If I could pick it up for €600 ish - worth a punt?

STANDY · May 17, 2018

Dedalus05
I would have had to factor the time spent finding the watch and the time & difficulty I would have had selling it into the resale price. I have no seller's profile on Ebay, no network of enthusiasts, no 200 posts etc - so I'm guessing 12 or so working hours with email and what-have-you back and forth with multiple interested parties. Granted I would enjoy the process, but when talking business I don't work for free.

So lets say I'd won the watch, I am thinking €2300 +€300 for time spend (a very modest €25 an hour considering were talking about a luxury brand), and then whether I do it, or the buyer does it, €300 for a service - bringing the total to near €3,000 w/ shipping and insurance.

Are we joking above....... I hope you are.

STANDY
No way this will hammer lower than 1200 😗

😁

tyrantlizardrex · May 17, 2018

Dedalus05
So lets say I'd won the watch, I am thinking €2300 +€300 for time spend (a very modest €25 an hour considering were talking about a luxury brand), and then whether I do it, or the buyer does it, €300 for a service - bringing the total to near €3,000 w/ shipping and insurance.

Would we still be describing a 'bargain'?

You'd be describing how a dealer would price this watch.

If a collect were playing at catch and release, they might remove the outer filth, and sell it as unserviced for a little bit more than they paid.

I thought we were all in this for fun watches, and the occasional handful of beer tokens? 😉

Dedalus05 · May 17, 2018

STANDY
Are we joking above....... I hope you are.

Honestly, no. When I am joking it is obvious I hope. I am just oblivious.

For example, when I spotted the auction - I had imagined swanning over to Adam's about 200 yards from my door and bidding on a dirty watch that would attract little interest from those in the room. The idea even that someone on the internet might bid hadn't even crossed my mind.

I enjoyed the fantasy for a while, and I am enjoying the company here killing down-time in work, and picking all y'alls brains. Will I learn anything? Pfft. Who cares? I just hope not to be a nuisance.

tyrantlizardrex · May 17, 2018

Dedalus05
For example, when I spotted the auction - I had imagined swanning over to Adam's about 200 yards from my door and bidding on a dirty watch that would attract little interest from those in the room. The idea even that someone on the internet might bid hadn't even crossed my mind.

Not that long ago, you might have got lucky, but now that every tiny little regional house uses the Saleroom and it's like, you're suddenly competing with the whole world.

STANDY · May 17, 2018

Dedalus05
Honestly, no. When I am joking it is obvious I hope. I am just oblivious.

For example, when I spotted the auction - I had imagined swanning over to Adam's about 200 yards from my door and bidding on a dirty watch that would attract little interest from those in the room. The idea even that someone on the internet might bid hadn't even crossed my mind.

I enjoyed the fantasy for a while, and I am enjoying the company here killing down-time in work, and picking all y'alls brains. Will I learn anything? Pfft. Who cares? I just hope not to be a nuisance.

tyrantlizardrex
Not that long ago, you might have got lucky, but now that every tiny little regional house uses the Saleroom and it's like, you're suddenly competing with the whole world.

Funny thing is 10 years ago he would have got it for €600 without anyone on the internet bidding 😗

Dedalus05 · May 17, 2018

tyrantlizardrex
Not that long ago, you might have got lucky, but now that every tiny little regional house uses the Saleroom and it's like, you're suddenly competing with the whole world.

True story: I was drinking in Grogan's one Sunday in 2006 and this somewhat arrogant young-fella was talking about the money he was making dealing art. I hadn't met the guy before (nor since), but I didn't like him and decided to raise the prospect that the market was way-over heated like the entire Irish economy at the time. "It won't last forever", I says. "Prices are going nowhere but up" he says. He was a fool.

Cue the crash in 2008, and we're all in the shit. Adam's is having a Fine Art auction, and out of curiosity I walk over on the heels of a starving artist friend of mine. At the end of the auction I had picked up a lot of five prints for €5 - three of which I gave away as gifts, and two of which I sold for a combined €200 or so since. Another piece, a wood-print of Don Quixote commissioned by Pope Pious the Nth I got for €50 - the artists name escapes me, but I still have the piece in storage and I am confident I'd get a chunk of change for it. My artist friend picked up a Nathaniel Hone pastoral piece for €200 because it was framed in such a way as to disguise the signature, the room was half empty, and no-one else spotted it for what it was.

I know as much about art as I do watches.