Storage Auction Hunter Wars

While watching just one episode too many of a SpikeTV "Auction Hunters" marathon, about guys who go around buying abandoned storage units (I prefer it to the alternatives "Storage Wars", "Storage Wars: Texas" or "Storage Hunters"), I decided to see if there were any of these auctions in my area. A quick Google search revealed that there is actually a website you can join to let you know when auctions are coming up and, in a moment of weakness, I signed up. When I got an email informing me there was an auction on Friday in Walpole I knew I had to check it out for myself. Here's what happened...

-I got there and discovered about 15 hard-looking guys with a couple of even harder-looking women waiting for the auction to start. I went into the office to sign in and found even more people inside. I could tell the guys in the office were the auction veterans because they were sitting around and talking about the business the way old-time baseball players would talk about the game. It was all, "How much did you get for those Jordan cards you found" or "Everyone just wants to get on TV doing this." Not these guys, though - they just love the craft. Still, the way you could really tell they knew what they were doing was that they stayed in the air-conditioned office until the last second while the rest of us were sweating outside on a 90-degree day.

-Before the auction started the Auctioneer had to read the terms and conditions to the group. If you've ever seen any of the storage auction shows you probably already know them: no going into the unit or touching anything inside, it was a cash-only auction and a $100 deposit was required on any unit you bought, refunded when it was empty and in this particular case you had until Sunday to clean out the unit. But, lest you think these are like any old terms and conditions where you can ignore them and still participate, that was far from the case. If you missed the reading of the terms and conditions you were not allowed to bid, only observe as was explained to the couple who showed up as we were walking to the first of five units up for auction. Clearly, they took these seriously.

-Unit #1. The first door swung open to reveal what looked like the typical contents of someone's garage. The highlights included a couple of shelving units with plastic containers, a Lamborghini car care kit which I guarantee you has never seen a Lamborghini in its life and a bed frame. But, there was a lot more in the back of the unit that no one could see. The Auctioneer started us off at $250, which no one bid on. Eventually he lowered his starting price to $200, which got a couple guys interested. This was when I noticed the over-stated way people bid on TV is a lot different than how it happens in real life, which was probably for the best. This crowd did not strike me as the kind who would appreciate flair. The back-and-forth continued until the unit sold for $300. Given what I've seen on TV that was a lot cheaper than I expected. Also, with the advantage of hindsight I would argue this was the best unit of the day, because it had the most potential for treasures to be discovered.

-Unit #2 The first thing we saw when they opened this unit up was a pile of wood scraps. I'm not sure if the person was using this unit as a workshop or just where he was leaving the remnants of his latest home improvement project. This unit actually had two doors, but they were only allowed to cut the lock off of one of them (never got that part explained), which meant we only saw half the unit. This is why the veterans bring flashlights. Without one the only things I could see were some mat padding that would go under a carpet and the tell-tale grey fuzz of either a speaker or an amplifier. The Auctioneer started us off at $200, but when his attempt was met with silence he dropped it down to $100, while asking us to "be reasonable." When that still didn't get any nibbles he dropped to $50 and eventually $25, at which point a mother and son team jumped in. They were joined by a man in a NASCAR shirt and eventually worked back up to $85, with the mother and son team taking it. "That's $200 worth of padding," the son said as we walked to the next unit. I didn't have the heart to tell him that I highly doubted that number.

-Unit #3 Ironically, this was the biggest unit, but it had the least amount of items in it. There was a couch, a couple twin mattresses, a treadmill, some skis and a large wood frame which looked like it would go around a fireplace with room for a TV in top. The stuff was nice and looked to be pretty good quality, but I think the key to a good storage unit is a little bit of mystery. You know you are buying things someone else decided they could live without, but you are just hoping they forgot about all the valuable stuff that was in there. With this unit you could see everything you were getting. On top of that the veterans made it sounds like mattresses are more trouble than they are worth. The Auctioneer started us off at $400. At this point I decided he must have some kind of formula based on the size of the room, because if he was trying to get people to bid based on what he thought the items in a unit were worth he was way off. Every time he lowered his starting bid he asked people to "be reasonable" and eventually at $200 he got a bid. Still, there wasn't much interested and the couple that bought the first unit ended up getting this one for $225. They may not have much excitement as they go digging, but I bet they will easily get their money back.

-Unit #4 When this door opened we were met with a cloud of sawdust and regular dust that had the first people in line coughing and retreating. Other than a mini-fridge like you would see on the counter of a convenience store and a metal Christmas tree holder, this unit mostly looked like wood shelves as far as the eye could see. I didn't see anything particularly interesting, so when the guy in the NASCAR shirt tried to jump on the unit by starting the bidding at $500, it send a murmur through the crowd. One of the veterans next to me told his friend he wouldn't have gone higher than $300 while several people went back to the unit to double-check if they had missed the extremely valuable thing that guy saw. As you can imagine, no one tried to out-bid that guy, which had to be a sinking feeling. It must have sucked as it slowly dawned on him that he bid way too much. Even if he eventually found something valuable, he still had to know that he could have had that unit for cheaper than he paid.

-At least, that's what I thought until we started walking to the last unit of the day. The guy in the NASCAR shirt was bragging about his victory to his friend, saying that the drafting table in the unit was, "easily worth $200." First off, I saw no drafting table. Secondly, what world does he live in where used drafting tables are that expensive? This was when it started to dawn on me that I may have the wrong mentality for these auctions. Even when I am super confident about something I just bought I will still have that half-second of buyer's remorse after the transactions. Not these guys. Every successful bidder was convinced that they had just tricked the rest of us. Their confidence, however misguided it may be, was actually kind of inspiring.

-Unit #5 This was the last unit up for auction for the day, so as soon as the door went up people started to head for their cars, which I didn't think was a good sign. When I finally got my first look inside this small unit I saw a bureau and a dusty armchair - that was it. As you can imagine the Auctioneer's attempt to start the bidding at $100 was met with amused silence, as the veterans were already saying their goodbyes to one another and making plans for the next auction. When he told us once again to "be reasonable" as he lowed his starting asking price to $25 I wanted to retort that he should be the reasonable one. At this point the only people still hanging around were me, some guy who showed up after the third unit and a couple of the veterans and none of us had any intention of bidding. I think we all just wanted to know how low he was going to have to go. The same couple who bought the first and third units tried to bid $1, but were told the lowest he could go was $10. They settled on $10 and not having to put down the security deposit (had I known that was an option I would have done it, just to say I had won an auction).

-As I walked away from my first storage unit auction I couldn't help but notice that for all their talk, only about four different people put in bids all day long, which means I had bid exactly as many times as most of the 'veterans'. And here I had been worried my lack of bids would make me stand out in the crowd. What I would have liked to do was hang around long enough to be there when people started going through their lockers, but that seemed like a breach of etiquette. Either way, it was an amusing way to kill an hour on a Friday morning. Still, the biggest thing I took away from the experience was something I already knew: with a little dramatic music and well-timed edits, you can make any activity seem much more dramatic on TV than it really is.