Parents House Sold at Auction

As I mentioned, the house where my father and mother lived their last years was included for auction along with the personal property that they had acquired over many years. My mother had for years volunteered at a :"Trash and Treasure" type community store and  was always purchasing costume jewelery for $0.25 - $0.50 and bringing it home and putting it into her jewelry box. We were surprised when at auction, this jewelery when sold in lots, brought more than $300.00.  She had probably paid less than $50.00 for all.

But back to the sale of the real estate.  We had never been involved in selling real estate at auction, and the market in Central Indiana, like many areas of the country is very soft.  We had a deal with the auctioneer that if the property sold he would be paid a commission of 3% and would get nothing beyond the advertising cost if it did not.

The house, pole barn, and a small outbuilding situated on one acre of land was appraised for $20,000.  The house was built in 1963 and except for interior painting and some tuck-pointing of parts of the brick exterior, had had virtually no other maintenance.  Sure, there was the occasional replacement of the water heater, a replacement of the furnace with the addition of air conditioning, but nothing major.

The auction was well attended, approximately 180 people who had registered to bid, but the bidding started out slowly on the house.  Whether prospective bidders were afraid that they might get the house on their first bid and didn't want to make it too high, or conversely, didn't want to look foolish by starting with a ridiculously low initial bid, I don't know.

After a period of"auctioneer speak", the bidding finally started at around $60,000 and quickly went to $95,000.  There were 3 bidders interested,and as long as there were three, prospects were good for a fair return.  The bidding went more slowly from $95,000 on up, as each bidder had to do a little thinking and possibly doing some psychological analysis to feel out the other bidders.  Slowly the bid went up, now in $1000 increments until one of the bidders dropped out at $108,000  The remaining two continued slowly and deliberately until it finally stopped at $116,000.

The auctioneer had told them that when the bidding ended, he would call a meeting of the family to see if the bid was acceptable.  We met and decided that we would sell the property, and the auctioneer went back to his stand and announced that the property would indeed sell that day, and we would have a new owner at the conclusion of the auction,  He then began again, asking if there were any other bids, trying to extract the last dollar possible from the winning bidder.  There was a bid of $117,000, then and then an opposing bid of $118,000, and then silence.  After some additional coaxing with no results, the property was declared sold.

And as at all auctions, people congratulated the buyers for their good deal, and the sellers for getting so much. Everyone was happy and the sale continued with more of the “little stuff” and one step closer to settling the estate