Wednesday, February 24, 2010
BE WARY OF TRAVELING AUCTIONS
Watch out for traveling auctions that set up in a hotel or large (rented) house and advertise pieces owned by celebrities. This week we found a sticker on our daily newspaper that advertised a "due to losses caused by Bernie Madoff auction." That's a new twist to the old line, "including items belonging to." The "due to" doesn't mean fabulous antiques that once belonged to Madoff will be sold. The items up for auction probably belonged to people who lost money when they invested with Madoff. The "including items" line is a similar trick. It often means the auction has just one item that belonged to a celebrity. And that item usually has such a high reserve that it's never sold--it's just used for advertising. Always research out-of-town auctioneers in town for a week.
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These scams are as old as the auction business exists. Here is another one. A couple of years ago I was invited by an estate owner to have a look at a large collection of antiques. I was offered exclusive first dibs in case I was willing to make an offer for the whole lot. The estate was big and obviously from an important family so my hopes were high. Unfortunately a quick round through the 22 rooms and cellars made clear that probably hordes of family members or other dealers had raided the estate and cleared it from any “real” valuable antique. I left with no serious purchase. About 6 months later, to my surprise, a well established auction house announced an important estate auction of the late XXXXXX containing contents and collections dating back to the 18th Century. Of course I was interested and went to the viewing days. What I found was an estate jam packed with an odd mix of general antiques, collections, vintage and repro-furniture all placed as if they had been there for years. Carefully I asked the auctioneer if all these items were indeed previously owned by the late XXXXXX. I was guaranteed nothing ever moved since his passing.
I thought for a moment that maybe the goods were temporarily removed previous to the sale for “any reason”.
As a regular auction buyer I keep old catalogues and going over some of them I found about 60 items that had previously not sold at the same auction house, some of them even more than a year earlier. From that moment on I look at estate auctions more suspicious.
I trust more colleagues share my experience. Dutch, Dutch’n Duchess Antiques.
Use caution when attending shows sponsored by "Roadshow" staff at various hotels to get your items evaluated. These "shows" always want to buy your items at ridiculous low prices. The cautionary part is that the real Antique Roadshow shows do not offer to buy your items and do not set up at hotels. Always check with 2 or 3 local reputable dealers before you go to the hotel venue. I'm betting your old reliable local dealer will pay much more for your items.
The same thing happens here in Texas - only they run it as a "house for auction and all the items". They make it sound like a rich person's house auction with luxury items and antiques. In reality it is all new items - that they auction which raises the prices more than they could get new in a store! Buyer Beware!
I am in England, I do NOT see a problem NEVER buy an item of ANY sort just because it was supposed to be owned by such and such or so and so.
UNLESS it can be proved without doubt that they owned it, signed it (Books) etc.
Nowadays FORGERS can provide letters and papers written by the likes of Churchill etc using original papers and inks that past (supposed) expert investigation, Trust me I know some of these forgers!
ALWAYS BUY BECAUSE YOU LIKE THE ITEM then you are never disapppointed....
Saw this ad in the Plain Dealer also - it immediately set up suspicions. Thank you for posting this warning.
",,,Always research out-of-town auctioneers in town for a week."
HA HA HA this sounds like we should check them out for seven days before buying... which isn't a bad idea!
The phrase "due to losses caused by Bernie Madoff auction" does not seem misleading to me unless the items being auctioned did not belong to someone who suffered losses due to Bernie Madoff - in which case who would care anyway. How could an English speaker or reader take this to mean they are selling items owned by Bernie Madoff? Certainly a lot of misleading stuff is written every day, but I don't think this is an good example.
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