Why You Should Never Let 'Experts' Value Items You Sell on eBay

Articles by Avril Harper™ Updated: Tuesday November 24, 2009

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Why You Should Never Let 'Experts' Value Items You Sell on eBay by Avril Harper

I’ve given up thinking you can’t teach your Granny to suck eggs (colloquialism for trying to teach experts their job) because the other day I saw something that went against everything I’ve ever believed about ‘experts’. It concerned a television programme about selling antiques and featured a woman who’d just cast a statue of some sort out of plaster.

Thankfully the event didn’t make it into the programme but some eagle-eyed visitor was keen to report it to the newspapers. This woman was attempting to show how even the experts get it wrong sometimes and boy did she accomplish her aim.

Handling the one week old statue the expert praised its beauty and wonderful condition for something so old. He wondered how anything could survive the centuries like this magnificent piece and still look almost like new!

Yes! Enough said, or perhaps not enough said, because that little tale, though true, was actually a lead to more important stuff I want to pass on to you now, which is:

ONE OF THE BEST WAYS TO LOSE MONEY is to get ‘experts’ to value your items, especially ‘experts’ at boot sales and flea markets. For ninety per cent of ‘experts’ at boot sales and flea markets, I reckon you can substitute the words ‘totally oblivious to value except for kiddies’ castoffs and jumble sale finds’ because the majority of ‘experts’ at boot sales and flea markets are ordinary people, like you and me, looking for items to buy cheap and sell at massive mark-ups. So they’ll value your items at £10, offer you £20, then later sell them at £200 or more. It isn’t dishonest, it’s business, or at least that’s the usual excuse.

Sarcasm aside, these people are rarely experts, certainly not in all things antique and collectible. There’s just too much to know about too many things for anyone to be an expert in every item presented to them to value.

Thankfully, there are ways to obtain a completely independent valuation of your products, including:

* Take it to big auction company valuation days. Companies like Christie’s, Bonhams, Sotheby’s, hold independent valuation days across the country. They have specialist experts, not Jack of All Trades, but experts in one or two tight market niches and their advice can normally be trusted. (Unless they value plaster items for television viewers).

* Real value is what someone else is prepared to pay for an item, so where better to look than on eBay, via its Advanced Search option into similar items that sold recently on eBay?

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