“I want to find one we can make some good money on,” he said.
The surge in popularity of storage auctions is due mostly to the interest in a few reality-television shows depicting the public sales, including “Storage Wars” on the A&E channel and “Auction Hunters” on Spike TV, according to managers of local companies.
The number of storage lockers put up for auction is also on the rise, because the poor economy is forcing some renters either to abandon their units or to stop paying for them, company representatives said.
Rage of storage auction
“Storage auctions are all the rage right now,” said Molly Hennessy, marketing programs manager with AuctionZip, which is a website that posts information about auctions in Ohio.
In Ohio, lockers whose renters have not paid the storage companies’ monthly fees for an extended period of time, usually between one to three months, are eligible for auction. Notices are sent to the renters, many of whom pay their past-due bills before their units are put up for sale.
But some owners are incapable of paying or do not respond to the notices. Storage company employees then cut the locks on those lockers, take a photograph of the units from the outside and then publish advertisements for the upcoming sale.
Lockers are then sold at cash auctions to the highest bidder. Bidders can examine the lockers from the doorway, but they are not allowed inside to investigate what might be lingering underneath tarpaulin or stuffed inside a box. Most storage companies host a monthly auction, and they use the proceeds from the sales to cover the cost of unpaid fees.
Everman, the rookie buyer, said he purchased the locker in September for $960 because the concert speakers he saw led him to believe there might be expensive musical instruments inside. Although there were no instruments or hidden valuables in the locker, Everman said he still hoped to break even by selling the items on eBay or at a store he owns in Indiana.
Storage auctions have been around for years, but interest in the sales has blossomed since the premiere of three new reality television shows, said Jack Sewell, property manager of a storage company in Miamisburg.
Sewell said since the debut of the TV shows, the number of visitors to his company’s auctions have increased eightfold.
Trash or treasure?
Sewell said the shows accurately portray the process, but the valuables the buyers on reality TV discover give people an unrealistic expectation of the contents of typical lockers. On the shows, the main characters often find collectibles, valuable artwork, cash, antiques and fancy furniture.
“What you see on these TV shows are the rarities,” he said. “The (lockers) you see on TV are the ones you see after they’ve gone through 100 units.”
Sewell said locker auctions can certainly pay off for buyers, but they are often a risky gamble. He said it is hard to tell what many lockers contain, and some are filled with nothing but junk that people left behind.
“It’s trash and treasures,” he said “You never know what you are going to get.”
Sewell said one renter paid for years for a locker full of old beer cans. He said some people pay for lockers filled with nothing but papers. Another renter had a casket in their locker, but it turned out that it belonged to a magician.
Company managers said the “newbies” and “rookies” are often jacking up the bids on the units, frustrating long-time buyers who visit the auctions to stock their consignment and thrift stores, or sell the items they buy at flea markets or online. Newcomers sometimes win a unit and then are unable to handle removing its contents and cleaning them out, which is a requirement of the sales.
Beth Jackson, senior manager of a storage company in Trotwood, said visitors to auctions must be disappointed when the actual sales fail to live up to the spectacle seen on TV.
“They expect the show, and that they’ll find all of this stuff behind a dresser or in a box,” she said. “The show doesn’t show you the flops — it shows you only some of them, not the bigger picture.”
Harry Potter wands
Jackson said also that she sympathizes with the renters whose units are auctioned for nonpayment because they lost a job or their home was foreclosed on, but customers have obligations to pay the rental fees, and companies must follow their policies and try to recoup their costs.
“You feel bad, but I can’t make the bill go away,” she said.
Billy Dill, 36, of Riverside, who also purchased his first locker for $5 at the auction in September, said he wanted to buy the locker Everman did because it looked like it contained a person’s whole life inside. Instead, he bought a locker with little inside except two authentic “Harry Potter” wands, which can retail for about $30 each.
Dill said he gave the wands to his children, and he may keep a bookcase he found in the unit, but the rest of the items he planned to throw away, which included some old clothes and a few worn-out mattresses. But he said he has dreams of scoring a locker at a decent price that will lead to a big payoff.
“I have always been the guy who goes to garage sales and flea markets to try to find good deals on things to try and make some money off of selling them somewhere else,” he said. “It’s the American dream to make something out of nothing.”
Contact this reporter at (937) 225-0749 or cfrolik@DaytonDailyNews.com.
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