Bill, I don't know what's going on with prices but collectors have to be pulling their hair out on what some of these pieces are bringing. People are really changing flavors.
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Very low prices, yet a minty '86 Winchester pulled over $25 grand

There was also the almost-$1500 Pope, lot 2577.

All joking aside, all 42 single shots did sell.  And if only 4 sold above their assigned maximums, almost all the rest sold either near or just above their minimums; moreover, only 14 received fewer than 6 bids, the rest averaging just shy of 10.

So, yes, times may well be changing with regard to single shot values.  Nonetheless, I'm going to see what happens over the next 12-15 months with single shots offered by Amoskeag, Poulin, RIA, and even Cowan before I commit hara-kiri with my Pope all-steel cleaning rod.

Bill Lawrence

All the great old single shots are down in value overall. It seems the "Quigley" wave may finally have subsided and prices have readjusted to below normal. I personally think in time they'll come back, but not sure they come back to the crazy levels they hit a decade ago.
It really is a buyer's market right now. But those who don't have to sell are simply sitting on their collections and waiting. So that might create a situation where there's not enough supply until prices get back up a little. I think some of these recent guns that are selling are through estates, so the owners are gone and families are selling at a bad time.

The point about internet bidders may be valid, but I would have to examine it closely.  I'm not convinced.

I've bought a lot of guns on GunBroker over the years, and I can't count the number of times where bidding wars have broken out.  Often the final bid is a lot higher than expected.  These are all internet bids.

I've bought a lot of guns from various auction houses.  Only once, a decade or more ago, did I buy in person - at Amoskeag.  I've bought many guns from Julia's by phone bids, but after inspecting the listings online.  The same is true with other houses.  More recently I have bought guns online through Proxibid.  I bought three guns in this week's Morphy auction using their own online bidding interface.

My point is this:  Online bidding increases buyer competition.  It seems preposterous to say it diminishes bidding.  More buyers come to the table and submit more bids.  In this week's auction, on the Morphy live online auction site, I saw many occasions of bidding competition between floor bids and online bids.

So I guess I have to politely and respectfully disagree. JMHO, YMMV, etc.

This is not to say I disagree that prices have declined over the past decade.  A lot of people "in the know" have made that observation.  A couple years ago I had a conversation with Wes Dillon, of Julia's, on this topic.  In fact, he was the one who brought it up.  He said prices for high-dollar collectible firearms peaked in 2009 and have declined perhaps 20%.  At that time, there was nobody who had a finger on the pulse of the market better than Wes Dillon and the staff at Julia's.  I would be surprised to hear Wes attribute this decline to internet bidding.

Perhaps we are dinosaurs, with our love for antique firearms.  The future may be in plastic - but not my future.  I have a substantial collection it has taken me a lifetime to accumulate.  If it is worthless when I croak, that means I got all the value out of it.  You can't take it with you!

Curl

There's still and always will be prime interest in Colt revolvers and Winchester lever guns for the simple reason that following a kind of herd instinct, many collectors follow what "everybody knows" (thanks in no small measure to almost unending promotion): even if they really aren't The Guns That Won the West, they are for sure The Guns That will Always Line Your Pockets.  Need proof?  The four individual guns that have to-date finally broken the $1,000,000.00 ceiling are 1 Winchester and 3 Colts.

Also, comparing GunBroker, Guns International, etc. which are internet-only to auction houses that turn to live, real-time bidders once Proxibid, et al. have closed their doors is more like comparing nuts and oranges.

Last, more people "coming to the table" can just as easily mean more lookers as more bidders, a possibility that's given some weight by the observation that approximately 20 % of the most recent Morphy-Julia sales collected five bids or fewer.

Bill Lawrence

Like I said above, "It's time to buy."  Don't buy at the top of the market.  Buy when prices take a slump.

Curl

This isnt one hurricane or a slump. The hurricane has passed. I dont think we have hit the floor of this yet. Rebel the $1500 pope really went at the last Morphy auction- ok 1599 but close enough. Everyone I see behind the tables selling antique guns and single shots is 70,80,90 and I dont see anyone younger standing in front buying them. There is dwindling interest in a dwindling market with a rapidly dwindling demographic. We sell our guns back and forth to each other but no one in the next generation wants them so we have fewer and fewer people to sell them to each year. I have friends that have wonderful collections that they bought in place of paying into their 401ks counting on them to pay back in retirement.  The guns get brought out for sale with 2007 prices on them and they sit. The friends die and their families sell the guns for pennies on the dollar. Its sad and breaks my heart but I see it happen time and again. Sadly in 20 years easily over half of the serious collectors I know will be gone- many long gone- and the interest just isnt there to replace them or to reasonably absorb their collections.  Guns are a commodity and interest is down globally in this commodity and particularly down with antique guns. I dont see that ever changing. I have a notebook in a gunsafe with my guns listed and phone numbers of friends to call should i die suddenly. There are prices on the guns that would be hard to say no to. Id rather have my friends get my guns for pennies on the dollar than a stranger after the auction house skims off 30%.

Rebel wrote on Oct 24^th, 2019 at 9:33pm:


I think you missed it if you didn't win it at this auction. One did sell in the $1500 range.

Vall, I did miss it, do you have a link? I'm one of those old farts who does bid online, so far, so good. I have gotten a dog once or twice, but not on expensive pieces. Overall my experience has been good.

Bill, as you say, time will tell.

Aaron
still looking

amazing, I hope someone here bought it!

there was a guy that would bet you if you played the same lottery number every day, that the day it comes up you wouldn't have it.

seems, I'm that guy.

I've been dumping a lot of cash into my 57 Desoto Adventurer to finish it up and haven't been checking the auctions.

Aaron
lookin for the next one!

And here's the rub about the ever-increasing buyer's premium.  Unless the seller agrees otherwise in his auction's contract, under that section of the Uniform Commercial Code that governs auctions, the buyer's premium belongs - and I do mean legally - to the seller.  What's sad, of course, is that very, very few sellers know that and auction houses seldom, if ever, disclose it.

Bill Lawrence

I was almost afraid someone would ask that.  But the point is so important, here’s the simplified, condensed version.

As laid out in the UCC, there are three legal rules that apply, except in the case where the auctioneer is the owner of the property being auctioned.

First, the buyer’s premium is just another amount of the purchase money paid by the buyer for the property won.  Therefore, since the auctioneer is legally the agent for the seller and is being compensated by the seller via a commission and sundry contractually-agreed-to cost reimbursements, for the auctioneer to also receive compensation from the buyer creates a legal conflict of interest.

Second, legally an agent works under the control of a principal and only within the express authority granted by the principal.  In short, an auctioneer can only do what the seller authorizes.  Therefore, unless the seller has agreed via the sale contract to allow the buyer’s premium to go to the auctioneer, the auctioneer claiming it would allow the seller to sue for breach of contract.

Third, the agency relationship between an auctioneer and a seller is founded squarely upon a fiduciary duty that requires total loyalty to the seller, which includes the strict and explicit prohibition of “self-dealing”, the legal term for an agent acting in furtherance of his own interest and gain rather than that of the principal’s.  Therefore, again, unless he does so with the seller’s contractual approval, an auctioneer cannot keep the buyer’s premium proceeds without breaching the fiduciary duty owed to the seller.

How do you like them apples?

Bill Lawrence

Bill:

Thanks very much.  That was a very clear and concise explanation.

Rem

Good explanation, but would anyone want to bet on how the contract between the seller and auction house is written?
Chuck

Bill Lawrence wrote on Oct 28^th, 2019 at 4:37pm:



Bill,

I am quite interested in your analysis.  Would you please direct me to the sections of the Uniform Commercial Code that apply?

This is an important point.

Thanks,
Curl

Sadly, there were no Pope rifles for $1500 or so that sold at the Cowans auction today, unless I missed one.
The Stevens Pope, went for over $3300.
My quest continues.

I would not be surprised if "modern" guns do have to be logged.  But requiring a background check before returning your own non-sold guns is likely either the auction house being extra-cautious or a new ATF ploy for getting guns away from those who shouldn't have them in the first place.

You'd be right Bill, "modern" guns do have to be logged in, but the FFL has to do the background check from what I could find out, It's the law, not a optional matter of being extra cautious or a new ATF ploy. It has been for quite a while, I'm told.
My FFL friend did speak with a BATFE agent about it.

For what's it's worth, Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms sounds like a good name for a convenience store to me

Aaron

Much of what AZshot says is true, especially about "bubble" markets.  But as Beanie Babies, perhaps the most infamous of such proved, the bursting of the bubble can be unpredictable, quick, and without warning.  Therefore, I never recommend them.

Bill Lawrence

A comparison may be made to the collector car market.
 
Honda Accords are popular with the younger enthusiast, but classics like a 40 Ford or 50 Merc still hold their value.
Yes, Model A's have dropped in value, but not ACD cars.

Younger shooters prefer black guns, but classics like Popes will always hold their value. This has become clear to me as no one has offered a $1600 Pope to my recent WTB, and recent auctions have been much stronger than that. There is always a fluke, but it's not the norm. Still looking BTW.

Aaron

Aaron wrote:
For what's it's worth, Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms sounds like a good name for a convenience store to me.

Too late. We have one in Bailey, Colorado. And they sell green cross also!!!

Flatlander

Actually, it should be; Department of Health, Education and Firearms; Divison of Alcohol, Tobacco and Welfare.