Wednesday, December 16, 2009

Auction Results: Signature Photography, November 19, 2009 @Heritage

The results of the recent Heritage various owner photographs sale in Dallas are a bit deceiving at first glance. With a Buy-In rate of less than 20%, things might seem to have gone pretty well. But a look at the Total Sale Proceeds tells a different story, the sum falling below the Total Low Estimate by a wide margin. The most telling data is found in the Above/In/Below statistics - nearly 75% of the lots that sold in this sale sold below their low estimate. Whether we attribute this to the estimates being too high, the material being too marginal, or the number of active buyers being too small, the results were less than inspiring.

The summary statistics are below (all results include the buyer’s premium):

Total Lots: 187
Pre Sale Low Total Estimate: $347600
Pre Sale High Total Estimate: $516100
Total Lots Sold: 151
Total Lots Bought In: 36
Buy In %: 19.25%
Total Sale Proceeds: $231455

Here is the breakdown (using the Low, Mid, and High definitions from the preview post, here):

Low Total Lots: 184
Low Sold: 150
Low Bought In: 34
Buy In %: 18.48%
Total Low Estimate: $471100
Total Low Sold: $221298

Mid Total Lots: 3
Mid Sold: 1
Mid Bought In: 2
Buy In %: 66.67%
Total Mid Estimate: $45000
Total Mid Sold: $10158

High Total Lots: 0
High Sold: NA
High Bought In: NA
Buy In %: NA
Total High Estimate: $0
Total High Sold: NA

A disappointing 74.83% of the lots that sold had proceeds below their estimate. There were a total of four surprises in this sale (defined as having proceeds of at least double the high estimate):

Lot 77020 Felice Beato, Peking, China, 1860, at $10755
Lot 77096 Annie Liebovitz, Clowns in New York, 1993, at $4780
Lot 77166 Jock Sturges, Nicole Euronat-Montalivet France, 1989, at $3346
Lot 77176 William Wegman, Reader, 1999, at $1076

The top lot by High estimate was lot 77075, Tom Kelley, Marilyn Monroe, 1949/Later, at $14000-18000; it did not sell. The top outcome of the sale was lot 77020, Felice Beato, Peking, China, 1860, at $10755.

Complete lot by lot results can be found here.

Heritage Auctions
Design District Annex
1518 Slocum Street
Dallas, TX 75207

No comments: