The safest way to sell your antiques for the best reward

What is the safest way to sell your antiques for the best reward?

Selling antiques and collectables must be easy, surely?

Well, yes, it is but selling antiques and collectables safely and receiving the correct money for them is a different story, clearly, we all want a fair price for our items, but we realise that we will not receive the High Street retail price or that insurance valuation of 20 years ago, don’t we?

If not, read on.

Let us say that you want to sell a writing box that has been left to you and not only do you have the receipt from 20 years ago you also have an insurance value for it. It was bought for £300.00 which was a good deal as the insurance valuation was £550.00.

Take it to the local auction and they offer a sales estimate of £80.00 - £100.00, you know that it is worth £550.00 so why let them sell it?

Run it down to the local antiques centre and you are offered £50.00; you are not happy and tell them that it is worth £550.00. It was never worth £550.00 as an insurance value includes an amount for you having to source a writing box which is a close match to your £300.00 one. You are then told that they are out of fashion and it really is only worth £50.00 to the dealer.

Not happy you refuse and take a look around the antiques centre. Low and behold there is a writing box nearly exactly the same as yours for £200.00 so you go back to the dealer and point this out. It is pointed out that this box is nearly the same but it has the original writing surface, two original ink wells and has never been restored.

What I am trying to point out is with antiques and collectables you cannot compare like with like as there is probably little comparison to the trained eye.

I have often heard “I have a chest of drawers just like that one, you have it priced at £200.00 but mine is bigger, mine must be worth £250.00”. Sadly, not the smaller a chest of drawers the more expensive it is, a 3’ chest can fit in far more spaces than a 3’6” one, it’s logical.

So, where can you sell your antiques and collectables safely for a fair price and not get ripped off? I am going to say sell to me, of course I am but take a look at the different avenues open to you below and make your own mind up.

Auction

At an auction you consign your item to the auctioneers to sell for the highest price possible, they will  suggest an estimate of its sale price. If you check the small print in the bigger sale rooms, you will note that this estimate may not be a true estimate of its value though.

 You will be charged a commission for them to sell your item, a local to Oxford auction house charges 16.5% (+ VAT) to the seller and a whopping 32.4% commission to the buyer. So, if an item sells for £1000.00 you will receive £802.00 (16.5% + VAT of £1000.00 is £198.00) but the buyer will be charged £1324.00, there is £522.00 of the value of your £1000.00 that the auction house has taken!!

Insurance is another problem, most auction houses will insure a piece at the middle of their estimate, how many times do we see in the press that an item sells 20 or 30 times its estimate??? Your £10 000.00 vase could be valued £30 - £60 and gets broken or stolen and you end up with a payout of £45.00!!!!!

Then you wait to be paid, be prepared for payment 4 – 6 weeks after the sale

The question must be asked that unless your item is important and needs promotion from one of the major international auction houses why would you sell at auction?

Ebay and internet selling platforms

These platforms used to work for sellers and money could be made, sadly they are not so good now, but they do still work for buyers and scammers though.

Look at one of the online sites to find the value of your vintage camera, well that will not work, the cameras listed have not sold so they are probably overvalued. You can look at the cameras sold and discover that the prices can be 50% different. This is probably due to condition and some really specialist detail regarding the lens or some such. So how do you value your item? Either too high and it will not sell or too low and you lose out.

Then there is the time to take photos, list the item and check back every day answering questions. If it does sell there is more time wrapping the item and posting it.

If the camera is delivered broken, scratched or not as described the buyer can ask for their money back – here is the scam, you make a refund and the item is returned only it is not the item you sent, you have lost both your item and the payment.

A lot of work and a big risk.

Distance buyers

We have all seen the companies on television offering a buying service, they send you an address label, you box up your items, and they get back to you with an offer.

They claim that your items are insured whilst in the post, how can they be as until they have received them, they do not know the value of them?

I really don’t understand why anybody would risk it.

Antiques centres

This has got to work, or so you would think. Take your antiques along to the local antiques centre for a valuation. You will see the person on the desk and ask if they are interested, you must remember that there is a very good chance that they may not specialize in your item or have the first clue what it is. They could only have been in business a few years

They will buy it as cheaply as possible to sell to another dealer in the centre taking 50% profit. You must be very lucky to find the right person on the right day. This sounds far fetched but I know of more than a few antiques centres where only the manager is allowed to buy items that come through the door.

Antiques shops

Take a look at what the antique shop has on its shelves, if you are selling a George III silver tea set and they are selling  Queen Elizabeth II coronation mugs at £3.00 each it is not worth even getting the set out of the bubble wrap. If there are bayonets and tin hats in the window you are not going to get the right price for your mahogany tea caddy on bracket feet that Thomas Chippendale designed and published in his catalogue.  

Perhaps the shop is owned by a general dearer, a general dealer is just that, there is an element of guessing involved and even though we have the Internet to use now there is little chance of you getting a fair price. You have to remember that having a shop creates large overheads, so a shop owner needs to buy as cheaply as possible. If you think about it selling to the means that you are paying their shop rent.

So, who is the best person to sell to? As I said at the top, me!

Sell My Antiques

My service is completely free, no commission, no overheads to be passed on.

I have been dealing in antiques 42 years this year but as I explained earlier, no one can know it all. I have a network of dealers and experts who can advise me daily from Antiquarian books to Zoomorphic Saxon strap ends *, the complete A – Z of antiques.  

I have referees who can be contacted who will confirm that I am bona fide.

The way I work is very simple, you can either telephone me for a chat about your items or send me images via email, from this I can value your items and if I am interested in any of them I can arrange to visit you to make you an offer. If you accept my offer I will pay cash or BACS there and then.

If you are not happy with my offer or I am not interested in items I can advise on specialist dealers who may be interested.

It is that simple, no listing on web sites, no posting items with no insurance, no massive commission charges, no pressure buying, just a professional, reliable and friendly service with over 40 years’ experience.

To save wasting your time I am not interested in 20^th / 21^st century glassware or china.

www.sell-my-antiques.co.uk

01235 414972

I do not deal in antiquities as detailed on my website but can recommend dealers who do