eBay

Anonymous · ‎06-17-2013

I know the mid-century retro furniture,lamps are anything else I should be stocking my shelves with?

spirit-of-shiloh · ‎06-18-2013

I wish I had held on to all my antiques,coins,jewelrey,silver bars and Krugarands as I would be sitting pretty today 😞 Back in the mid 90's I sold off just about everything just to save my stable....at the end I still lost it:( I threw all my money at at a dying horse so to speak.:(

I notice fads,etc. go in waves. In the late 80's the western "thing" was in. ,Big trucks and horse trailers etc.Western bars popped up all over the place,clothing stores couldn't keep riding gear on the shelves,silver embellished saddles and bridles were going for top dollar and I was making a killing selling my homemade horse jewelrey and bridels and couldn't keep up. This is just one area of many more tastes back then. Folks also were in the rustic/shabby decor.

Then everything came to a halt. The property values were plummeting,horses were now too expensive to keep up,hay went up, foreclosures, bars closed and the domino effect hit.

Then when things began to pick up again a new era exploded.Designer purses, jewelery and clothes were the NEW wave.

So I guess we have to go with the flow. Now we are in a precarious situation and the luxuries are put on the back burner.

Hopefully things will perk up again and folks will appreciate the vintage,antiques and collectibles. Also the Baby boomers are aging and are thinking more on the lines of saving for their future. I guess its like the stock mkt. so to speak. We shall see.

pentiques · ‎06-18-2013

I think buying antique as an investment is as risking as any other investment. If you want to buy as investment you have to know your item and buy very cheap. I am keeping all of my stuff. I started collecting 50 years ago and still have many of the things I bought originally. Now if I buy anything to keep it is because it was great bargain

Also my house if full so if I keep anything I have to sell something out of the house. There are exceptions to that rule, if I have any room I can hang something on the wall or put it in a draw.

I look around and see if I can invest in any stocks that will bring me more than keeping an antique item.

Think about the folks who bought blue sponge ware, yellow ware, Bennington, Roseville, etc. when those items were hot. It will take years for some of that stuff to appreciate beyond the price they paid. Should they dump that stuff and use the money to try another antique investment.

Always a chore to try to figure this out. Really a chore because we all love this old stuff and want to keep dealing and handling it.

flanagan-laneantiques · ‎06-18-2013

shiloh:_| your stable, so sorry you lost it. I know how you love horses.

sounds like some of you are doing what I'm doing. Saving the best stuff, at least for now. I'm finding it really hard to turn down some really great pieces for dirt cheap, mostly furniture though, which means I have a store full, a house full, AND a storage unit full. :^O

I need to unload the cheaper stuff. though, to make room for the better stuff. That's why I put my dining room set up for sale. (the set that caused the issue with the nutty poster a while back)

My living room has seen a lot of pieces come and go.

skezeks42 · ‎06-18-2013

... I have also seen a slow decline in the antiques market since the late 1990's. Is this a long term dead end for the trade?

There is a core group of folks who will always have an interest in collecting olde junque. I believe we may be near that core right now, and have been hovering here for awhile now. I didn't see a slow decline. It dropped off the cliff in the early ....oughts, (00-05). It's kinda maintained these doldrums for the last several years but that core of collectors remain dedicated. Too many folks got wrapped up in the trade for purely mercenary reasons. Most of these have dropped by the wayside. Those remaining at this point are here because of the love of olde junque, not the$$$.

I kinda like it really. The folks I deal with today have a genuine knowledge of their field and their enthusiasm is genuine, as opposed to the dealers/buyers of a few years ago whose knowledge extended little beyond the latest price guide or auction result.

Remember though, here in the mid Atlantic region we're surviving a bit stronger than most other areas as far as the trade is concerned.

I'm sure the market will rebound with the economy. The focus will be skewed toward the "moderne" so to speak but I'm certain it will recover...to some degree......eventually .

__________________________________________________________

Quidvis recte factum quamvis humile praeclarum
Whatever is rightly done, however humble, is noble.

Don

thelmasstuff · ‎06-18-2013

Our Antique Show a couple of weeks ago went very well and the dealers were happy. The minimum profit I heard was about $400. Not bad for a one-day show that started out pouring cats & dogs until 9 am. Buyers were lined up.

messilane · ‎06-18-2013

One way to be sure what NOT to buy, is to watch what I list, because once I list anything, that means that the market for that widget has tanked. :^O

I have never had the money to invest in high-end items, so it has almost always been "collectibles" and "oddities" for me.

But I just keep plugging along with what I have, with not much hope of replacing any of it.

“Those who would give up Essential Liberty, to purchase a little Temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety" - Benjamin Franklin

pillarboxred · ‎06-18-2013

Having just sold a Regency silhouette miniature for £53 I know how depressed the market is. For someone with funds, now is a good time to buy. Many UK dealers have stopped listing antiques because the returns are so low online and they claim they can get more or as much for less work offline. Whatever, a knowledgeable buyer with a taste for antiques can do well now if the aim is to furnish a home rather than make money.

A generation of leading UK antiques dealers has passed away and the markets they served seem to have dispersed.

Also, the repurpose / recycle craze has made broken and badly restored or bizarrely adapted items screamingly fashionable (I think Steam Punk is something to do with that).

charmar10 · ‎06-18-2013

I can only speak for my area, and there

is very little of anything selling here. Folks just

don't have the cash for luxuries, and are making do

with the bare miminum. When other parts of the

country get sick, our area dies.

Anyone selling good quality school clothes..cheap..

can make some money right now.....other than that, nada.

spirit-of-shiloh · ‎06-18-2013

Thank you Flanagan...yes a part of my heart was ripped out but that's the way it goes I guess.:(

I never collected to resell....I collected because I loved antiques and collectibles. OK,the silver bars and Krugarands were an investment and the gold did make us a profit but the silver bars tanked and that was a huge loss.

I still miss a lot of the stuff I sold out of desperation but then I have to remind myself of the poor souls who lost everything in natural disasters and it doesn't hurt as bad.

Then about 12 years ago I started buying junque in hopes of starting a used collectibles shop. I went overboard and now have over 100 rubbermaid containers filled,every cupboard stuffed and every room cluttered 😞

Well that dream tanked too so now I need to get off my duff and list. I am at a self imposed road block, and look at the stuff and get overwhelmed. Maybe I am just depressed but won't admit it? I will promise myself to list one item per day,baby steps, then weeks,months go by.

I end up relisting so eBay won't punish me since I have read on the boards that if you don't sell for awhile then start up again your funds are held.X-(

I have that urge to go shopping too, another downfall I have,LOL. Maybe by the time I decide to list my junque they will all be antiques in the year 2525.:-p

birgittaw · ‎06-19-2013

Nothing in my area is very hot as far as antiques go. And I just finished a listing for Tupperware. Tupperware! OK, it is actually from the 50s, so perhaps not so bad. But I am hoping no one who knows me sees it!

I'm saving the things I have and love for either my estate sale, or my hopefully grateful offspring.That would be good and sometimes great Americana.

I still buy antique white English ironstone, since I have a good show customer base for that -- mostly from Alabama, it seems. Not at all at the prices I used to get, but still workable. The rst? Hit and miss -- an occasional piece of artwork, sometimes small antique shelves, benches and stands.

Nothing seems to be really hot: Welll, motel furniture with chalk paint, and linen/burlap upholstery, made up lamps from heavy iron chain, assembly line paintings, sofa tables made from iron bases with old doors on top. Nothing much antique.

ownedbybear · ‎06-19-2013

Weird stuff sells, still.

Anything a magazine or newspaper tips will sell for a few months, so read them! Read up on what's fashionable, regardless of age. Vintage is still madly hot here, in terms of clothing and retro furnishings.

Seriously good jewellery always sells as does good usable useful Stuff of any kind. Run of the mill trad antiques? Nah.

The next great economic powers are the BRIC bloc: the US is on that gentle downward slop, as all empires go, ours included. Watch them and learn.

And actually, that's a good mantra. Read, learn, react fast, change your model.