hiring someone to sell equipment

You can sell everything in an auction. Call Cincinnati Industrial Auctioneers.

Or you can sell everything yourself. There is no good way to sell on consignment without getting cheated. All smart sellers avoid consignment sales like the plague.

Scrap metal is worth nothing nowadays and expect to get almost nothing for scrap machinery, or even pay for removal.

There are companies that appear to sell used equipment as a business. You might look at:

Although these two companies specialize in oil field equipment there must be other companies that do the same for plant equipment.

There are quite a few of them. One of the biggest ones owned the magazine I worked for 15 years ago.

But, as Iggy said, most of them want consignment or they'll just pay you pennies on the dollar. The best bet is an auction. Iggy knows the business.

I'm glad you responded as you have the experience. Some of the stuff is gold, like a 99% Bridgeport loaded with tooling and others are like 30 ton presses with old style safeties. I don't pretend that all will sell for my perceived value but I do have to get rid of everything in the next year before the State takes the building for the road.

You certainly can. I've seen whole towns and girls' -virginity- sold on eBay, for a taste of the gamut.

That's probably not a bad idea. Auctioneers can jack up the action so idiots are bidding against each other enough to pay for the auction fees, and get him a better price than a "help me out" ad.

Yeah, unless the stuff is handicrafts and you're asking $5 a pop.

Gawd, scrap iron is back down to $15/T? It's hardly worth the gas.

But when will stick iron come back down to realistic prices? Crom, they wanted almost $30 for a stick of 1"x1/8 angle or 5/8" square the last time I checked. UFR!

Auction off the good stuff & call HGR to bid on the rest, than call the scrappers to take what's left?

MikeB

The Bridgeport should easily sell for cash. The presses, you need to research them, some are not sellable and some are. A year is a long time. I hope that you have a way to rig them inexpensively, like an overhead crane. Otherwise rigging charges will kill your sales.

Even if not, auctioneers will help get a more or less fair price where a reseller can buy and still make some money resellin on ebay.

It is worth about 50-60/ton in chicago in a semi truck quantity.

Gunner, while your recommendation is a solid one, even good auctioneers have bad auctions from time to time, I love those.

Right. As a BUYER, bad auctioneers are truly wonderful.

That much? Wow, is someone remelting it near there?

Like an old auctioneer friend said years back "an item is worth exactly what the highest bidder is willing to pay on a particular day

- not one penny more, and not one penny less"

The secret is to use an auctioneer that has the reputation for getting the buyers out. It is in his best interest to get the best price possible for YOU, not the buyer - because he gets a percentage of the take. If by spending a few bucks on advertizing he can get 2 buyers for an item instead of one, he can more than double his take.

Get 10 or more buyers??? Who knows.

Around here anything that can be used by hobbyists or small (usually mennonite farm based) businesses goes for a reasonably high price. But the guys know their stuff - and if it's junk, there's a pretty good chance you won't get more than junk price. Sometimes you get more than you would expect if 2 guys both want it for parts though!!!

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The deal with auctions for larger stuff is twofold -- firstly, you need to be in an area of enough large enough population so there's similar activity to create at least _some_ demand or both the turnout and bidding will be minimal irregardless of the actual quality of the auctioneer himself. He can only expedite the sale, he can't create bids from nothing.

Second is as somebody else noted, if it's heavy stuff and remote and you can't load, or at least assist, it'll drive willingness to part with cash for the item way, way down in order to make up for the expense/trouble of getting it to its new home.

I'd suspect the prices are different across the US. East and maybe gulf is scrapping Ships and containers.

Dallas is another issue. Tyler another issue. Tyler used to get all of the iron pipe from Dallas/area. Don't know what they produce from now.

Mart> >

I have a nice Toyota forklift and have moved most things with it at one time or another and Roger can thread a needle with it and is a pretty good rigger so we should be able to safely load anything on a flatbed at least. But, believe me, I know the value of a professional rigger. I regret there's no market for all the overhead shafting in babbited bearings.

Actually there is a market for the shafting but probably not a ton of money. There are quite a few folks out there setting up line shaft driven shops and museums. The problem is getting the info out.

What is the Bridgeport? 3phase? Tooling?

If I'd ever won the Lotto, my dream shop would have had a nice range of CNC machinery inside, outside under an overhang, a line shaft driven shop powered by steam or hit or miss engine.

Jon

Lots of LineShaft shops up in the Linwood/Wallenstein/Wellesley area of Ontario

What marvelous juxtaposition, Jon! Duality lives.

CNC + line shaft + steam + hit/miss