I was inspired to post this by missing a mint condition dive watch dated 1967 with box and papers, sold in a local auction for £20. I had to go out, it was Lot 298 and I got in and online at Lot 314. I'm still mightily pissed off. Ok it was only an Ingersoll, but I quite liked it and it still had to be well worth twenty quid! I'm sure other OF members must have had similarly maddening experiences. Do tell!
I once missed out on an Ingersoll diver.... Oh wait, sorry, that was you. Personally, I prefer not to relive the agony of missed opportunities or bargains, having found that new one will soon freshen the wound anyway.
Yes, misery loves company, as they say. I use e-snipe occasionally, and set up a bid a few months ago just when they began to experience problems with Ebay. I honestly can't recall exactly what it was that I was bidding on (as I tried to purge it from my memory), but I liked the watch very much, and almost certainly would have won it (as it went for much less than my bid). It turns out that for a short period of time e-snipe was having trouble with Ebay, and many users had similarly disappointing experiences. To be fair, their system is now back to working well again, and I do still use it, though try not to for watches that I really want!
I recently missed out on an 18-size, 24-jewel Bunn Special pocket watch, perfect double sunk vitreous enamel dial, 14-Karat near perfect hunter case. It came to me to have the movement removed from the case which weighed 62 grams (2 ozs.) with the case springs. The movement was going to one guy, and the case to a scrapper! Made the antique dealer an offer of $2,000.00 (Cdn.). He told me he was committed, but he wished he had talked to me first! Another one bites the dust!
I meant to comment in this thread about an 18k pink gold Flagship caliber 30L that I missed out on years ago. I think my max bid was $760 and it ended up selling for $765 (the numbers might be off a little - it was years ago). Now, the winner might very well have gone Ashley and had a max bid of $1500 for all I know, but the sting still smarts a tiny bit, and I was reminded of this when I ran across this picture in my Photobucket account while pulling old shots of Constellation Pie Pans for the PPP thread. These sell for triple that price now! I eventually got an even nicer automatic pink gold that has since moved on, but this is the only nice Flagship I chased and lost out on.
Despite being severely funds-limited, I wandered into a local auction house and left a bid on this. Didn't win it as it went for over three times my limit. Not too distressed, despite it being an interesting piece. It had a badly cracked crystal, and though the hands moved and the day, date and jump day hand all seemed to move when the crown was turned, there are two small pushers at 2 and 4 o'clock on the side of the case that are supposed to set the day and date. Neither appeared to work.The dial may also have had some mild "refinishing". Also, my research would indicate that parts for the R 455 movement are like hens teeth. Oh well, onwards and upwards
I once missed out on a Porsche Design Orfina. It was a holiday, I was driving at the time. Everyone knows that auctions end lower when people are busy with holidays, presidential debates, etc. I missed the end of the auction by a few minutes and It went for half market value.
When I was 17 my dad came home and said that he had just seen a TR4 at a yard sale. They were asking $750 and it needed gearbox work. I was at the time driving a MG midget. I could not believe my dad didn't buy the TR on the spot (I had a part time job and had ample money to reimburse). We rushed back to the yard sale and of course it was sold.
Lecoultre was misspelt on this one in a local auction. I was on the telephone and planned to bid at the end....however the end came without any "fair warning" to me and it slipped away as I begged the person on the other end of the line to just BID! Now as Denis said I have no idea if it would have panned out in my favour, but it wasn't a pleasant experience! Inexperience on my part at the time and lesson learnt. Not sure I'll find another with the same dial. But as most of the pleasure comes from the hunt at least l'll be happy for long time. Unlesssss YOU know where this is?????