Are Heritage auctions "Prices Realized" legitimate?

nugget369

I have bid on more than twenty coins from Heritage "On Line" in the past two months and I have never won. Whether it's a Lincoln MS67, a Buffalo MS67 or a Saint MS66 the result is the same, "You Have Been Outbid". And it's not like my bid's are low either, in fact I usually bid at or slightly over wholesale. However when I view Heritage's "Prices Realized", seemingly nice coins routinely sell for about wholesale and sometimes under. If these prices were true then I should have won my share of coins already. My theory is that the actual winning bids are indeed higher than they state, and the low "Prices Realized" is a ploy to attract more bidders and make it appear that coins can be won at bargain prices.

Louis

Every coin that I've won in thier auctions has been listed correctly in thier "Prices Realized".

LincolnCentMan

I disagree. There are many times, particularly with the lincolns, when coins will be bid 2-4X what a generic example is worth b/c there are at least two people that think the coin will upgrade. I've been bidding on Heritage auctions for a couple of years. I periodicly watch coins end, and I've never seen a sucessful auction that didnt have the appropriate price recorded in their archives.

Heritage does have reserves on their Internet Only auctions. They're typicly a little high, but doable. If you bid on something and it's not at that reserve you wont be the high bidder. The true reservse levels are generally revield a couple of days before the auctions close. The bid will jump up to a level where "The next bid meets or bets the reserve."

David

RGL

Heritage also has correctly listed the price for lots I have won ...

wildjag

Most of the coins I have won from Heritage are either right at or alittle above the prices realized estimates. If you want the coin bad enough, you might have to watch the bidding right down to the last second or you will be overbid and never win.

ConstellatioCollector

Heritage has correctly listed coins that I have won!!!

nugget369

Allright if the PQ 67 Lincolns on Heritage are bid up well in excess of wholesale, then where would you all recommend that I search.

Placid

BST board.
Start a thread WTB: MS67 lincoln's.

fountainheadgold

Heritage has correctly listed coins that I have won!!!

haletj

I wanted to bid on some ms67 late date Lincolns on Teletrade yesterday...seemed really nice and really cheap, but didn't, want to save money for the early dates. They seem to have a lot often so you can either pick out nicer ones or cheaper ones.

Newmismatist

Heritage's prices realized are accurate. I've sold coins thru Heritage and bought coins in the their auction and the prices always accurately reflected the actual transaction. If you're bidding on the PQ coins, there's going to be competition. Also, this is a pretty strong market these days & the wholesale price index may be a bit out of date in this market. You may have to bid higher.

gemtone65

I would be surprised if there was a factual basis for the assertion that any of the major auction firms do not post accurate prices realized. The only caveat relates to buy backs by consignors, and certainly Heritage among others no longer lists prices realized on such coins. My personal experience supports the observations of the Numismatist regarding Heritage, as well as the other well known auction firms.

A more subtle and probably much more important concern relates to how the auction firms treat your bid when it is very aggressive. That is, if your proxy bid is, say, twice the second high mail or e-bay bid, at what level will an auction firm start the bidding? This is crucial information to have in order to formulate a reasonably successful bidding strategy, especially when you are not a floor bidder.

The more you trust the auction house to start the bidding at one increment above the second high bid, the more agressive you can be be in your bid submission. But, even then, you can still get hurt by high reserve prices. In this regard, Heritage has recently begun to provide bidders with the reserve information as well. In sum, of all the major auction firms, I would say Heritage is the one you can have most confidence in overall to conduct the auction in a manner most equitable to the bidders.