<< <i>From a buyer's perspective, I could care less. I'll just lower my bids to compensate for the increase in fee. It's not complicated. The people who will be most affected are the consignors. >>
Next time I get one of those calls from Dallas I'll just say "sorry, can't afford your fees anymore." I expect that it will be the widget consignors who get hit the hardest.
Well...If they must keep up with stacks...they raised their buyers premium 2+1/2 % so I will drop my bids by 5%. It's a matter of principal with me and I will do this! I did the same with Stacks.
Another point worth making is that what you generally see in the auctions are the coins that Heritage, Spectrum, etc., do not have a market for otherwise, have a surplus of, or problem coins they need to move out. It is impossible to know whether a given coin is a "collector" coin, PQ and high end unless you carefully examine the lot. I'll bet every coin I have bought at auction that was nice was a collector coin, not a dealer coin unless I bought the item cheap. And I know many of the coins I have run at auction have been conservatively graded or PQ for grade like this $20 1852-O in PCGS AU58 that would be worth triple what it sold for over ten years ago, and frankly went way too cheap because I was encouraged it would go higher without a reserve: http://images.goldbergauctions.com/php/lot_auc.php?site=1&sale=10&lot=1553&lang=1
Those at the auctions can eyeball all the coins for upgrades or real market opportunities if they sell cheaper than actual value. It is a huge advantage that they have. I believe that many of those at these companies are good, family-oriented people with sharp numismatic and business sense. But they are also quite adept at taking advantage of opportunities.
I hope it bites them in the .... Looks like to me the guns they auctioned the other day in dallas flopped. I had 25tracked that i was placing bids on the bulk of them and decided at the last second i could live with out them. I went back and looked and only 2 went over what i would have bid. Wether i had won any of them is beside the point but i would have most likely driven the price up. I doubt Heritage will miss my 30-40k a years in winning bids. I gave up on ebay also. I am computer challenged but i have found you can find the same stuff for less by looking at other sites.
I am sure it is old news but i have been buying hunting stuff thru companies that do business with wally world, it is 50 cents on the dollar and shipping is like 2 bucks on everything from 50 dollar gun backs to Leupold Mark 4 scopes.
Mark NGC registry V-Nickel proof #6!!!! working on proof shield nickels # 8 with a bullet!!!!
For people saying that they won't buy from Heritage any longer, let me just say this: If you are buying easy to acquire coins, you have plenty of options. However, if you are buying scarce / coins which are not inexpensive, you have four options:
1) Private party transactions 2) Dealers who are the first sources of said private parties for material 3) High profile coin auctions 4) The bourse floor at large shows
Re item 1), you have to know these people, and they have to decide that it is in their best interest to sell material to you. They often go to option 2), as these dealers will offer them first shot on difficult coins to acquire.
Re item 2), to gain the confidence of these dealers, you'd better buy from them every so often (how often depends on the dealer), or else you'll no longer get first shot at new material. The inherent risks of this are buying one or more expensive rare coins that you'd rather not purchase
Re item 3), if you don't know the private parties, nor the dealers mentioned above, this is really your best option. The large auction houses know this, and imo, that's why they think they can raise their fees and not hurt their business.
Re item 4), my experience is by the time nice material hits the bourse and I see it, said coins have already exchanged hands two or three times, and is more often than not priced too high to be seriously considered for a purchase.
As an addendum, I can't speak for anyone else, but it is my experience that "want lists" with dealers in themselves are not productive.
"Vou invadir o Nordeste, "Seu cabra da peste, "Sou Mangueira......."
Ian at Great Collection said his rates will stay the same.
Heritage - Rates are too high. I have to pay sales tax (Texas)...... how are the New York collectors liking that? Shipping rates are high. Slow... slow shipping.
Si vis pacem, para bellum
In God We Trust.... all others pay in Gold and Silver!
Unless you're a seller and work out a deal for consigning your coins... 10% sellers fee. Buyers fee is... soon to be 17.5% Not including shipping fees/etc to get the coins to Heritage.
Total... almost 30%
The point is, if you buy a $500 coin from a Heritage auction and resell, lets say within a year for $600, what's the true value of the coin? And why would you want to take that kind of loss? Glad I'm not a flipper.
Coin value appreciation should not happen because of "fees".
Remember before Heritage changed to defined fixed increments? Which Stacks now follows.
Industry practice was that increments were 5%-10% over the next bid. "Cut" bids were, as always, allowed. And all bids were accepted or rejected at the discretion of the auctioneer at the podium at that moment. Buyers' fees, when introduced to the US markets, were 10%. Not a big deal; backtrack an easily calculable 10% and you've got a viable and easily made increment. Instead of $1000 hammer you had $900+10%=$990. Later the change was made to 15% BF.
My belief is that these changes were made so that "retail/unsophisticated" consignors (often heirs who would sell it all in one or a few sales) would somehow think that being given "full hammer" was a better deal. After all, it was the buyers who paid the extra charges. So hammer less 5% seemed less of a burden than hammer less 15%.
Now Stacks and Heritage have fixed increments. The range that I consider most egregious begins at the $20,000 level. WTF is the story with the next increment being $22,500 (12.5%) Why an increment that is not easily calculable? If the increments were $2000 from that point on then cuts of $1000 would be easy to do on the fly. My personal belief is that $2000 increments/$1000 cuts are reasonable at this level. Let's not discuss what goes on at $50,000 and over.
Dontcha thing it's a little counter-intuitive to bid $21,250 as a cut rather than $21,000? My personal favorite is $38,750.
Virtually if not all standard cut bids (including those below $20,000) are now at least 5%. A backward calculation of 82.5% will never fall within the increment range. It's 2.5% less or 2.5% more. Lose the coin (82.5% is NOT a valid increment, nor is 87.5%) or pay more than before.
Forget the motivation; just do the math.
I believe I will piss off a few friends in the industry, but actually my remarks will have absolutely no impact at all. That ship has sailed.
Someone check my math.and the logic behind it.
Actually it's only arithmetic.
I'd love to be wrong.
Rick
"People sleep peaceably in their beds at night only because rough men stand ready to do violence on their behalf." - Geo. Orwell
Walker Proof Digital Album Fellas, leave the tight pants to the ladies. If I can count the coins in your pockets you better use them to call a tailor. Stay thirsty my friends......
<< <i>For people saying that they won't buy from Heritage any longer, let me just say this: If you are buying easy to acquire coins, you have plenty of options. However, if you are buying scarce / coins which are not inexpensive, you have four options:
1) Private party transactions 2) Dealers who are the first sources of said private parties for material 3) High profile coin auctions 4) The bourse floor at large shows
Re item 1), you have to know these people, and they have to decide that it is in their best interest to sell material to you. They often go to option 2), as these dealers will offer them first shot on difficult coins to acquire.
Re item 2), to gain the confidence of these dealers, you'd better buy from them every so often (how often depends on the dealer), or else you'll no longer get first shot at new material. The inherent risks of this are buying one or more expensive rare coins that you'd rather not purchase
Re item 3), if you don't know the private parties, nor the dealers mentioned above, this is really your best option. The large auction houses know this, and imo, that's why they think they can raise their fees and not hurt their business.
Re item 4), my experience is by the time nice material hits the bourse and I see it, said coins have already exchanged hands two or three times, and is more often than not priced too high to be seriously considered for a purchase.
As an addendum, I can't speak for anyone else, but it is my experience that "want lists" with dealers in themselves are not productive. >>
consignors are the losers... bids will factor in the higher juice-... just as the lower credit card limits hurt..
There was nothing in the Heritage PR to state why they were doing it except that to remain competitive they needed to raise their rate. So will this translate into better customer service, especially for the consignors? More than 100% of hammer, 107%+ like Superior when it was around paid me? Will the free food spreads be more lavish at these posh auctions? I hope so. Heritage has cast it's influence as far and wide as it can, with their representatives appearing regularly now on Antiques Roadshow.
<< <i>For people saying that they won't buy from Heritage any longer, let me just say this: If you are buying easy to acquire coins, you have plenty of options. However, if you are buying scarce / coins which are not inexpensive, you have four options:
1) Private party transactions 2) Dealers who are the first sources of said private parties for material 3) High profile coin auctions 4) The bourse floor at large shows
Re item 1), you have to know these people, and they have to decide that it is in their best interest to sell material to you. They often go to option 2), as these dealers will offer them first shot on difficult coins to acquire.
Re item 2), to gain the confidence of these dealers, you'd better buy from them every so often (how often depends on the dealer), or else you'll no longer get first shot at new material. The inherent risks of this are buying one or more expensive rare coins that you'd rather not purchase
Re item 3), if you don't know the private parties, nor the dealers mentioned above, this is really your best option. The large auction houses know this, and imo, that's why they think they can raise their fees and not hurt their business.
Re item 4), my experience is by the time nice material hits the bourse and I see it, said coins have already exchanged hands two or three times, and is more often than not priced too high to be seriously considered for a purchase.
As an addendum, I can't speak for anyone else, but it is my experience that "want lists" with dealers in themselves are not productive. >>
consignors are the losers... bids will factor in the higher juice-... just as the lower credit card limits hurt.. >>
No. The "big fish" will get an additional 2 1/2% of hammer. Everyone else will be SOL.
Personally, I don't care what the buyer's fee happens to be. I'm willing to pay $X for a particular coin. If a dealer or auction house is asking more than I am willing to pay, I don't buy the coins. Coins are discretionary purchases. If more people thought the way I did, there would be fewer people buying fewer coins, and said coins would cost less to reflect this.
"Vou invadir o Nordeste, "Seu cabra da peste, "Sou Mangueira......."
I used to be somebody, now I'm just a coin collector. Recipient of the coveted "You Suck" award, April 2009 for cherrypicking a 1833 CBHD LM-5, and April 2022 for a 1835 LM-12, and again in Aug 2012 for picking off a 1952 FS-902.
one of the major cell phone carriers is charging $30 now to renew the contract with its customer. i also heard that they want to charge $2 to send you the paper bill. what the heck
The last time I consigned with Heritage at a 15% buyers fee I netted around 89%....an 11% net commish. That's certainly nowhere near the potential 25% that was available if nothing was negotiated. So today the upper limit is 27.5% and my commish could now be approx 13.5%. But as usual, that could probably be negotiated to 12-13%. And I agree this will be steering more consignments towards dealer-brokers. And at some point even that safety net might get squeezed. When I consigned material back in the late 1980's my typical net commission for smaller consignments ($20K or so) was around 13% as I recall. From that perspective not much has changed in 20 years.
Nice to see Colonel Jessup exercising his keen mind with us once again. He always hits his target dead on.
I sent a "whine" to Heritage about their business decision. Here's their response:
"We thank you for your opinion and value what you have to say. We made this change only after long consideration. Please keep in mind that as a buyer, the total amount you pay, not the buyer’s premium, is what matters, and we calculate this amount for you at every step of the bidding process. In addition, as a seller, your fees are always negotiable."
So, pretty much echos the logic expressed in this thread, although I found it interesting that they left open the seller's side of essentially "well, we could negotiate the seller's fee down so that you get what you would have a few months ago."
<< <i>I sent a "whine" to Heritage about their business decision. Here's their response:
"We thank you for your opinion and value what you have to say. We made this change only after long consideration. Please keep in mind that as a buyer, the total amount you pay, not the buyer’s premium, is what matters, and we calculate this amount for you at every step of the bidding process. In addition, as a seller, your fees are always negotiable."
So, pretty much echos the logic expressed in this thread, although I found it interesting that they left open the seller's side of essentially "well, we could negotiate the seller's fee down so that you get what you would have a few months ago."
Interesting. >>
That's a nice canned response saying " We will do what we want and you will like it or lump it."
the sellers at Central States auction lost at least $400 .00 or maybe more from my lack of bidding.. Dealer friend says Heritage doing all these revenue enhancements in order to go public ....selling stock in Heritage
<< <i>I sent a "whine" to Heritage about their business decision. Here's their response:
"We thank you for your opinion and value what you have to say. We made this change only after long consideration. Please keep in mind that as a buyer, the total amount you pay, not the buyer’s premium, is what matters, and we calculate this amount for you at every step of the bidding process. In addition, as a seller, your fees are always negotiable."
So, pretty much echos the logic expressed in this thread, although I found it interesting that they left open the seller's side of essentially "well, we could negotiate the seller's fee down so that you get what you would have a few months ago."
Interesting. >>
If Heritage (or any other auction site) actually believed this line of BS they would not have buyers fees at all. Period.
<< <i>That's a nice canned response saying " We will do what we want and you will like it or lump it." >>
All businesses do what they want, and customers (well, prospective customers) either go along (like it) or find someone else to do business with (lump it).
Whose greed? The auction houses, for wanting to maximize their income? The consignors, for wanting to realize higher winning bids? The bidders, for wanting to minimize their costs?
<< <i>That's a nice canned response saying " We will do what we want and you will like it or lump it." >>
All businesses do what they want, and customers (well, prospective customers) either go along (like it) or find someone else to do business with (lump it). >>
People do what they do (even when they're organized into a company) because they think it's in their best interest to do so. I didn't say it was deep. I said it's reality.
<< <i>If Heritage (or any other auction site) actually believed this line of BS they would not have buyers fees at all. Period. >>
Well said. If you respect the intelligence of your bidders and consignors these types of games are unnecessary and even 10% is just a shell game. If you think many of them are stupid this is a good business decision.
<< <i>Ian at Great Collection said his rates will stay the same.
Heritage - Rates are too high. I have to pay sales tax (Texas)...... how are the New York collectors liking that? Shipping rates are high. Slow... slow shipping. >>
those states that charge sales tax for coins make this heritage change a loser
Some of you already knew it, but I just noticed StacksBowers auctions Buyers Fees are now 17.5%. I won't like paying an extra $25 on each $1000 lot won.
I collect Capped Bust series by variety in PCGS AU/MS grades.
<< <i>Some of you already knew it, but I just noticed StacksBowers auctions Buyers Fees are now 17.5%. I won't like paying an extra $25 on each $1000 lot won. >>
I knew that in the recent S/B auction in Baltimore, but I adjusted my maximum bid to reflect the increased buyers fee. I don't know if I scored big time, but I did win the lot I was interested in and was more than happy with the look of the coin in hand when comparing it to the online photos.
Beer is Proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy -Benjamin Franklin-
The difference in philosophies between the major auction houses and eBay are amazing. The auction houses suck up to the seller and tell the buyers to pound sand. But eBay sucks up to the buyers and tells the sellers to pound sand.
<< <i>The difference in philosophies between the major auction houses and eBay are amazing. The auction houses suck up to the seller and tell the buyers to pound sand. But eBay sucks up to the buyers and tells the sellers to pound sand. >>
I'm addicted to exonumia ... it is numismatic crack!
ANA LM
USAF Retired — 34 years of active military service! 🇺🇸
I am hoping this may mean I may find more material at dealer tables. I have bought all of two coins from dealers in the last three years, and three from Heritage.
"Vou invadir o Nordeste, "Seu cabra da peste, "Sou Mangueira......."
Comments
<< <i>They will keep raising it until business suffers. >>
The real problem is the lack of competition. When Stacks and Bowers merged together, we ended up with only two companies doing premium coin auctions.
<< <i>From a buyer's perspective, I could care less. I'll just lower my bids to compensate for the increase in fee. It's not complicated. The people who will be most affected are the consignors. >>
Next time I get one of those calls from Dallas I'll just say "sorry, can't afford your fees anymore." I expect that it will be the widget consignors who get hit the hardest.
Greedy FR's
Those at the auctions can eyeball all the coins for upgrades or real market opportunities if they sell cheaper than actual value. It is a huge advantage that they have. I believe that many of those at these companies are good, family-oriented people with sharp numismatic and business sense. But they are also quite adept at taking advantage of opportunities.
I am sure it is old news but i have been buying hunting stuff thru companies that do business with wally world, it is 50 cents on the dollar and shipping is like 2 bucks on everything from 50 dollar gun backs to Leupold Mark 4 scopes.
NGC registry V-Nickel proof #6!!!!
working on proof shield nickels # 8 with a bullet!!!!
RIP "BEAR"
1) Private party transactions
2) Dealers who are the first sources of said private parties for material
3) High profile coin auctions
4) The bourse floor at large shows
Re item 1), you have to know these people, and they have to decide that it is in their best interest to sell material to you. They often go to option 2), as these dealers will offer them first shot on difficult coins to acquire.
Re item 2), to gain the confidence of these dealers, you'd better buy from them every so often (how often depends on the dealer), or else you'll no longer get first shot at new material. The inherent risks of this are buying one or more expensive rare coins that you'd rather not purchase
Re item 3), if you don't know the private parties, nor the dealers mentioned above, this is really your best option. The large auction houses know this, and imo, that's why they think they can raise their fees and not hurt their business.
Re item 4), my experience is by the time nice material hits the bourse and I see it, said coins have already exchanged hands two or three times, and is more often than not priced too high to be seriously considered for a purchase.
As an addendum, I can't speak for anyone else, but it is my experience that "want lists" with dealers in themselves are not productive.
"Seu cabra da peste,
"Sou Mangueira......."
<< <i>Coins get more expensive every time they exchange hands. >>
Great, I have a couple I am burried in and need to profit from. You buying?
Heritage - Rates are too high.
I have to pay sales tax (Texas)...... how are the New York collectors liking that?
Shipping rates are high.
Slow... slow shipping.
In God We Trust.... all others pay in Gold and Silver!
Unless you're a seller and work out a deal for consigning your coins... 10% sellers fee.
Buyers fee is... soon to be 17.5%
Not including shipping fees/etc to get the coins to Heritage.
Total... almost 30%
The point is, if you buy a $500 coin from a Heritage auction and resell, lets say within a year for $600, what's the true value of the coin? And why would you want to take that kind of loss? Glad I'm not a flipper.
Coin value appreciation should not happen because of "fees".
Industry practice was that increments were 5%-10% over the next bid. "Cut" bids were, as always, allowed. And all bids were accepted or rejected at the discretion of the auctioneer at the podium at that moment. Buyers' fees, when introduced to the US markets, were 10%. Not a big deal; backtrack an easily calculable 10% and you've got a viable and easily made increment. Instead of $1000 hammer you had $900+10%=$990. Later the change was made to 15% BF.
My belief is that these changes were made so that "retail/unsophisticated" consignors (often heirs who would sell it all in one or a few sales) would somehow think that being given "full hammer" was a better deal. After all, it was the buyers who paid the extra charges. So hammer less 5% seemed less of a burden than hammer less 15%.
Now Stacks and Heritage have fixed increments. The range that I consider most egregious begins at the $20,000 level. WTF is the story with the next increment being $22,500 (12.5%) Why an increment that is not easily calculable? If the increments were $2000 from that point on then cuts of $1000 would be easy to do on the fly. My personal belief is that $2000 increments/$1000 cuts are reasonable at this level. Let's not discuss what goes on at $50,000 and over.
Dontcha thing it's a little counter-intuitive to bid $21,250 as a cut rather than $21,000? My personal favorite is $38,750.
Virtually if not all standard cut bids (including those below $20,000) are now at least 5%. A backward calculation of 82.5% will never fall within the increment range. It's 2.5% less or 2.5% more. Lose the coin (82.5% is NOT a valid increment, nor is 87.5%) or pay more than before.
Forget the motivation; just do the math.
I believe I will piss off a few friends in the industry, but actually my remarks will have absolutely no impact at all. That ship has sailed.
Someone check my math.and the logic behind it.
Actually it's only arithmetic.
I'd love to be wrong.
Rick
A+
MJ
Fellas, leave the tight pants to the ladies. If I can count the coins in your pockets you better use them to call a tailor. Stay thirsty my friends......
And I think that his comment regarding unsophisticated consignors is spot on.
RMR: 'Wer, wenn ich schriee, hörte mich denn aus der Engel Ordnungen?'
CJ: 'No one!' [Ain't no angels in the coin biz]
<< <i>For people saying that they won't buy from Heritage any longer, let me just say this: If you are buying easy to acquire coins, you have plenty of options. However, if you are buying scarce / coins which are not inexpensive, you have four options:
1) Private party transactions
2) Dealers who are the first sources of said private parties for material
3) High profile coin auctions
4) The bourse floor at large shows
Re item 1), you have to know these people, and they have to decide that it is in their best interest to sell material to you. They often go to option 2), as these dealers will offer them first shot on difficult coins to acquire.
Re item 2), to gain the confidence of these dealers, you'd better buy from them every so often (how often depends on the dealer), or else you'll no longer get first shot at new material. The inherent risks of this are buying one or more expensive rare coins that you'd rather not purchase
Re item 3), if you don't know the private parties, nor the dealers mentioned above, this is really your best option. The large auction houses know this, and imo, that's why they think they can raise their fees and not hurt their business.
Re item 4), my experience is by the time nice material hits the bourse and I see it, said coins have already exchanged hands two or three times, and is more often than not priced too high to be seriously considered for a purchase.
As an addendum, I can't speak for anyone else, but it is my experience that "want lists" with dealers in themselves are not productive. >>
consignors are the losers... bids will factor in the higher juice-... just as the lower credit card limits hurt..
There was nothing in the Heritage PR to state why they were doing it except that to remain competitive they needed to raise their rate. So will this translate into better customer service, especially for the consignors? More than 100% of hammer, 107%+ like Superior when it was around paid me? Will the free food spreads be more lavish at these posh auctions? I hope so. Heritage has cast it's influence as far and wide as it can, with their representatives appearing regularly now on Antiques Roadshow.
<< <i>
<< <i>For people saying that they won't buy from Heritage any longer, let me just say this: If you are buying easy to acquire coins, you have plenty of options. However, if you are buying scarce / coins which are not inexpensive, you have four options:
1) Private party transactions
2) Dealers who are the first sources of said private parties for material
3) High profile coin auctions
4) The bourse floor at large shows
Re item 1), you have to know these people, and they have to decide that it is in their best interest to sell material to you. They often go to option 2), as these dealers will offer them first shot on difficult coins to acquire.
Re item 2), to gain the confidence of these dealers, you'd better buy from them every so often (how often depends on the dealer), or else you'll no longer get first shot at new material. The inherent risks of this are buying one or more expensive rare coins that you'd rather not purchase
Re item 3), if you don't know the private parties, nor the dealers mentioned above, this is really your best option. The large auction houses know this, and imo, that's why they think they can raise their fees and not hurt their business.
Re item 4), my experience is by the time nice material hits the bourse and I see it, said coins have already exchanged hands two or three times, and is more often than not priced too high to be seriously considered for a purchase.
As an addendum, I can't speak for anyone else, but it is my experience that "want lists" with dealers in themselves are not productive. >>
consignors are the losers... bids will factor in the higher juice-... just as the lower credit card limits hurt.. >>
No. The "big fish" will get an additional 2 1/2% of hammer. Everyone else will be SOL.
Personally, I don't care what the buyer's fee happens to be. I'm willing to pay $X for a particular coin. If a dealer or auction house is asking more than I am willing to pay, I don't buy the coins. Coins are discretionary purchases. If more people thought the way I did, there would be fewer people buying fewer coins, and said coins would cost less to reflect this.
"Seu cabra da peste,
"Sou Mangueira......."
Recipient of the coveted "You Suck" award, April 2009 for cherrypicking a 1833 CBHD LM-5, and April 2022 for a 1835 LM-12, and again in Aug 2012 for picking off a 1952 FS-902.
<< <i>This sounds a lot like airline bag fees >>
one of the major cell phone carriers is charging $30 now to renew the contract with its customer. i also heard that they want to charge $2 to send you the paper bill. what the heck
nothing was negotiated. So today the upper limit is 27.5% and my commish could now be approx 13.5%. But as usual, that could probably be negotiated to 12-13%. And I agree
this will be steering more consignments towards dealer-brokers. And at some point even that safety net might get squeezed. When I consigned material back in the late 1980's my
typical net commission for smaller consignments ($20K or so) was around 13% as I recall. From that perspective not much has changed in 20 years.
Nice to see Colonel Jessup exercising his keen mind with us once again. He always hits his target dead on.
"We thank you for your opinion and value what you have to say. We made this change only after long consideration. Please keep in mind that as a buyer, the total amount you pay, not the buyer’s premium, is what matters, and we calculate this amount for you at every step of the bidding process. In addition, as a seller, your fees are always negotiable."
So, pretty much echos the logic expressed in this thread, although I found it interesting that they left open the seller's side of essentially "well, we could negotiate the seller's fee down so that you get what you would have a few months ago."
Interesting.
<< <i>I sent a "whine" to Heritage about their business decision. Here's their response:
"We thank you for your opinion and value what you have to say. We made this change only after long consideration. Please keep in mind that as a buyer, the total amount you pay, not the buyer’s premium, is what matters, and we calculate this amount for you at every step of the bidding process. In addition, as a seller, your fees are always negotiable."
So, pretty much echos the logic expressed in this thread, although I found it interesting that they left open the seller's side of essentially "well, we could negotiate the seller's fee down so that you get what you would have a few months ago."
Interesting. >>
That's a nice canned response saying " We will do what we want and you will like it or lump it."
Dealer friend says Heritage doing all these revenue enhancements in order to go public ....selling stock in Heritage
<< <i>I sent a "whine" to Heritage about their business decision. Here's their response:
"We thank you for your opinion and value what you have to say. We made this change only after long consideration. Please keep in mind that as a buyer, the total amount you pay, not the buyer’s premium, is what matters, and we calculate this amount for you at every step of the bidding process. In addition, as a seller, your fees are always negotiable."
So, pretty much echos the logic expressed in this thread, although I found it interesting that they left open the seller's side of essentially "well, we could negotiate the seller's fee down so that you get what you would have a few months ago."
Interesting. >>
If Heritage (or any other auction site) actually believed this line of BS they would not have buyers fees at all. Period.
Experience the World through Numismatics...it's more than you can imagine.
<< <i>That's a nice canned response saying " We will do what we want and you will like it or lump it." >>
All businesses do what they want, and customers (well, prospective customers) either go along (like it) or find someone else to do business with (lump it).
<< <i>greed really suxs >>
Whose greed? The auction houses, for wanting to maximize their income? The consignors, for wanting to realize higher winning bids? The bidders, for wanting to minimize their costs?
Plenty of greed to go around, I'd say.
this...
<< <i>"The auction houses, for wanting to maximize their income"
this...
And it's not greedy for buyers to want to pay less? Why not?
<< <i>
<< <i>That's a nice canned response saying " We will do what we want and you will like it or lump it." >>
All businesses do what they want, and customers (well, prospective customers) either go along (like it) or find someone else to do business with (lump it). >>
<< <i>
That your "canned response" response is silly.
edited to add... everybody acts in their own self interest. Expecting anything different will generally result in disappointment.
<< <i>
<< <i>
That your "canned response" response is silly.
edited to add... everybody acts in their own self interest. Expecting anything different will generally result in disappointment. >>
As silly as your your deep thoughts!
<< <i>As silly as your your deep thoughts! >>
People do what they do (even when they're organized into a company) because they think it's in their best interest to do so. I didn't say it was deep. I said it's reality.
You can accept it or not. Your call.
<< <i>If Heritage (or any other auction site) actually believed this line of BS they would not have buyers fees at all. Period. >>
Well said. If you respect the intelligence of your bidders and consignors these types of games are unnecessary and even 10% is just a shell game. If you think many of them are stupid this is a good business decision.
I used to buy at Heritage and Bowers auctions as a respite from my hard work as a CPA, dealing with the complicated tax code.
After July 31st, it appears some of the new increments will remind me more of the IRS tax code at work than my fun and relaxation in my hobby.
I am going to have to join you for breakfast and watch you perform your magic in getting complimentary breakfasts with the lovely waitresses!
<< <i>Ian at Great Collection said his rates will stay the same.
Heritage - Rates are too high.
I have to pay sales tax (Texas)...... how are the New York collectors liking that?
Shipping rates are high.
Slow... slow shipping. >>
those states that charge sales tax for coins make this heritage change a loser
<< <i>Some of you already knew it, but I just noticed StacksBowers auctions Buyers Fees are now 17.5%. I won't like paying an extra $25 on each $1000 lot won. >>
I knew that in the recent S/B auction in Baltimore, but I adjusted my maximum bid to reflect the increased buyers fee. I don't know if I scored big time, but I did win the lot I was interested in and was more than happy with the look of the coin in hand when comparing it to the online photos.
<< <i>The difference in philosophies between the major auction houses and eBay are amazing. The auction houses suck up to the seller and tell the buyers to pound sand. But eBay sucks up to the buyers and tells the sellers to pound sand. >>
ANA LM
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"Sou Mangueira......."