1 auction - several large 2 rail estate collections

Ed, I am very sorry to hear that you lost a good friend. My sincerest condolences to you and to John's family.

Yeah Ed that's a bummer.

Take care

Unfortunate that this will be on the 6th; I have a prior engagement that I cannot break that day that I agreed to many months ago.

 

Then again, while it might be very interesting to see all of these items sell, I really have very little need of any additional cars or engines.

Some darn fine equipment there Ed. Wow all I need to do is live nearby and have a BIG pocketbook. Brad see all the PacLtd cars!?

You know me I'm a sucker for passenger cars.


Would you look at that Midland Big Dome! Wow and done right too. Whew

 Ed, Sorry for your loss.

OK, I'll be the one to ask it, what does "L&T" indicate after several brass locos?

How about "Locomotive and Tender."

Thanks Bob....I thought of that, but this is a model RR seller offering an auction opportunity to model RRers.  Does that mean that every listing w/o L&T is only an engine or a tender??

 

I would expect that distinctive on a general resale site that features tenders staged backwards in front of the wrong steam engine.

 

Surely this must mean something else.

 

No matter what L&T is, this looks like a great opportunity!!  Glad we do not have one of our swap meets in the near future, this event is going to siphon off a bunch of cash.

Tom,

Having been to many Maurer auctions over the years I can state that they generally do a good job of describing the lots on their printed list.

While many steam locomotives are listed as L&T (locomotive and tender) many are not although they are indeed a Locomotive and tender.

 

Maurer specializes in Lionel, Flyer, and tinplate but has had some wonderful O scale collections at times. I recall many years ago Bob, the employee who usually does the O scale auctions, had a Lenoir Milwaukee steam locomotive up for bid. He started at something like $50 and was taking $25 increments. Once it got to several hundred dollars someone finally said something like $1500 to put things in perspective and up it went from there.

 

I believe we can expect to see all the O scale "heavy hitters" at the auction.

Some nice pieces in the collection.    

Some nice pieces in the collection.....    

 

Mr Heil,

 

who are the heavy hitters?   

-- just curious...

Norm Pullen, Bill Davis, Jack McGarry, the guy from Kentucky (not Keith Wiseman), and some others. These are the guys who purchase large collections for resale and do a lot of business on ebay and through magazine ads and always have lots of stuff available at the major 2 rail shows.

Mr Heil,

 

Those are some familiar names....

 

Last time I attended one of these, Norm and maybe 6 others were  buying ~80+% of the room at prices that promoted my early departure.

The "big dealers" generally go into the auctions with a ceiling bid in mind as they have a good idea of what they can resell the piece for and still make a profit.   For the sake of John Robert's widow I hope there will be some active bidding on his lots.  One lesson re-learned in handling the estate is the need to have a detailed inventory of the rolling stock.  Comments like DCC installed or any super detailing help to add value.  Original boxes tagged with inventory control numbers can speed the process.  In this case it took an unbelievable number of hours to gather the items prior to hand off to the auction house. 

 

Thanks for the expressions of concern regarding John Robert's passing.  John was a member of our Monday night O scale group and influenced the design of a company coal mine and housing site on my branch line.  In his honor the mine and community   bear his name. 

 

Even though I have no bidding interest, it will be interesting to see what pieces like the Lenoir RDC's, Fischer passenger cars, and Yoder "critters"  will bring at auction. 

 

Ed Rappe

Indeed.  This aspect and that this will no doubt also serve as something of a social event would be the only real reasons for me to attend. 

Ed, if I lived in the region I would certainly come in and bid fairly on some of the pieces. I would love to own some of them. Colorado is a long hike from the auction for me.

Agreed I hope the sale yields well for the estate. It's a beautiful collection.


       

I do not know  John Roberts , but based on the listings, He had style and an eye.

 

To my way of thinking there is a distinct difference between operators/collectors and those who professionally buy and sell brass trains for a living. I can also say with a high degree of certainty the previously named 'heavy hitters' and or their 'representatives' will most likely be in attendance. Anyone looking for a 'bargain' at this auction are up against pros who are running a business to make a profit on each and every item they take home!

 

nyccollector

Which means you can get them cheaper by out-bidding the heavy hitters than you can by buying from them.  Of course if you are looking for stuff at half the market value, it will be close.

 

Remember, the heavy hitters have to make money on resales, so they are not paying market.

Last time I was at a Mauer auction I agreed with you on arrival.

Martin is correct, the heavy hitters have their own big money customers.  They know that Joe Blow will pay almost anything for B&O stuff, that Pennsy Pete will do likewise for big PRR steam, etc.  They are not necessarily buying for resale to the general market but in many cases for resale to these customers.  Thus, they can pay in excess of the general market value at auction.  It's not fun to watch if you're in the audience though.

Irregardless of who the bidders are an auction house is the only way to move a collection in a short period of time,especially O scale.Estate sellers want the cash value  not the trains, in todays market the few big buyers of these collections are no longer willing to make a major up front investment even greatly discounted for product they may be selling for years to come[therefore the very low cash offers if the seller requests a price]. Today a few of the dealers in this market will broker a collection for a fixed fee, will it sell quickly "NO" but over the long term the seller will realize what the market will pay for the models, a large Brass collection over time should yeild a steady stream of income for the estate. If you sell out before you check out you will probably leave your heirs more money!JMO

Not sure about that auction house, but I thought many of the online auctions had pre-start bidding, you can place a bid right now, and then let the auction run the numbers, just like eBay does.

 

Of course you cant watch it live, but if you have that number in your mind, the max you want to pay for it, then why not. Its not like you are at a show were you can flip the thing over to check it out, or take it to the testing table either.

This is a traditional auction Fri preview 6-8 Sat 9 bidding starts.

I don't think Maurer does much phone or internet bidding....

Mauer does have an absentee bid process. 

 

BTW, you are the Devil.....or at least his agent, Mephistopheles,