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GameBats
02-01-2011, 08:08 PM
I'm having trouble interpreting the Mears auction rule in quotes below.
Does the auction house place bids for the consignor in order for the item to reach a desired reserve?

FYI...This is not a flame, I'm just a little confused.


"Certain lots may have reserves established by the consigner as a means to protect their investment. Reserve bids may be executed on these lots only up to the point of the established reserve, but not past it. Since as part of the auction contract a reserve may have been established, an item with a reserve is not considered for sale or transfer until that established reserve has been met. Bids up to the reserve may be executed confidentially on behalf of the seller in a manner similar to the execution of absentee bids."

Thanks,
John

Lokee
02-01-2011, 08:19 PM
I'm having trouble interpreting the Mears auction rule in quotes below.
Does the auction house place bids for the consignor in order for the item to reach a desired reserve?

FYI...This is not a flame, I'm just a little confused.


"Certain lots may have reserves established by the consigner as a means to protect their investment. Reserve bids may be executed on these lots only up to the point of the established reserve, but not past it. Since as part of the auction contract a reserve may have been established, an item with a reserve is not considered for sale or transfer until that established reserve has been met. Bids up to the reserve may be executed confidentially on behalf of the seller in a manner similar to the execution of absentee bids."

Thanks,
John

that is sure what it sounds like.

GameBats
02-02-2011, 08:58 PM
So, If an auction item has a hidden reserve of $20,000 and the public bidding appears to stall at $10,000 the auction house may place the next bid and every other bid up until the reserve of $20,000.

How does this differ from shill bidding? I'm confused?

LWMM
02-02-2011, 09:48 PM
So, If an auction item has a hidden reserve of $20,000 and the public bidding appears to stall at $10,000 the auction house may place the next bid and every other bid up until the reserve of $20,000.

How does this differ from shill bidding? I'm confused?

The difference from shill bidding is that because the reserve is already in place, if someone's bid is bumped up (e.g., from $10,000 to $12,000) they will not have to pay the extra $2,000; with the reserve not having been met, neither amount (10 or 12 thousand) would be enough to purchase the item. However, if the reserve has been met (here at $20,000), a bidder could equally purchase it at 20 and at 22 thousand, so it would be unquestionably unethical to bid it up the extra $2,000.

I assume that the reasoning for bidding up an item to the reserve is largely psychological, where what look to be high legitimate bids may inflate a bidder's idea of an item's value. If one is the only bidder above $10,000, it may be hard to justify paying double that just to meet the reserve. However, if it seems that someone else is willing to pay $19,000, justifying $20,000 may be easier.

Furthermore, if one does not have a good sense of what the reserve is, one one may quit bidding earlier if repeated bids do not meet it. For example, if one bids seven times after $10,000, raising the price in toto to $17,000, one might just give up, not having a sense of what is needed to meet the reserve. However, if the item has already been artificially bid up to $17,000, that same legitimate bidder may be more likely to bid it up the $3,000 more needed to meet the reserve.

Excepting cases in which the auction house were to explicitly label each "reserve bid" as such (which would significantly mitigate the first psychological impact), the practice feels shady to me, as it's effectively trying to pull bidders along and get them to engage in artificial bidding wars.

When Mears's auctions are running, do they show the bidding logs at all, or just the total number of bids and current amount? If they do display logs, does each lot give some sort of ID for each unique bidder (such as how eBay does, with a coded user name and number of feedback)? The reason for asking is that I wonder how "reserve bids" are displayed: whether they just bump up the number of bids (and by how many?) and the high bid, or they are given some identifying information.

GameBats
02-03-2011, 10:44 AM
"Excepting cases in which the auction house were to explicitly label each "reserve bid" as such (which would significantly mitigate the first psychological impact), the practice feels shady to me, as it's effectively trying to pull bidders along and get them to engage in artificial bidding wars.

When Mears's auctions are running, do they show the bidding logs at all, or just the total number of bids and current amount? If they do display logs, does each lot give some sort of ID for each unique bidder (such as how eBay does, with a coded user name and number of feedback)? The reason for asking is that I wonder how "reserve bids" are displayed: whether they just bump up the number of bids (and by how many?) and the high bid, or they are given some identifying information."



Can Dave Grob or someone from Mears explain?

GameBats
02-06-2011, 02:17 PM
I found Hunt Auctions has the same policy as Mears word for word.


From Hunt Auctions Bidding Rules...."Reserve bids may be executed on
catalogued lots on behalf of the seller and shall be executed confidentially
in a manner similar to the execution of absentee bids."

I didn't see anything within the Lelands Auction rules to indicate they allow for confidential bids on behalf of the seller.

trsent
02-08-2011, 01:28 AM
"Excepting cases in which the auction house were to explicitly label each "reserve bid" as such (which would significantly mitigate the first psychological impact), the practice feels shady to me, as it's effectively trying to pull bidders along and get them to engage in artificial bidding wars.

When Mears's auctions are running, do they show the bidding logs at all, or just the total number of bids and current amount? If they do display logs, does each lot give some sort of ID for each unique bidder (such as how eBay does, with a coded user name and number of feedback)? The reason for asking is that I wonder how "reserve bids" are displayed: whether they just bump up the number of bids (and by how many?) and the high bid, or they are given some identifying information."



Can Dave Grob or someone from Mears explain?



MEARS has their own forum at www.mearsonline.com (http://www.mearsonline.com) and I would assume they would answer such questions there since they rarely post on this fourm.

GameBats
02-09-2011, 11:25 AM
Thanks Joel, I posted my question on the Mears forum.