I'm leaving this review because my experience with this estate sale/auction company was stressful,…read moreunnecessarily complicated, and ultimately cost us money.
My husband and I won nearly $500 worth of items in their Bainbridge Island auction. We live on Camano Island, so pickup required a ferry trip and significant travel time. The night before pickup, we noticed fraudulent activity on our bank account and our bank froze our cards. On the way to pickup, we contacted the company to explain that we would pay in cash. We were told they do not accept cash (or any payment) at the pickup site and were instructed to go to Walmart, buy a gift card, and use it to pay online before we could receive our items. This was odd, but we did it, which delayed us. After payment, we called again to confirm and to say we would be late. We were told it was fine and they would wait.
While waiting for the ferry, we called once more to keep them updated. At that point they asked us to come the next morning at 9:00 a.m. instead, which we agreed to. The next morning we arrived early, but the ferry filled up and we had to wait for the next sailing. We immediately contacted the company, apologized, and explained we would arrive about 20 minutes after 9:00.
During the ferry ride we received a text saying we had 90 minutes to remove our items. When we arrived, the person on site repeatedly emphasized the 90-minute limit and was rude from the start. Our items were spread throughout a three-story house, and access was only through the garage, so we were running up and down stairs and working as fast as we physically could. As the 90 minutes approached, he repeatedly demanded we choose items to "leave behind," even though we were actively moving everything out and had no intention of abandoning anything we paid for. As such we attempted to remove what we could from inside the house and placed those items next to our car to load.
When the 90 minutes ended, he told us we could not take any more of our purchased items and forced us to leave items behind, even the items that we had removed but were not "in our car". He began taking those items we had already carried downstairs and were loading into our car and carried them back into the house. He also ripped a box out of my husband's hands as he was placing it in our trunk.
A neighbor, who witnessed what was happening, kindly offered to let us park in his driveway so we could finish packing quickly without blocking anything. The company representative then told us we could not go to the neighbor's driveway and threatened to call the police--then actually did. When the police arrived, the neighbor confirmed we had permission to be there, and the officers told us (correctly) that this was a civil issue to work out with the company, not a police matter.
Once we got home and accounted for what we were allowed to take versus what we were forced to leave, we calculated that about $180 worth of items we paid for were kept from us. To make matters worse, many of the items we did receive were not as described and/or not working. I understand "as-is" policies and that estate sales operate on tight schedules, but the way this was handled was hostile and unreasonable--especially given that we were present, working quickly, and communicating throughout the entire process.
Over the past 10+ years we have worked with hundreds of estate and auction sellers and have never had an experience as disturbing as this. I strongly recommend that anyone considering bidding with this company read their contract carefully and understand that they may enforce it in a way that benefits them rather than trying to find a reasonable solution. Also worth noting: they have a physical store, so items they deem "abandoned" may simply be resold.
