Selling Railway Items

[7013]

I was recently asked by an old lady to look at her late husbands collection of model railway items. There were about five locos four of which were fairly cheap locos and one mint boxed Wrenn 'Devizes Castle' with original handbook etc. which was obvoiusly the pick of the bunch. There is a box of Hornby/Lima etc. coaches and a box of wagons. There is also a box of buildings and miscellaneous trackside and bit boxes etc. most of the rolling stock is boxed and I guess 1970-80s Leaving aside the Wrenn Castle I guess there is £2-300 worth of stuff. She has asked to sell it for between £800-1000 which I think is unrealistic and have told her that I think she is expecting too much. She is not interested in selling individual items, I would have bought a couple but she was adamant that she wanted the lot to go. I have said I will try to find the best way for her to sell the lot. I have thought of Vectis Auctions and contacted them, I am not sure about dealers and how to approach them, and she does not really want to use ebay. Any suggestions on the best approach would be appreciated, I want to get the best deal for her so that she gets a realistic but fair price.

[Classsix T]

Tough one this. An item is only worth as much as anyone is prepared to pay. Whilst you want to do the best you can for the lady, you have to be honest with her (which you have been).

Tell her a reserve as she sees fit will result in the whole lot remaining unsold.

 

C6T.

[Kenton]

Where do "little old ladies" get such expectations from?

 

Possibly talk to a local club, or local model shop, but expect the same advice.

 

I would expect best possible prices from ebay but at a cost of time and effort presenting individual items.

 

I'm afraid I think the dealers (and I include the auctioneers) to give the lowest possible price (their interest is to make a killing, and not to be kind to widows and orphans).

 

Sounds like she has been given good advice, if she just wants disposal then a "favourite" charity shop will be best all round.

[34theletterbetweenB&D]

The 'expectation' probably relates to a conversation with the late husband at some point in the past in which he told her that "All that money he had spent on the model railway had come good, collectors were now paying high prices for the more desireable items, and he shouldn't be surprised to realise at least £800 for his collection". The trouble is of course such information has a very short shelf life, and what was possibly true perhaps a decade ago, most certainly isn't today.

[Guest dilbert]

Looks like a case of having to go thru a process of (re)setting expectations. One approach would be to reference similar items that have sold on eBay over the last few months - this will a least, for those items that were sold, give an indicative price range. How varied is the content when it comes to selling as a lot ? A dealer would obviously take this into account (in order to break up the lot into individual item)... but then you're back to where you started from... dilbert

[Pugsley]

Where do "little old ladies" get such expectations from?

It's not just little old ladies these days, it seems to be everybody.

 

If I had a quid for the number of time that I've seen people asking a ridiculous amount of money for utter sh*te, I'd have enough, er, to buy said utter sh*te.

 

Possibly a bad example..

[kevinlms]

It sounds like she has already made up her mind - that is for someone to give her at least 800 pounds for the lot. She wants a high price without any "messing about".

 

 

As from your description that is highly unlikely she is going to accept any other sort of deal, so it is probably best to walk away.

 

You could give a a list of suggestions, for her to think about once she realises her ideal isn't going to happen.

 

1/ Send to local club to sell by commision at an exhibition? An understanding will have to be determined first on what happens to unsold goods.

2/ List on eBay - are you prepared to do this for her?

3/ Continue with contacting big name actioneers - almost certainly they will take the lot, but at very cheap prices for low value items.

4/ Give her a price for items you are personally interested in & if she says yes to those - consider it sold!

5/ Don't give her prices or estimates for anything you're not prepared to buy, as worthless numbers.

 

 

People buying 2nd hand goods will almost always pick and choose, unless all the goods in a box are cheap. The high prices her husband referred to only applies to "Mint Boxed".

 

I once visited a layout in a garage that the owners had "inherited" when they moved into the house about 5 years ago. They suddenly decided the layout might be worth something, so they contacted my local club. However, it consisted of about 20 metres of very badly rusted steel track & points, with about 20 plastic kit buildings on a very solid baseboard built into the end of the garage. No locos or rollingstock or anything else.

The advice was for them to carefully remove the buildings for sale by commission at our exhibition, the rest was really only fit for the tip. The original owner probably knew this, but couldn't be bothered breaking it up.

They were clearly very disappointed.

 

Kevin Martin

[7013]

Thank you all for your suggestions, it is always good to get another perspective on these things. I will have to talk to her and give her the news that her expectations are far too high, it will help that I tell her that I have sought opinion (which I am doing) and my estimate for all the things she has will probably only realise about £200. I will offer her the 'Ramsays' top price for the items I want if I can get her to sell them individually and suggest a selling strategy for the rest. I did mention to her that there were certain charitable organisations that would love some of the things she had but it fell on deaf ears. Many of your observations are correct and some people through no fault of their own have over inflated ideas of worth.

I remember taking my mother into M&S for some new clothes she purchased three pairs of trousers, a couple of blouses and pure wool pullover for the princely sum of £30, when we got to the pay desk she excalimed 'How much?' and followed up saying 'I normally only pay £5 pounds for this much at the charity shop.' I wished the floor would open up and swallow me as I payed for the goods for her and we left hurridly.

[ThePipersSon]

Another option is to take the items to a local model shop which deals with second-hand. My local one seems to buy in collections (boxes full of ??) and then sells the items individually. This would probably achieve less money than selling on Ebay, but it could be an option, Also, you'll should get a reasonable idea of what the whole lot is worth.

[The Stationmaster]

I would try an auction house which has a record of achieving good prices - look at back auction results. A good average for 'run-of-the-mill' locos at auction in a mixed lot is c.£30-40, Wrenn locos can go very high depending on condition and completeness of packing, some auction houses seem to achieve ludicrously high prices on fairly ordinary scenic items in a mixed lot. Coaches depend very much on what they are and condition but you could be looking at anything between £5 and £20 each. But at an auction house you will pay seller's commission (usually 15% I believe plus VAT on that commission so broadly 18% of the hammer price in fees - some auction houses will charge more).

 

But at least going that route you can get rid of the lot as it will usually sell - albeit sometimes not for a vast amount, you never know. I think you'll get a poorer deal from a dealer than selling at auction unless it's one you know and you know what the stuff is worth, at least at an auction you have the advantage of dealers fighting against each other and thus paying more!

 

But whichever way she sells it from your description - even at a high price auction - she definitely isn't going to get £800 although she might beat your estimate (due to scenic stuff selling for ridiculous prices as much as anything else). Have a look on this page fro some results http://www.specialau...cats.php?h_id=1

[chris p bacon]

In the past I have brought a couple of layouts and broken them up, I am quite clear in what I want from each board and what I am willing to pay (point motors/points) and it has been up to the owners whether they hang on to the rest and sell that seperately. both times they chose to sell me the boards and were realistic of their value.

Sadly it sounds like she has watched "cash in the attic" or something similar.

[298]

Thank you all for your suggestions, it is always good to get another perspective on these things. I will have to talk to her and give her the news that her expectations are far too high, it will help that I tell her that I have sought opinion (which I am doing) and my estimate for all the things she has will probably only realise about £200. I will offer her the 'Ramsays' top price for the items I want if I can get her to sell them individually and suggest a selling strategy for the rest.

 

You could give her an itemised list, just in case she gets in touch with another expert so they could give her a price without wasting their time viewing the collection.

 

I think alot of the expectation comes from those ridiculous daytime Antique Roadshow spin-offs, an hour on a Sunday seemed fine but now it seems every programme between Breakfast and the Six o'clock news is either about property or selling antiques. That one where they buy things from a fair then sell them (at an inevitable loss) at auction is bad enough, but one I try to avoid is "flog it", where the punters are obviously wound up by the director and can only give snide comments. I can't work it out, are they greedy or do they think the expert is trying to rip them off...?