K
Riomouse911
Riomouse911
M
  • Locked
Gun Auction
Replies
4
Views
577
Polishrifleman
P
Z
  • Locked
Historic Auction - Pancho Villa's guns
Replies
0
Views
548
ZeSpectre
Z
JRWhit
  • Locked
Went to my first gun auction
Replies
5
Views
565
ApacheCoTodd
ApacheCoTodd
JimSupica
  • Locked
Colt collection will auction Fri & Sat, Topeka Kansas
2
Replies
28
Views
1K
Old Fuff
O
Back
Top