How to Buy or Sell
You’ve never bid in an online auction before and you’re wondering what you need to do. We’ve gone to great lengths to make the process simple and user friendly
Bidding
To bid in any of our auctions, you must first have a Bidder’s Account. (If you already have a bidder’s account with HiBid, you will not need to create a new one. Use your HiBid account for any of our auctions.)
IF YOU ALREADY HAVE A VALID HIBID ACCOUNT
- Click “Login/New Bidder” at the top of the auctions screen
- Fill in your username or email address and password then click the “Log On” button.
IF YOU DO NOT HAVE A VALID HIBID ACCOUNT, create a Bidder’s Account by following these instructions:
- Click “Login/New Bidder” at the top of the auctions screen
- On the screen that opens, click on the “REGISTER HERE” button for a new account (NOT the Log In button)
- Keep in mind you are creating a new account. If you fill in the email address and password above the REGISTER HERE and LOG IN buttons, you’ll get an error message
- Step 1 asks you to fill in your email address twice. Enter your email address and when complete, click on the “Check Email” button
- If successful and the email is not being used by another account holder, you’ll be directed to Step 2, “Complete Account Info . . . Tell us about yourself”
- Step 2: In the “Tell Us About Yourself” screen, fill in the information asked for as accurately as possible. This information is used to contact you, send invoices, and for shipping. Don’t put inaccurate or bogus info here. I will only serve to confuse and delay your items getting to you and you may lose your bidding privileges.
- Create a username for yourself and enter a password you can remember. Write down your password someplace, you WILL need it again. One of the most frequent requests for service we get is “I can’t remember my password.” We cannot help you with a forgotten password. (Password is case sensitive, too)
- Once you have all the personal information completed and the username and password entered, click “Create New Account”
- Your account has now been created. Now you must register in an auction to place bids on any item in it.
Registering & Bidding:
- Once you have created an HiBid account, you will be asked to register for each auction you wish to bid in.
- Registration is simple; Click “Login/New Bidder” at the top of the page.
- Fill in the email or username you created when setting up your HiBid account and enter your password.
- NOW, choose the specific auction you wish to bid in (where the items you are interested in are)
- Each auction will be in its own box. At the bottom of each box, there will be three buttons you can click on, “Auction Details,” “Register to Bid,” and “View Catalog.” To register for the auction, click on the “Register to Bid” button.
- A Register screen will open. This is where you will be asked to fill in your credit card information and agree to the Terms & Conditions of the auction. Fill out the screens as they appear, and your registration will be complete. Be sure to fill in the 3-digit security code from your credit card and check the box that you have read the Terms & Conditions before closing the form.
- Once you have filled in the form and submitted it, you will be registered to bid in the auction.
You will be given the opportunity to pay your invoice in CASH after an auction closes. Be sure that the credit card info you’ve entered is correct and valid. Bogus CC information or debit cards which are NSF will get you booted off the site quicker than any other reason. No foolin’.
A Buyer’s Premium is a fee the auction house charges to the Buyer of goods to help offset the cost of bringing auction items to market. Explained in another way, an auction house has certain fixed costs of doing business in much the same way a grocery store has (lights, water, labor, etc.) Whereas a grocery store offsets, or passes on these costs in the form of higher prices, an auction firm must pass them on in the form of higher commissions or fees. One way to accomplish this is to divide the commission between the buyer and seller. Certainly it isn’t an even split, but the additional commission or Buyer’s Premium, is charged to the buyer rather than the seller. This fee allows the auction company to remain in business, allows the seller the ability to sell their items without paying ALL the commission (which would be much higher) and gives buyers the opportunity to purchase items which otherwise wouldn’t get to market. In addition, some of the Buyer’s premium is earmarked to pay the rising costs of credit card charge fees (currently 3.5%). Everyone except my mother pays the Buyer’s Premium!
Sales taxes are collected from all bidders within the borders of the State of Colorado. If you reside in Colorado and have a valid sales tax license and a signed sales tax exemption on file with us prior to the auction closing, we will not charge you sales tax. You’ll be charged sales tax for the jurisdiction where the items are sold from NOT where you live. If you are an out of state bidder, you won’t be charged sales tax.
Each auction has a list of bid increments published for your review. As the value and price of an item increases, so does the increment of the next bid. For example, lower valued items such as lawnmowers, have bid increments in the $1-$5 range while larger value items, such as vehicles, have increments in the $100-$250 range. Knowing what the next bid increment is or what it will be changing to will help with your strategy when buying. Knowing the next increment may prevent you from bidding that last time, or it may help you knowing the other guy may not want to make that next bid either! You’d be surprised how knowing that one simple trick will help you win more items.
As in a traditional live auction, the auctioneer calls the bid until he/she has exhausted all bids and declares the item “SOLD!” The “Going once . . . going twice . . .” phrase we’ve all heard is really the “soft close” of an auction. Unlike eBay auctions and some other auction houses, few in the auction industry utilize a “hard close.” A hard close is where all bidding stops at a certain pre-defined time and any bids higher than the one received at the closing time are not recognized. This style of bidding gave rise to the term “sniping” and is usually used in a derogatory sense. Whomever has the fastest fingers or the quickest internet has a decided advantage and there are “sniping” computer programs available to help a sniper even more. NOT FAIR!
We utilize a soft close, usually with a three-minute extension of time for any bid received in the last three minutes. The extension will continue for three more minutes as long as the item is receiving bids. Once there are no bids for three minutes, the item will close.
You will be sent an invoice with all charges included (except shipping) at the end of the auction to the email address you signed up with. Instructions for payment and pickup will be included with the invoice. Entries on the invoice are all items you’ve bid on and won, sales taxes, Buyer’s Premium and any special fees if applicable. Shipping will be billed separately.
Place a bid and if yours is the highest, YOU WIN!!! Really! Develop a strategy for your bids including how much you are willing to spend on any single item and how much you are willing to spend in an auction totally. Nothing is more embarrassing than to find you have won two $500 items only to realize your bank account only has $750 in it. Use the green “Bids” button at the top right of the page to keep track of this information.
Regarding the actual bidding process: Select the item you want to bid on and click on the “Bid $xx.xx” button at the bottom of the item. A “CONFIRM YOUR BID” bidding screen will appear which gives you the option of picking the next bid increment (usually highlighted in the box), a larger bid on the increment scale, or a custom amount you choose (increased by at least the next increment). Select or type the amount you wish to bid and click on the “Confirm Bid” button. Your bid is now entered and you will be informed on the screen if you are currently the highest (winning) bidder or whether someone has placed a bid higher than yours (you are outbid). The item you bid on will appear in green (winning) or red (outbid). If you are outbid, you will need to enter a new bid amount in the same fashion as before. The alternative to entering a bid each time you are outbid is to determine your maximum bid and enter it into the bid amount box. In this way, the computer program will bid for you in an incremental amount higher than any other bidders until the bid goes over your maximum amount. If the bid does not reach your maximum, you will win with a lesser amount and will be very happy about it. If the bid goes over your maximum, you may still bid higher, but you’ll need to enter a new maximum amount. “Bid until you win,” is what we always say!
Selling
Contact us first! By contacting us, we’ll be able to give you some guidance as to whether your item is suitable for sale at auction, whether it should be given a good burial or whether it falls somewhere in between. The process is nearly the same whether you have one or many items, but it all starts with one phone call to 719.924.9379. Alternatively, you can access our “Consign an Item” page by clicking HERE. Fill out the requested information, take a few photos, and send it to us. We’ll get back to you quickly and let you know what we can do.
Absolutely! One item, ten items, a thousand items. We can handle it all. It doesn’t matter what kind of items either. We specialize in high quality treasures to be sure, but that doesn’t mean we won’t sell the occasional lawnmower. It all depends on your needs and what the end result should be. We won’t limit ourselves to selling via the auction method only, some things just sell better in other venues.
We’ll draft a contract for you to sign with all the clauses, provisos, quid pro quos, etc., along with an estimate of costs and a statement of services. Each item and the sale they are in is unique; each require special attention and attention to detail is where we set ourselves apart from the competition.
The short of it is you’ll be responsible to bring your items to us. We can arrange to pick up items from you but if you wish to avoid additional costs . . . well, you know what I mean. BTW, we’ll need sufficient time to prep your items, so please get them to us at least 4 weeks before your scheduled sale date.
It depends on how long we need to store items, the quantity of items, whether you need to vacate a building to have us store them on short notice, or how well in advance of your scheduled auction sale date we receive them. Communication is key. We will store for short periods free of charge, but longer periods require a fee to be imposed.
It’s our goal to only sell first rate high quality goods to our buyers. They appreciate the quality and we appreciate not having to deal with unhappy persons who’ve found a flaw in their purchase. So, inasmuch as is possible, your item must be in good repair for its age and usage. A 100-year-old piece is not going to be pristine generally, but it must have all the requisite parts attached. Missing parts may disqualify an item from being sold at our auction, but remember, a piece of primitive furniture can be sold with some flaws while a piece of Louis XIV furniture better be pristine. Note: Don’t assume if your item is broken it has no value, let us evaluate it first. We’ll be glad to give you an opinion of marketability.
Each auction is advertised individually and there are costs associated with it as a whole. Special and unique items may also be worthy of advertising and we sometimes choose them out of an auction to highlight. If your item falls into the special and unique category, we will discuss with you methods to feature your item and the cost that may accompany it.
Generally, we will send payment to you within 30 days of auction close. We will send a settlement document listing all the items we sold for you, the prices realized, and the net amount owed to you. Depending on value of the settlement, we will send payment in check form or wire transfer.