Recommendations on estate sales: tips/tricks/pitfalls

[jakespeed]

There is an estate sale that my wife is going to this morning. I stopped by yesterday and was told that they have some fountain pens that they'll be selling. The problem is, my wife isn't very knowledgeable on pens, and I won't be there to determine if something is a good value or not. Do any of you have any tips/tricks/pitfalls to use or watch out for when buying pens from an estate sale?

 

Aaron

Edited May 27, 2009 by jakespeed

[Raiche58]

I hope someone knowledgeable gets back to you on this one. I've been moving around the forum trying to see what the input about estate sales has been and there are some great buy stories and bunch of junk stories. When I've looked at the listings on estate sales in my area, they don't seem to mention having fountain pens available, but this has got to be something vintage dealers do to build their stock. I'll be checking on this thread to see if anyone else chimes in.

 

Thanks for starting it!

[The Grim Sheaffer]

Two Types to watch out for.

 

1: The true value of the pens was never communicated to the family. Most wives do not understand paying for a pen from the holiday savings. In this scenario the family are also quite miffed off with the amount of time and effort expended on such a trivial matter. With a a final act of defiance they flog the pens cheaply. Look for these...

 

2: The family equate the time and effort spent on the pens to reflect their value and want a good return on the investment irrespective of their real value. You may as well avoid these.

 

If you are able to recognize these two scenarios you have 50 to 60 % of sales wrapped up. The other 40% is like ebay except you get to see the pens first.

 

I always feel that I am doing poor old Bill a favour by giving his pens a good loving home. He would have liked it that way.

Edited May 27, 2009 by The Grim Sheaffer

[weissa]

Too late to help your wife, but when I'm fortunate enough to get to an estate sale ahead of the dealers, and what's there is not a pile of junk, my general strategy is to point out the problems (or potential problems) - tooth marks and other imperfections, levers that don't move (or move too freely), rattling sac bits, stuck pistons, loose clips, etc. That often gets the price down. Sometimes if you share some general knowledge about pens (again, this won't help your wife), the sellers are more inclined to give you a break on price.

[pen2paper]

I've found very few pens 'in the wild' because of ARSS Antiques Road Show Syndrome.. everyone is sure their pen signed the DOI, and is worth 250K.. surprisingly, the few estie's I've found in antique malls were reasonable, because I was able to state the approximate cost to resac/restore-which made my statement credible-price reduced accordingly.

The 3 I did pass on, included a Doric.. which I 'now' understand was too far gone for reasonable repair...glad I balked.

[sumgaikid]

Could you let us know how things turned out? Was your wife able to get some

fantastic deals?

 

Inquiring minds want to know...........

 

John

[gyasko]

It's rare to find anything anyway, so i would say is the main trick is to find pens. Then you worry about whether they're worth it. My questions are: "do i want this" "can i fix it" "can i afford it?". If someone is doing the buying for you, i'd tell them to buy anything if it's cheap enough. A junker for 50 cents or a dollar may have a perfectly good J bar which you could use in a nicer pen. Other than that, i'd say make use of your mobile phones.

[weissa]

I need to vent somewhere about this, and this topic seems appropriate.

 

So I've spent a good part of the last year cultivating an estate sale operator. I contact her before sales to find out if she has pens, and she's good at replying. Last year I got a handful at a sale, one of which I was able to clean up and resell for more than I paid for the whole lot (which were mostly junk). Today she's having a sale 5 minutes from my office, and she's confirmed to me that she has a few pens. I get over there and take a number. I'm 28, and they let the first 25 people in. After 10-15 minutes two people have come out, and I go in. I go right the the checkout table and ask her about the pens. She reaches in front of the cash box for them, and they're gone. She says that I should wait a few minutes to see if someone comes up with them, and she can tell them that the pens were being held. After a few minutes she calls out to ask if anyone has them, and someone replies that he does. She says that someone else had put them there, but he responds that he was there early (and he's clearly a regular). She gives me a kind of apologetic look, and that's it. :bonk:

 

I'll get over it, but for today, I'm hating estate sales.

[FarmBoy]

I need to vent somewhere about this, and this topic seems appropriate.

 

So I've spent a good part of the last year cultivating an estate sale operator. I contact her before sales to find out if she has pens, and she's good at replying. Last year I got a handful at a sale, one of which I was able to clean up and resell for more than I paid for the whole lot (which were mostly junk). Today she's having a sale 5 minutes from my office, and she's confirmed to me that she has a few pens. I get over there and take a number. I'm 28, and they let the first 25 people in. After 10-15 minutes two people have come out, and I go in. I go right the the checkout table and ask her about the pens. She reaches in front of the cash box for them, and they're gone. She says that I should wait a few minutes to see if someone comes up with them, and she can tell them that the pens were being held. After a few minutes she calls out to ask if anyone has them, and someone replies that he does. She says that someone else had put them there, but he responds that he was there early (and he's clearly a regular). She gives me a kind of apologetic look, and that's it. :bonk:

 

I'll get over it, but for today, I'm hating estate sales.

This has happened to me and not just with pens. BUT, after 15 years of Estate Sales with the same crowd I'm a bit more than a regular and I'm also usually willing to pay more than the other regulars that will just buy to resell.

 

Let the sellers know you collect and are there for may be willing to pay more than most people that will just resell them. Also offer to give them an appraisal of pens and related items based on current market trends if you are comfortable doing so. Also let them know that you can and do fix many pens and should the family want to keep pens as a reminder of the relatives, you would be more than willing to help out. This all builds a good relationship and gets you moved to the top of the line--Ever notice how some people always seem to be number 1 or 2 on that list?

 

What gets me is the pens that people snag and don't pay for, especially when they are being held at the register for me...

 

Todd

 

[jakespeed]

As it turns out, my wife didn't go to the estate sale at all that day. She was on the list and intended to go first thing in the morning, but when she got there it was very packed with people, news reporters and police to keep the peace. I've never heard of an estate sale going down like that, but I guess people here take their bargains seriously. Anyway, my wife doesn't deal well with crowds, so she skipped it. I stopped by the next day, and the fountain pens they had said they had were all gone, but I was shown a fistful of cheap ballpoints that were all rubber-banded together.

 

Needless to say I walked away empty handed, but did go back the next day (when everything was half off, or more) and got a nice painting of a horse for my wife; so it wasn't a total loss. That being said, the information I've gotten from this thread so far has been very useful, and I'll definitely keep it in mind when I go to another estate sale.