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I think the gist here, is that the quality of original cars is mostly crap now at BJ, because of the risk of a no-reserve auction. And while these sales are real,
they are an anamoly compared to the market . Nobody says they did not happen, but they have to be taken with a grain of salt when analyzing the market. Most of the time the best cars still change hands privately by informed enthusiasts.
I have watched more than one fellow hobbyist get smoked at BJ with great cars. This particular site, has quite a few big smart players in the game (not me
) and they know what is going on.
John
Have purchased 3 cars at auction.
10 straight Scotsdale BJs
Russo and Steele Scotsdales since they started
At least 20 assorted Mecums
A few RMs
and 18+ years of daily open-outcry auction participation on the financial floor of the CBOT
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I am new here and you guys don't know my background so maybe I should explain where my comments come from. I am 59 years old and began my sales career in a small town Dodge/AMC dealership in Illinois in 1968-1974. I was in various auto related businesses (including owning and auto repair shop and a body shop)for 30 years and retired myself from working for others in 1998 when I moved to Sedona, AZ. Over the past 40 years I have owned 150+ sports, muscle, antique and special interest cars as well as a few motorcycles personally. I have lived in Arizona for 28 years and had attended the B-J auction for 27 consecutive years as well as many other AZ auctions over those years.
I used to agree with the idea that the B-J prices were not in touch with reality, but don't any longer. Why? Well, the general conversation at these winter AZ. auctions was that most of the GOOD cars would be at B-J. That WAS the case before they went "no reserve." The cost associated with these auctions were pretty much the same, so if you were able to plan far enough ahead to get into the limited list of cars why not take your car there people thought. However since they were "the" auction to take your car to, B-J started "picking and choosing" the cars they would accept and the quality rose considerably. It stands to reason that these car were the cream of the crop and would bring top money in the hobby, but this is not what we see in general sales prices throughout the REST of the hobby. This went on for many years, there was a lot of schill bidding, where dealers that sold 50% of their cars at auctions would spend their advertising dollars with entry fees, bidding up their own cars to "create a history" of "it bid to X amount previously" for justification of an expected price.
These auctions could not pay their expenses from the money earned on the run fees so they of course are looking to SELL the cars not just have them run.
B-J has been the only one that can get away with running a no reserve auction and still have people standing in line to consign based on the reputation they earned over the years. For the past 8 of 9 years I have had a bidders paddle and spent the entire week at B-J. I have become aquainted with many of the big players that attend B-J and the other AZ. auctions. I have seen a decline in the quantity of quality cars at B-J every year since the no reserve policy began. There USED to be some big dealers that always had a large number of high quality cars that were regulars at B-J for years that decided they would not participate in the no reserve auction. Some big players found out the hard way that in order to buy their own cars back what it would cost them and left with hard feelings never to return.
Other AZ. auctions have capitalized on this such as Russo & Steele and have picked up a lot of the quality cars AND buyers that have walked away from B-J.
What I am saying here is that B-J is no longer the leader in these hig prices as they used to be. It is realy spread all over the country over other auction companies now, but B-J STILL gets the biggest national COVERAGE as they have the contract with SpeedVision so more people sees their results quicker.
If you think that these auctions don't drive the price of the market you are dead wrong. 3500 or more of these old cars are sold in the AZ. auctions in one month. Then add all of the other auctions throught the country and remaining year, and you will find that private, high end transactions don't hold a candle to the auction volume. The private sales do not get reported. The old car price guides are determined from reporting dealers and auctions, so those guides are determined practically 100% from those sources.
I can tell you first hand that many of the high end players that trade in a small circle of other like players are paying top dollar to trade iron. These guys don't need the money but this is just another way of keeping score of what they do and having things that others can't have. Some of these guys are really not even car guys, it is just a venue to play in.
I am not trying to be a smarta$$ here, just relaying what i have seen regarding this subject first hand over the last 28 years.
BTW, I did not attend B-J at all last year and only spent one day at Russo & Steele with a good friend that was selling a car. Also I have never bought or sold a car at B-J or any other specialty auction as I have never felt that I ever needed any help buying or selling a car. I did watch a good share of it on SpeedVision.
The expense of just attending these auctions and the fact that the quality cars are spread over too many auctions held at the same time has taken away the luster of the experience for me.
I hope that some of you got something out of this epic post.