AUCTION info...

[Roper14]

Just wondering if anyone has any tips on any decent auctions in the ArkLaTex region that would be pretty good to go and try and buy a 40-60 hp tractor. I have been to about 5-6 over the past few months (on weekends) with no luck---- I heard -from here- about the Noon Day tractor auction in Flint, Tx (a monthly auction)......are there any others like that out there that are on the weekends...all the ones I have been finding in the middle of the week (enlow auctions around tulsa and brinkley auctions around ardmore)....not afraid of driving 4-6 hours but it needs to be on a Fri or sat...

thanks for any info......
for the "lookers"--- auctions are weird---the same tractor may bring $2-3k more at a regular farm auction than at a tractor auction only b/c there are more/less tractors to go around to the buyers...but then again you never know.....

 

[firedog]

The Horn auction in China, Tx. 1st Saturday of every month.

for previews see Horn Auction - Welcome

 

[sandman2234]

Brinkley Auctions is up in Idabel, Oklahoma, not too far from your target area. They have a sale once a month, and every third one they have a salvage tractor sale. Usually a two day sale, one for tractors, the other for farm and ranch equipment. They have a "sorta website" that has a calendar, but will send you a flyer if you sign up.
David from jax

 

[Harold_J]

...
thanks for any info......
for the "lookers"--- auctions are weird---the same tractor may bring $2-3k more at a regular farm auction than at a tractor auction only b/c there are more/less tractors to go around to the buyers...but then again you never know.....

I think prices are usually higher at regular farm auctions because the bidders are less suspicious of poor quality machines. If an individual farmer is having an auction because of retirement or going out of business I feel a little safer buying his stuff that he was using up till the end instead of a piece someone is trying to unload at a consignment or dealer auction. I have seen more of my friends get "stuck" with a bad buy at regularly scheduled or consignment sales than at individual farm sales. I prefer the latter except for smaller items(things without an engine!).

 

[patrick_g]

So, lets see, the consensus is... hmm, we have no consensus. Experience differs on type of auction with best prospects.

I have been to a several "farm" auctions where folks had died or were movin' to town and some that were just made up of goods available to the auction company. In the case of the death, movin' to town or whatever auction, the professional auction company usually has goods hauled in to be part of the sale. You are not at all assured that the tractor or implement you are bidding on was in use on THIS PLACE until recently.

Even the cardboard boxes of "personal items or toys" are not always part of the actual household being sold off but may be STUFF brought in.

About the only thing you can say for sure about the prices at auctions is that you can't say for sure. I have seen lots of used stuff (junk quality) sell for new or higher prices and good stuff sometimes go for a super bargain. You never know. Much depends on whether or not there are other serious bidders with interest in the items you are bidding on.

You better know what a fair price is as it sure can't be determined by the auctioneers comments, the crowds attentions, of the bidding action.

Pat

 

[Roper14]

I appreciate the info...I will take a look at the Horn Auction in Tx...I would have gone to the Brinkley Auction except they sell the tractors on Thursday and it is about 6 hrs away (meaning I would need to take off 3 days from work - 2 to travel and one for the auction)

The other poster was correct - there is pretty much no rhyme or reason why something will sell at a high or low value at different locations (bid runners, bad weather, people not paying attention, and people having no clue of the value of what they are bidding on)

Sorry for this story but this is a little petty but a perfect example --- one of the auctions ive been to they were selling plastic barrels that came from a car wash --they had 16 of 'em...they first offered them all at $2/each to anyone...no bites...so they decided to sell the whole group off...two idiots got after it...they sold for $45...when they were finished, everybody started laughing.......that is what you have to lookout for at auctions

thanks again for the info...any other will be useful

 

[flusher]

Just wondering if anyone has any tips on any decent auctions in the ArkLaTex region that would be pretty good to go and try and buy a 40-60 hp tractor. I have been to about 5-6 over the past few months (on weekends) with no luck---- I heard -from here- about the Noon Day tractor auction in Flint, Tx (a monthly auction)......are there any others like that out there that are on the weekends...all the ones I have been finding in the middle of the week (enlow auctions around tulsa and brinkley auctions around ardmore)....not afraid of driving 4-6 hours but it needs to be on a Fri or sat...

thanks for any info......
for the "lookers"--- auctions are weird---the same tractor may bring $2-3k more at a regular farm auction than at a tractor auction only b/c there are more/less tractors to go around to the buyers...but then again you never know.....

Basic info you need before bidding on a tractor: make, model, serial # to get the year of manufacture, and engine hours.

Make and model usually aren't a problem, but sometimes there may be a question about model if the ID markings on the sheet metal are missing or are hard to read.

You need to know where to look on the tractor for serial #'s and there's no guarentee that the info will be there. It took me several tries recently to find the serial number on an Allis Chalmers WD that was for sale in my neighborhood. The S/N was stamped in the axle housing and was barely readable.

With make, model and S/N you can find wholesale and retail prices from The Offical Tractor Blue Book. Makes sense to me to use the blue book (about $16 from amazon.com). The Blue Book also gives you tractor serial numbers and tells you where these on found on the tractor.

You wouldn't buy a used car or truck without blue book info. Same goes for a tractor.

Engine hours can be a problem unless you can verify that the tractormeter is working. Best way I know is to run the engine at pto speed and see if the hours indicator is moving. That may take a while if there's no tenths of an hour readout. I try not to rely on auction folks telling me that the hour meter works. They only know what they're told by the owner/consigner and the info may be inaccurate.

Once you know the wholesale price and the hours, you can make your own estimate of max bidding price. Of course you add or subtract bucks from this price depending on condition of the tractor, bonus features (extra remotes, FEL, implements included in the sale, etc) and your desire for this piece of iron.

 

[Harold_J]

...You never know. Much depends on whether or not there are other serious bidders with interest in the items you are bidding on.

You better know what a fair price is as it sure can't be determined by the auctioneers comments, the crowds attentions, of the bidding action. Pat

That sums it up pretty good Pat.

At one time I had a conversation with an equipment dealer who attended a lot of auctions and there was one thing we both agreed on:
If you want to do well buying at auctions there is no substitute for attending a lot of them.
It will give you the experience and exposure and of course you will be there when the occasional very good buy or unexpected comes up.

I would say also get there early, not only to look around and check things out but to listen to what some of the locals are saying and get an idea of what kind of operation the seller had and if all the stuff is really his, was he a trader, etc.

It's good to understand your own personality also. If you tend to be cheap and then have later remorse about not bidding enough, then go one or two bids higher and you will usually feel better even if you don't make the buy. Conversely if you tend to be too "enthusiastic" then best pick a top price and stick to it.

You got to remember it costs money these days to attend an auction. If any distance you have fuel, tolls, time, do you have to take a truck/trailer or come back later. Do you need someone with you to keep an eye on small items you purchase which sometimes tend to disappear. It all adds up.

 

[capt jack]

Catching brothers are having a big auction on Fri. 2-29-08 in Sherman Tx.
(60 miles north of Dallas). the site is on hwy 82 on the west side of Sherman. I've been by a few times and they have several tractors in that size range.
Catching Bros. auctions should have a web site.
Jack

 

[sandman2234]

I understand the travel problems of Brinkley Auction. It takes me a little longer than that to go to Idabel, but I have done it before. I am on their flyer list, but the flyer usually gets here too late for me to make plans to go. I use the calendar they put out a lot more, but realistically, the only reason I go is because it is only 50 miles from Daddy's and I like to drop by there if an auction is in process while I am visiting Daddy. He also enjoys watching the bidders make fools of themselves, lol.
David from jax

 

[patrick_g]

I understand the travel problems of Brinkley Auction. It takes me a little longer than that to go to Idabel, but I have done it before. I am on their flyer list, but the flyer usually gets here too late for me to make plans to go. I use the calendar they put out a lot more, but realistically, the only reason I go is because it is only 50 miles from Daddy's and I like to drop by there if an auction is in process while I am visiting Daddy. He also enjoys watching the bidders make fools of themselves, lol.
David from jax

I watched a HF large aluminum handled pipe wrench sell for about 2x the new HF price. A couple hand trucks went for about $5 over retail.

You have to stay alert at an auction. I have been to a few.

At a recent auction: I thought I was savvy. I came with a trailer and intended to go home with some round bale feeders and some creep feeders. There was a split tank with no legs on the ground out of sight behind a feeder made of two half barrels in a substantial angle iron frame. The half tank 3ft long and 10 inches wide was worth maybe $0.50 and they called it a feed trough. I bid $10 thinking I was bidding on the feed trough made from 55 gal barrel and got the piece of junk. Then the bidding started on the split barrel feeder and I thought the bidding was for the next item in line. Pretty funny. I eventually figured it out and since I bought 4 each round bale feeders, and 4 each creep feeders, plus the split barrel feeder, the $10 buy for the piece of junk was more amusing than important.

It was just a total accident that I was standing where the piece of junk was out of sight behind another item. In the big scheme of things $10 for a piece of junk was nothing as the total for everything else (including a good supply of used but good shape T-posts) went well over $1000. It was an amusing but important lesson. Pay attention, stay alert, know for sure what you are bidding on.

The T-posts were segregated into two groups, the straight ones in piles of 50 and the bent ones in one heap. Another guy paid less attention that I did and won the bid for the bent T-posts, thinking he bought ALL the T-posts. He just didn't pay attention and was not a happy camper when an auction employee explained it to him.

I have yet to attend a farm auction where the goods being sold were all from that farm. They haul in tractors and stuff to take advantage of the number of buyers. This can be good or bad. Good as it increases selection, bad in that you don't know the history of the "foreign" equipment and can't ask the owner.

Idabel is a 5 hour trip for me (one way) so would make for a very long day. Luckily we have enough auctions in the local area (less than 50 miles one way) to more than meet my needs/interests.

Pat

 

[gemini5362]

For a short period of my life I owned a flea market and rented out booths. I had my own booth plus all the space in the building that was not donated to booths. I attended a lot of auctions for items to sell my experience has been if at all possible look for auctions during the weekdays. My favorite website for finding auctions is these guys National Auction List - Live Auctions - Find Auctions and Auctioneers Anywhere! they have a pretty good website with calendars that you can mark by state or auctioneer or type of auction you are interested in (farm auctions is one of the categories) The most important thing to remember about an auction is that you have to pick a price and make yourself stick to it. I have had the same experience as pat in that I have seen people pay more for used items than they sell for new. People will get caught up in the bidding and decide not to let the other person beat them and then wind up paying too much. Pick your price and stay with it. When you decide how much you want to pay then bid quickly. I have seen people that as soon as the auctioneer looked at them if they were not the high bidder they immediately nod yes. A firm bidder like that will sometimes scare other bidders out because they think that he is determined to buy it. That can backfire sometimes but if you have your max price firmly in your mind then you dont have to worry about it. A lot of auctionners will also let you preview items. If you are coming in from out of town you can call and ask them if they are going to be working out at the auction site and ask to be allowed to look. Not all will do that but some will. I
have bought houses at auctions before. I called up the auctioneer (who in arkansas has to be a real estate agent) Told them I wanted to inspect the property. They set a date and time to meet with me before the auction. Properties that I wanted to bid on I had the auctioneer send the legal information and the appraisal that had been done on the property to my bank so that I had my financing all aranged prior to going to the auction. ( my banker has told me to just go bid and if i got the property to call him for the loan. I believe him but dont intend to put it to the test. ) When you are bidding on an item if you mistakenly are bidding on the wrong thing usually you will realize it about the time you have bought it. If that happens just tell the auctioneer that you were mistaken about what you bid on. They dont like that to happen but most of them will be nice about it and just resell the item. The ones that are not nice and make a bid deal of it need to be treated accordingly and lose your business. The last piece of advice I would offer is dont go to an auction expecting a steal. Every auction I have been to has dealers at it. When I was a dealer I basically figured that i was going to buy everything that went for half the price I thought I could sell it for. I bid on ALL of those items. When an item went for more than half the price I valued it at then I evaluated how fast it would sell or other attributes to see if I wanted to keep bidding.

 

[Roper14]

Input is pretty much what I have seen also...especially what gemini5362 wrote
"The last piece of advice I would offer is dont go to an auction expecting a steal. Every auction I have been to has dealers at it. When I was a dealer I basically figured that i was going to buy everything that went for half the price I thought I could sell it for."

I went to a local farm auction recently specifically for a JD 4700 with all the bells and whistles with only a side photo to go on. I got there and the hood was not only broken but pieces were gone, panels were taped together, knobs missing, bucket wouldnt curl, and so forth. the tractor had ~1300 and it looked like it had been used for 1301 hrs. Everybody judges items differently - I judge them by the way I think they should "look" as if I someone had "taken care" of them...a lot of the time you can look through fresh paint, oil everywhere, no oil anywhere, a tractor too clean (tires shiny - yeah right) hardest aspect to judge (IMO) is their trannys.....anyway I decided what the heck I'd bid up to $9500 on the 4700..yes i figured a steal except for the fact that the bucket or forks were not included even though they were attached
(another TRICK - this AUCTION CO. did not have many items and it was almost parting on the tractor.....you buy a tractor then somebody runs you on the bucket...)
tractor ending up selling for $9900...forks and bucket for $450/500 EACH so the LOCAL USED TRACTOR DEALER ended up having about $11k it. If he had not of been there, I would definitely not be in this forum...I would be in the JD forum trying to fix a 4700 as cheap as possible (spending $$$ hand over fist more than likely)....
Yet at $3.30 diesel, and another auction this weekend, $10 grand is pretty much the limit so we move on...

 

[patrick_g]

AUCTION

March 1st 10:00 AM Tupelo, Oklahoma

Construction equip
HAy, Farm, cattle equipment.

Trucks, trailers, tractors, supposedly in good condition.

John Deere Tractors:

4440
4430
2550 with 148 loader
2020 with aux hydraulics

JD round baler
New Holland square baler
2 ea Gehil 9 ft rotary mowers
Kuhn mower conditioner
3 different rakes

5 trailers
JD and other grain drills, cultipacker, folding harrow, lime spreader, fertilizer spreader.

J&R hydraulic post driver
another hydraulic post driver
Skid steer tree shear
25 and 28 ton feed bins, grain augers
3 trucks and a Jeep

Misc Powder river panels and portable corral.

I tried to hit the highlights...

Kevin Haney auctions 580-927-5029

Preview Feb 29 3-6 PM

Driving directions: From intersection of HWY 48 and HWY 3 go north on 48 for 3 miles to Pleasant Grove Cemetery Rd. turn left (west) and go 1/2 mile to auction site. Signs will be posted.

Pat

 

[Roper14]

I appreciate the Auction heads up ... I had three yes 3 already lined out that I had to pick from on Sat. Morning at 10 leaning towards one around Batesville AR ---a JD Dealership is having its annual "used tractor liquidation" before the new season starts up... they are selling probably 30+ tractors (probably 4-5 that I would truely be interested in) and other misc items that were traded in....I was thinking about the noonday auction as they have a lot of auction items, but the tractor selection seems a little slim compared to last month's (on their website) and then there is one in Warren, AR...an annual consignment sale that has everything..implements, toys, chains, atvs..ladeededa and maybe a few tractors...maybe i will get one here soon and I will quit bothering everyone...on second thought the local dealer has an 8454 cub that is cute...but durn it I don't like those R4 tires...oh well good luck to me.

 

[firedog]

maybe i will get one here soon and I will quit bothering everyone

#1. Get a tractor and you'll be here more than ever.

#2. You ain't bothering anybody.


Good luck & happy auctioning!!!

 

[patrick_g]

#1. Get a tractor and you'll be here more than ever.

#2. You ain't bothering anybody.

Good luck & happy auctioning!!!

Firedog got it right but... forgot to say, "Let us know how it turns out and if able post pix."

Oh, and Firedog, when you said, "It may be a small world after all. But it's pretty darn big when you're using a pea size brain" you reminded me of a line I have used before...

There is a scientist interested in my brain, George Washington Carver, he does lots of things with peanuts.

Pat

 

[Cade]

Auctions are so unpredictable. There was an auction house 2 miles from my place that I always went to. You could buy power tools cheap, but hand tools and other stuff went higher than the retail value. I left a bid on Craftsman radial arm saw, which was in great shape, for $75. knowing that it is worth 7x that. I ended up getting it for $50.

On a rare occassion i have seen tractors go at an auction. I think if I was looking I would search craigs list.

Good luck.

 

[flusher]

So, lets see, the consensus is... hmm, we have no consensus. Experience differs on type of auction with best prospects.

I have been to a several "farm" auctions where folks had died or were movin' to town and some that were just made up of goods available to the auction company. In the case of the death, movin' to town or whatever auction, the professional auction company usually has goods hauled in to be part of the sale. You are not at all assured that the tractor or implement you are bidding on was in use on THIS PLACE until recently.

Even the cardboard boxes of "personal items or toys" are not always part of the actual household being sold off but may be STUFF brought in.

About the only thing you can say for sure about the prices at auctions is that you can't say for sure. I have seen lots of used stuff (junk quality) sell for new or higher prices and good stuff sometimes go for a super bargain. You never know. Much depends on whether or not there are other serious bidders with interest in the items you are bidding on.

You better know what a fair price is as it sure can't be determined by the auctioneers comments, the crowds attentions, of the bidding action.

Pat

I've been to a half-dozen farm auctions the past 3 years. I always check the list of items before I go and look up the price ranges in the Official Tractor Blue Book for the tractors at auction. Of course you usually don't know the year the tractor was built. You need the serial number for that, which usually isn't published by the auction house. So you have to look for it at the preview or get to the auction early to find the s/n. Sometimes you luck out and find the s/n, sometimes not. But at least you're in the ball park with the Blue Book info.

I find that the folks bidding on the big ag tractors (100 hp+) generally pay pretty close to Blue Book prices. Not surprising since these guys make a living with this equipment.

Where I find the huge swings is in the smaller utility tractors and the "collectables". There you see people sometimes getting great bargains and you also find examples of auctions going considerably overpriced. Probably some combination of inexperienced buyers and collectors with serious cases of tractor fever.

 

[Roper14]

Posted by flusher
....I always check the list of items before I go....

That is the only way that I WILL go to an auction is if I know EXACTLY what they are going to be having for sale. Now granted they usually do have the stipulation that they can pull an item if they want, yet by researching on the net/papers for the auctions, I can usually find out what tractors they are going to have for sale...then I can do any research on the "tractor" (weight, type of pto, age, type of hydraulics, trannys, etc,etc,etc...and of course price) so I will have a pretty good idea of exactly what the tractor may or may not have on it when I get to the sale...a tractor with a 24x24 tranny (shuttle) is worth a tad bit more than a little ole 8x8 shifter..(duh) yet who knows the two tractors may bring the same amount...but I want to be informed....maybe toooo informed which is the reason I havent bought anything yet....like I said earlier..no use in driving to a sale 2 hrs away if you have no clue what is going to be there (unless you have $$ to burn..and if I did I would have something new already... )