making auctions "honest"???

I went to the HWy 64 auction in Baldwin Saturday. On my way down, I was talking with a friend of mine. We were discussing the crooked crap that goes on at most sales, like when the auctioneer runs up price for a bit, acting like he has bids, but then starts much lower after he doesn't get one hooked. Or the jockeys hiding out in the shadows, pretending they aren't buying stuff for their lots, but they are. Or the sellers protecting their items.

I wonder why anyone hasn't cut out the caller and run a sale like this -

Crowd walks up to item and anyone who wants it steps forward. Say I'm one. I walk up and say I'll give 100. The next bidder has 10 seconds to walk up and say "I'll give 200", or whatever they'll give. $1 minimum up to $10, $5 minimum to $50, $10 minimum to $200, $25 minimum to $1000, 100 minimum beyond that. So it goes until the last person is standing with their price. Cashier is just there to say SOLD after people stop bidding... If you're the owner, you can walk up and say "I'm the owner and I want at least $1000" If no one steps forward, the crowd moves on. Cuts out all the BS of jockeys hiding their bids, auctioneers running shills, sellers protecting thier stuff, etc.

the highest bid gets it in the end

You're paying for all that entertainment.

That would take WAY too much time.

If you went to the Hwy 64 auction you where at one of the crookest auctions around. Dan Powers, Gary Delarm and Mike Fransen own and run this auction., Two of those three are as crooked as a door nail. Mike being about the only dissent one. Then you add in two or three local jockeys you have 80-90% of the true sale items owned by this bunch. I quit going to this auction years ago. It is always rigged. There is NEVER a bargain on any of the good equipment there. One of the Powers bunch or the jockeys usually own those items. I saw one corn planter at three different auctions but one of these fellows only to have it sold on CL a month later.

With the way Powers runs his auction, with supposed Internet bidding, you never know when they are buy bidding you unless you know the players. They usually represent the equipment fairly well but your going to be giving full RETAIL on most items if your the high bidder,

(quoted from post at 18:40:01 03/29/15) That would take WAY too much time.

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...as compared to the 4630 at said sale? They shill bid it up to $11,000, and said they needed more. Took five minutes to tell the crowd that it wasn't gonna sell for less than $12K. In my sale idea, the owner would have walked up and said "I need $12K minimum". After 10 seconds, if no one steps forward, the crowd moves on. No beating up the crowd, no shill bidding, no fake bids, they just move on...

I was at Jeff's sale last summer. He owned a 4430 that was up for bids. When the bids weren't going where he thought they should be, he grabbed the mic from the auctioneer and threatened to light the tractor on fire for the insurance money. How long did his tirade take???

Those are called cowboy auctions, saw one on youtube once. Bull sale, bidding starts at $500, everyone who wants in raises their hand. They run the bid to $600, $700 ect. until only one guy has his hand up, sold.

Nate

(quoted from post at 18:52:08 03/29/15)

(quoted from post at 18:40:01 03/29/15) That would take WAY too much time.

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...as compared to the 4630 at said sale? They shill bid it up to $11,000, and said they needed more. Took five minutes to tell the crowd that it wasn't gonna sell for less than $12K. In my sale idea, the owner would have walked up and said "I need $12K minimum". After 10 seconds, if no one steps forward, the crowd moves on. No beating up the crowd, no shill bidding, no fake bids, they just move on...

I was at Jeff's sale last summer. He owned a 4430 that was up for bids. When the bids weren't going where he thought they should be, he grabbed the mic from the auctioneer and threatened to light the tractor on fire for the insurance money. How long did his tirade take???

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Most auctions I've been to either the owner has to bid on his own item and pay the commission if he "buys it back" or they say when they start that the item has a reserve and the will announce that the reserve has been met. I enjoy auctions. Mostly watching others when they are either bad mouthing and item or bidding. About the only thing I don't like are the few auctions when an assistant is claiming to have a bid when clearly no one bid. I will only give an auctioneer one chance and if I think they may be cheating I leave and very attend another of their auctions.

What always amazes me is what some people will pay for boxes of really cheap tools. I've seen busted up junk tools sell for an amazing amount of money.

Rick

In your scenario whats to stop the owner or a shill bidder from stepping forward and bidding.

Auctions will never change. Have a price in mind. Bid to you own it or stop and walk away.

I guess i never worry about whose bidding against me. I have a price, that i will pay. if it's $1 over, i'm fine with that. someone else can
have it. just because i consign something to an auction, doesn't mean i wanna give it away, just because no one was in the market. I pay the
penalty for buying it back, by paying the by-back fee!

I think that if you want to go to a real auction a person should spend some time at a Richie Brothers auction. I have seen millions of dollars of
machinery change hands in a days time and I think that it is run as straight forward as can be. Most run for several days at a time.

Auctioneers are snakes, i saw only one honest one in all my life. too bad the guy got cancer and died,..he was only 36.

I think most farm sales are pretty straight forward. I said most. That said, I feel its the consignment sales that cause a lot
of the angst. Consider this, on a farm sale a good auctioneer will encourage his seller to sell everything with no reserves. If
an auctioneer starts accepting reserves and the sellers act on them, word soon gets around that So & SO Auction Co often does a
no-sale on major items. I drove 2 hours to stand in a cold rain all day just to get top bid on X item just to have them no-sale
it. I'll never go to his blankety blank sale again. Pretty soon SO & SO Auction Co can't draw a crowd because of his reputation
so only half a crowd shows up so the seller shot himself in the foot anyway by putting reserves on. Everybody looses.

The auctioneers around here do no reserves BUT if its a major item they're concerned about, they will usually announce there's a
reserve price before the bidding starts. If it won't bring half what it should, they usually say Farmer Joe can't let it go for
that. Top bidder see Farmer Joe after the sale and see if you can't work something out. Nobody complains about this as most
agree with Farmer Joe and don't want to be in the same position.

Now on a consignment sale, the auctioneer has 800 people he's working for. Most consignment sales are nothing more than a place
to get rid of surplus, junk, old or repairable vehicles, out-of-date equipment, trailers and trucks that won't pass DOT, tractor
weights that look just like the ones somebody stole from your yard, your Grandmas old lawn mower etc.

People want to get rid of junk without the hassle of advertising, phone calls, tire kickers and creepers on your property. But
its also human nature to want top price for your treasures. Now it just isn't practical for a consignment auctioneer to have a
list of reserve prices for every other item for every other seller. Most will tell you if you want to protect your price, just
have someone bid for you or bid on your item yourself until you get the price you want. That's how you protect your price. Its a
very common practice. Is it really being dishonest? Its just a way of setting a reserve price. Push the bidders to hard and you
end up bidding your own item back, pay the auctioneer a minimum and your still stuck with the item. Its a way of finding a price
you both agree on. Nobody is forcing the other to bid higher than he's comfortable with be it buyer or seller. All depends on if
somebody wants to buy worse than someone wants to sell.

You don't want auctions "honest," you want to shift the advantage heavily in favor of the buyer so you can buy things cheap.

Why do you think it's the seller's obligation to basically give away his possessions? You'd be crying bloody murder if it was your stuff!

These tactics are sometimes effective, but they can also backfire. THAT is just one of the reasons why things show up at multiple sales.

These tactics are only "dishonest" if you've been "victimized" by them. What it really is, is buyer's remorse.

Seller wants the most money, not "honest". So that will never work.

Bid what you think an item is worth, and stop bidding if it goes past.

That's about the only 'honest' you can get at an auction.

Nearly everything on my farm came from an auction.

Paul

What's not honest about wanting the most money for whatever you're selling?

You don't have much fun at auctions do you? lol

Do like I do, I don't go to auctions for the reasons you give, crooks.

I never assume the auctioneer is playing fair, I simply figure out what I am willing to pay for something and when it goes over it, I stop bidding. Some days you win, some days you do not.
As cheap as I am, most of the time I go home empty, but when I do win the bid, I feel like I won big. Not to hijack this thread, but rrlund, are you going to the clare yoder auction on
the 18th?

I agree with others that say "bid what you want to pay, stop when it's too much".

The only thing I don't like is if there is a reserve and no one is told. Nothing worse than to think you've bought something and then find out you didn't.

BTW, similar thing also happened once at a real estate auction. Bunch of parcels were auctioned off of one large piece. After the last lot went, auctioneer said we're going to go to the second round where people can combine bids on parcels and if the price for multiple parcels was more than what the individual pieces went for, the combo bidder wins. Huh?

Lots of unhappy people who got outbid by people when their lot was folded into another bid package.

Then, when all was said and done, the auctioneer and seller huddled and the auctioneer announced the sale was off, the seller didn't get what he wanted from the overall sale. (Several million, IIRC, was the overall total. Don't know what he wanted)

Now EVERYBODY was unhappy, except the auctioneer who got a payday.

That was the last time I went to one of that outfit's real estate "auctions".

Nowadays, I research real carefully before I waste my time going to an auction. There had better be multiple pieces I'm interested in, not be too far from home, not interrupting any of my major projects I might have going on. My time is worth something and as I get older, it becomes more valuable.

(quoted from post at 03:55:47 03/30/15) You don't want auctions "honest," you want to shift the advantage heavily in favor of the buyer so you can buy things cheap.

Why do you think it's the seller's obligation to basically give away his possessions? You'd be crying bloody murder if it was your stuff!

These tactics are sometimes effective, but they can also backfire. THAT is just one of the reasons why things show up at multiple sales.

These tactics are only "dishonest" if you've been "victimized" by them. What it really is, is buyer's remorse.

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How would my system disadvantage the seller? If they want to protect it, they or a representative step forward and protect it. Everyone knows exactly what is going on. Everyone knows exactly where the price is. Everyone knows who the bidders are. Up front, honest, straightforward buying and selling.

What I'd like to see go away it the auctioneer pretending to have bids and running the item up before dropping back down and starting over. The only reason they do this is in hopes that the bidder isn't paying enough attention and tries to get in after they think bids have been accepted. I've watched things sell cheap at auctions because the crowd doesn't trust or like the auctioneer. The buyers bid low because they're sure there's shenanigans with the bidding.

I think the only person cranky with my idea would be the crooked auctioneer that likes to pull the dishonest tricks.

Auctions are one of the last reminants of the free enterprise system in this country so I say live and let live.If you don't like the rough and tumble stay home with mama.I don't really expect a person to bring a $3000 tractor to an auction and stand there like a dolt and watch it sell for $500.The auction you describe would be miserable but you are free to organize one and see how it does.So when is your auction?
Always keep 3 things in mind when going to any auction
1)Its being put on to make the auctioneer and his backers money.
2)The auctioneer is trying to make the sellers the most money he can.
3)The buyers need to look out for themselves because no one else is going to.

The answer to that is of course Take all your busted up tools to that auction
next time(LOL).

Honest auction?? really??? If you bought and sold at hundreds of auctions annually over many years like I did and had to do it for a living you gain a different perspective. Sure, I like honest and live my life that way but I have no control over the auction or auctioneers or the owner or all the other bidders and most of what goes on sort of "goes with the territory" IM NOT SAYING ITS RIGHT OR WRONG OR DEFENDING IT MIND YOU only sayin. Its sort of like "if you cant stand the heat get out of the kitchen" or the old WC Fields line "You cant cheat an honest man" lol

Its not the oldest profession, but auctioneering has its methods and means but if you did it for a living and learned all the tricks of the trade you learn to live with it (NOT saying its right or wrong) and learn to pay what its worth to you not one cent more and be done with it. Then let all the other rookies or crooks do as they think they have to, just take care of yourself and run your own business in an honest fashion and give good service and you can make it despite all the pitfalls of auctions......

John T Long time past farm equipment and truck dealer

If a jocky buys a peice of equipment, then you know that the item was cheap and there is still more money to be made. A jocky has to make his purchases worth while. If you watch those guys bid and then stop bidding, you know the item has crossed over from wholesale to retail price range.
Loren

Powers Aucton is about as crooked as they get. I like the Highway 64 sale but not how Powers does business. The best is Sweeny at Waukon IA if they are going up they have money no games there. I hope to go their sale on the 31st. Did you see any of the six John Deere chuckwagons sold at the highway 64 sale? They were in rough shape and I already have to many but was wondering what they sold for as the wagon gears were worth more than the boxes. Tom

The gears were fair, boxes were junk. Guy I brought along bought 2 at $600 each. Others brought 600 to 800.

I'm going back down today to pick up a Parker box I bought.

Thing of it is the auctioneer is the sellers agent. Doesn't matter if it's a regular auction or a consignment auction the auctioneer is representing the SELLER, not the buyer. Now there is self interest on the part of the auctioneer because he gets paid a commission. So it's in the auctioneer and sellers best interest to get the top dollar for each item. So it becomes the buyers who have to protect themselves by A. knowing what they are buying B. knowing the value C. not exceeding the value or the top dollar amount that they are willing to bid.

So if you don't like the system that you are not going to change don't go! Seems pretty simple to me.

My auction rules are 1. predetermine what I'm willing to pay for an item. 2. never exceed that limit. Most often things I'm interested in sell for more than I'm willing to pay but I enjoy them anyway.

Rick

i was to a sale in sd a couple of years ago and there was a lady auctioneer no names but i was bidding on a tractor and stop right away they kep looking for one more bid and nothing so they said sold but they could not find the bidder so they look at me and i ask her if she was pulling bids out of the air she said that they dont do that but they still had no bidder she was not happy with me at all there was 400 people at the sale looking at her