Monday, September 26, 2005

Live Auctions -vs- Online Auctions

I am an auctionaholic.

I actually stopped going to live auctions for quite sometime because they were costing me a fortune and we were running out of living space in our home. They can become very addictive but they are oh so exciting!!

Well.... I went to one over this past Memorial Day weekend, I justified it because it was only a block from my house and it started at 10:00 am. I drove by the evening before and it didn't look like there were too many items sitting out so I figured that I would be home by 3:00 pm. Plus, it was a teaching experience, my husband had never been to an auction.

Right off the bat I bought the first item that came up for bid. A great set of 1950's tumblers in a wonderful metal holder. Lot 2.... also went to bidder #73, that was me. There were a few items in this box lot that I needed and I also sold a couple of items I didn't want to some folks so my $5.00 box lot only cost me $2.00.

That is the beauty of live auctions. If you win a box lot of items, invariably there will be atleast one person in the crowd that will buy one item from you out of that box. Several of my box lots this day included crochet thread, I wasn't all that interested in the miles of crochet thread but several ladies were.... they bought the thread from me and I kept the goodies that I wanted.

I also bought a 1920's oak 4 poster full sized bed for $110 and a bachelors chest with beveled mirror for $40. 2 vintage cans of Phillips 66 grease in metal cans, a copper boiler for $5.00!!!! And a bevy of many wonderful items.

It got to the point if an item wasn't getting any bids the auctioneer would look out into the crowd for bidder #73 (me) and ask me for $1.00, if I would bid that 1.00 others would jump in and start bidding.

Hubby left the auction at noon and told me to call him when I was ready to come home. We finished up at 4:30 pm. It took 3 FULL pickup loads to get my treasures home and my wallet was about $350.00 lighter. But all in all it was a magical day and one I will be repeating again soon.

This kind of fun is not to be missed by anyone and I will not deprive myself I will just learn to budget.

No comments: