“Government Boat Auction Sales and Where You Should Really Look…
On November 03, 2009 in General
If you have done a search for boat auctions at all online then you’re probably well aware of the often touted boat liquidation sales available from Uncle Sam. Government agencies like the U.S. Marshals Service and the General Services Administration (GSA) regularly liquidate surplus or seized boats along with about any type of forfeited or surplus asset via. internet or via. state or local auctions houses.
My experience with these Gov’t sales is that many of the sources the Government uses to liquidate their assets are what I call ‘transparent’ market places. These types of markets unfortunately easily enable bidders to compare the seized asset with a similar asset and thereby ascertain very quickly about how much they will bid. And often times too much. For example one of the transparent sites you frequently find government boat auctions is bid4assets.com Since there are already thousands of other non-Gov’t yet similar assets being auctioned away on this site to the general public it’s difficult to really get a worth while since everyone has clear view of the market.
What I’ve tried to do is to identify state and local Government sales events close to home that auction off boats Live, on site and with few bidders. Especially local Police and DEA auction events. The reality is that most don’t realize that daily across the U.S. a landlord, business owner, or some creditor is issued an order from the court directed to the sheriff, requiring him to seize the debtor’s asset or property so it can be promptly liquidated at auction. The intent of course for the proceeds isto pay down the creditors as much as possible. Surprisingly whoever attends these ‘must sell’ sales events (and they come and go all the time) will frequently have opportunity to walk away with an extremely cheap asset.
Now when it comes to finding these Government boat auction sales take a deep breath…you can try and keep up with sales events on your own. Agency websites and newspapers advertise when they are scheduled to occur. However, there are time-saving membership auction database sites that keep up with that on a daily. I’ve found them a big time saver. These sites offer their members access to their regularly pruned auction sales data banks for a nominal, one-time fee.
I have signed on to several of these sites since most tend to focus on a specificwide or deep range of assets. Alternatively, others focus on particular types of auction sources. Strangely most membership sites are strictly Government related ..which in my opinion is too limiting since there are so many other types of auction venues to take advantage of.
In the end the key with any auction is to once and for all pick your particular asset, hone in on it by frequently exposing yourself to listings so you can make suitable comparisons and offers. When it comes to finding a steal at any Government auction sale or repo boat auction event, you have to be able to really know when you’ve come across a a great offer. And you can only do that by constantly comparing assets so as to recognize an undervalued asset when you see it.