jr59

Yea we would like more pics of this!

HercRider

And more pics of this, too.

And to the OP-nice score. You didn't try to take advantage of anyone, and you were rewarded with a very nice set of components.

Drummerboy1975

Thank you for posting this. It's finds like this that keep guys like me, and many more on here, going day in and day out looking for stuff like this.

Congrats.

s7card

One thing I didn't mention was a giant stack on 1970's magazines that came with the bikes.... not a huge deal, but in digging through them, there is an old (1974) campnagolo parts catalog. I don't have a scanner right now, but if it's something people would be interested in, I can see about getting it all scanned, or at least get some good pictures of each page.

JunkYardBike

Seller wouldn't hold it and I couldn't get there immediately. My friend could.

Tempest in a teapot. Enjoy your haul. Not that you plan to dump the stuff right away, but as others have suggested, keep it for a while. The value certainly won't depreciate any (unless you wait until all the boomers are gone).

ecnewell 

I'd say yes, especially taking value/price into account. Congrats OP!

s7card

Thanks, I honestly haven't decided what to do with it all yet... some of it will get sold I imagine, and some of it I will hang on to. Seeing the Schwinn restored to ride able status would certainly warm my heart....

s7card

I think the hipsters are filling in for the boomers in their consuming of vintage campy parts..... at least around here.

old_dreams

Oh man! I should have emigrated years ago. That kind of thing just doesn't happen where I live. Congrats and enjoy!

Before you even take a damp cloth to it (if that might be your intention) I'd recommend asking the folks around here what to do and how to go about it. You'll get lots of good advice for free.

-holiday76

wow. i just started laughing as I was viewing the picasa pics. under the circumstances id personally have no feelings of guilt whatsoever. Based on my very rough calculations you just netted yourself about $5-6,000 in ebay sales not including fees. Maybe more.

lotek 

+1
I was originally thinking the lady was the seller not a sales agent for the estate sales company.
I'd have no qualms in this situation.
Marty

sykerocker 

The "Pickers" situation is easy - the cable network that carries the show is footing the bill (works the same way one shows like American Choppers, etc.). It wasn't the guy's money being spent.

sykerocker 

At the risk of sounding like a real cynical bastard, remember that all those espousing the higher morality haven't had a chance to pick up that bike for $200.00 - and then gets lots of other stuff, too. I'd be very curious to see how many in this group would, honestly, being offered this same inventory, by the same people, for $200.00 would immediately protest that they should be paying at least a $1000.00 for everything. I'm as honest as the next guy (and almost as honest as Poguemahone) but if someone insists on a price that is less than I know it's worth, I'm not going to argue him up. I'll save my honesty for not trying to argue him down.

illwafer

i would have offered $180.

Poguemahone

... and to be honest, in this situation I would have paid the asking price of the estate company. And run. But there are times when I think honesty has actually gotten me a better deal. And I am actually looking for the better deal. At times, a dose of honesty can seal the deal . It's worked well in the past year on the MX Leader and a box of Suntour Superbe. It doesn't always. Many folks simply don't want to go thru the trouble of a more monetarily rewarding sale.

I've also been in the reverse situation, where the asking price is ridiculous. Then I tend to either walk away, or make an offer (and then walk away).

I think my general point here is that you are dealing with people, and there is a psychology to it. The one thing I never do is try to appear, well, sleazy or too interested in profit. I can deal with some profit, but in bikes I refuse to make it a be all and end all.

I've brought this up before, but in my spare time, a few hours a week, I work for one of the biggest sellers of vintage comic books in the United States. In a business frankly full of sleazeballs, he is the most honest character I have ever met. He takes me along on the bigger buys, in part because I have a very good eye and know the comic book grading scale very well. I get to watch him work with people; when he's buying or selling he never treats the other party as an adversary or a mark. I've learned a ton watching him work deals.

As a plus, I've held in my hands the very first issue of Action Comics (first Superman), the first Sensation Comics (Wonder Woman), multiple copies of Fantastic Four number one, etc. It's a fun job.

OP, you did fine in my book. There is no cause for any moral/karma worries.

rootboy 

The woman in question could have been a destitute widow. Could have been a wealthy trophy wife getting rid of some reminders of a nasty divorce. Could have been anything, for that matter. Ridiculous to speculate perhaps. As it turns out, she was a hired hand. Until that was learned, however, any and all assumptions concerning her circumstances were equally absurd, but just as likely true as any other. What would I have done? I don't know. I'm no angel, that's for sure. But I believe there's nothing wrong with a little White Knight-ism now and again. It turns out those who expressed moral reservations in this case misplaced their concern. Holier than thou? Perhaps.
And yet, some of the better tests of character occur when no one is watching, and chivalry isn't necessarily dead. It just has a funny smell.

WNG

I'd have asked her to throw in a set of dishes.

TimmyT 

HA! Most estate sales people probably know dishes way better than they know bikes. I inherited a not-so-fantastic-looking set of dishes from my grandmother when she passed away because my sister didn't want them. I priced them out on Ebay and did some quick math. The dishes are in excess of $1500, and this isn't a very expensive vintage set. If you're looking at a few $K in bike parts, my guess is that the dishes were way more valuable.

EDIT: which probably means you could have gotten a $10K set of dishes for like $400 with the saleswoman!

s7card

Funny you should mention that, there where some glasses my wife wanted there, she told me to see if they would throw them in with the bike when i went back...... I just payed them for them (didn't try to haggle). Upon getting home she told me i was a bad bargainer. She has sense recanted.

cudak888 

Please don't ruin this thread with arguments over the morals of what constitutes a fair price.

-Kurt

frantik

Estate sales are usually run by "hired hands". Otherwise it would have been called a garage sale.

the guy who owned the stuff is dead and buried. he will not miss any of the extra money that he could have gotten. His living relatives also obviously have better things to do because they hired a 3rd party to liquidate the estate.

In almost all transactions there is "information asymmetry".. usually the seller holds more information than the buyer, but sometimes the situation is reversed. it's the nature of selling things.


also, the price someone could get for something on Ebay doesn't reflect the value of the item at a physical sale. Cambria is a small town in California that is far from any major metropolitan area. If the OP didn't pick up the bike and parts, they could have ended up at the dump! The estate lady was probably pretty pleased with herself that she managed to get $200 for it all.

r0ckh0und 

Nice find s7card! There was an episode of Storage Wars a while back where they had a round table discussion and talk some about knowing values of the things they find. Moral of the story was that no one knows everything about everything. I suspect many of us here have paid to much for an item and/or sold one for to little, I know I have.............sometimes your the windshield and sometimes your the bug! A couple of years ago my wife found a Dr. Suess book at an estate sale for a quarter. It was a hard blue cover of Barthomew and the Oobleck. She knew it was a first edition and that it was probably worth a great deal more than a quarter. My research led me to a couple of them on ebay with BIN prices over $1000

bigbossman 

My MIL does this with a group of folks. The event is pre-staged and prices assigned during the week prior to the scheduled sale date. On the day of the sale, they organizers have little old ladies like my MIL man the sale to collect the money and move things along. SOMETIMES a family member is on-hand to arbitrate or take care of pricing issues, but usually not. It is pretty much turn-key..... the family hands over the key to the house and tells the organizer to clear it out.

The price for that bike was fixed before the sale was opened for business.

DavidW56

I'm late to the party again...I am floored by this purchase. Great deal! My wife and I go to estate sales and yard sales, and we formerly attended auctions. I agree with those who have posted there should be no ethical dilemma here.

The estate sale people price items generally with more knowledge than the buyers. But they also have a limited time to sell, usually 3-4 days, if that. They also know many buyers are planning to re-sell items. It's often very obvious, especially when some buyers are loading up their trucks with armfuls of the $5-for-everything-that-fits-in-the-bag sale on the last day of the estate sale.

I myself picked up a $5 bagful of kitchenware, just because I like vintage bottle openers; my wife just resold on eBay one of them for $75 because it was a combination corkscrew, knife and opener with "Jack Daniel" etched on the handle. Would the estate seller have gotten $75 at the house? Not unless that eBay buyer showed up there.

My wife was very happy that I picked up that item, and some others. Kind of balances the bike-buying books in my household.

oggypop

This made my day ... A gift from the vintage gods.