Hmmm.
Thankfully it doesn't work that way here, but I've always thought that it probably should or would eventually. If I was running an estate company, I would auction off what I knew to be the big ticket items at the end of the day. Give people a chance to look around the house and clear out the small stuff and examine the things they want to bid on. Seems you could offer the client a maximum return that way. As much as I love scoring things at ridiculous prices, part of me feels bad when I come to respect the people whose stuff I'm rifling through, and wonder if they shouldn't get more (or their estate) for the fabulous things they amassed. For example, at this sale I went to, the sideboard in question (picture below) went for under $200. It seems really weird to me that a company would do that. The desk in this thread was under $50. Anyway.
And on a surreal note
I was at an estate sale this morning and by the time the company came out to give out #s an hour before the sale, I was still the only one there. By the time the sale opened there was a typical crowd. Of the many I have attended over the years, this has never happened. It weirded me out more than the typical estate sale shenanigans do.
It's true.
I have been going over in my head since the sale, wondering how I would have handled it if I'd been there a half hour earlier. The real-life winner of the piece and I would probably not be friends now, and I would have shoved the rude dude into the entryway wall before he ever had a chance to potentially break anything. I know I did the right thing by letting the guy step in front of me (I was standing exactly where you needed to be to get there first), but part of me wants to go back over and be that dickhead. But this is a moot point if the sale-runners grow spines and not let scummy people act like children.
Shenanigans
I've never been to this type of sale, I don't think they are common in the UK, if they exist at all. Over here, if the family realise the potential value of what they have it gets put into an auction at a legitimate auction house; if not the house clearance firm makes a killing (or the dealers they give the good stuff to do!).
As someone above mentioned, all this shenanigans would be neutralised if the "good" items from an estate sale were auctioned off at the end of the sale.
Disturbing comments here. Ide...
Disturbing comments here. Identify the head of the sale and pay for it before inspecting it? What a bunch of underhanded crapola.
Where I live there are tickets on the item. You need to have the ticket in hand to pay for the item. And once you've taken the ticket off the item, you are obliged to buy it.
Most of the honest sellers here have gotten rid of sign up sheets because they were rife with fraud and also unfair to out of town buyers who would have to make two trips to the site-one to sign up and another to wait. Impossible for some people. There is still one company that has a sign up sheet and they're really dishonest about it. You'd be first in line only to discover that they signed 30 of their friends and family up at the store in the weeks preceeding the sale. They'd also do things like say "no sign up sheet" in the listing and then change it the night before..."Oops, forgot to mention we have a sign up sheet. Call our store to sign up." And it would be midnight and impossible to call the store. I hate that company and would never go to another one of their sales again.
Hats don't hold places in line. And you can't hold places in line for a friend that isn't there. If two people are waiting and someone steps away for a few to get coffee or go pee, that's one thing. Even to sleep for an hour if it's at midnight. But none of this garbage where someone waits and someone else shows up five minutes before opening.
The worst experience I've had is with older folks. Seriously. I've been waiting at 5 am and some old lady comes up at 7 and acts like she's looking at the sign up list and then just stays at the front of the line. That's another reason why sign up sheets are BS. Another old elephant of a guy would walk as slow as possible and block people from going past him after he'd let his partner slip through.
I won't go to estate sales with sign up sheets anymore.
You should have told the fat a** with the hat to take a hike and worked to block her and her husband. Tripped them as they ran past. Lol.
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