Make Money Using the Auction House - Examples from the World of Warcraft Auction House | mmo Auctioneer

Lich King Auction House - An Epic Adventure

tyson — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 18:43:05 +0000

Today I paid more than I ever have for an item in the auction house in the hopes of re-listing for a profit. What will no doubt seem small potatoes to a few of you was a bit of a risk for me. 2100 gold was the buyout for a pair of non-crafted “tanking” shoulder pads, which happened to also look appropriately bulky and cool.

Since the market’s still young I figure that things with good stats and rarity are still likely to fetch a high price, even though I can’t see myself ever paying that much for something at the AH, at least with this character. I’m just a level 10 druid with no other characters on the server and not a lot of free time.

So 5 hours later I checked the AH and wouldn’t you believe but they sold. For 3898.45g. The net profit was a little over 1600 gold, by far my highest on one item, actually about double. I looked at the name who bought it, did a /who and it was a level 80 Death Knight. Go figure, the new class looking to get some respect.

The temptation to play my Druid is high. I mean, I could literally skill him up to max with income, and start a new AH alt since he’d be out adventuring. But I honestly don’t have that kind of time anymore. The main thing as always lately, will be the auction house.

Someone’s comment from a few days ago also jarred me into paying attention to the trade channel banter as I used to, so thanks again. So I ended up making a deal for only 60 gold something that typically went for 200g using my standard “How much for the _blank_?” then polite-with-full-english-sentences brief business queries/negotiations. Seems to work much more often than not. Happy AH-ing!

Lich King Auction House - Market Stabalizing

tyson — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 13:23:31 +0000

On the main server I’m experimenting with, the market is finally starting to react with fairly predictable results. The most interesting is that while I had a slow period for about a week where I was always at +1k-2k gold net profit and had more inventory in the auction house, suddenly I find myself in the +3k-4k net profit with still another 2-3k gold in inventory. Soon I’ll be sitting at around 8k gold in the bank when I started with just 2k a few weeks ago.

Some observations about the Lich King AH:

More epics: Mid level 70 epic items have started to appear, even if just crafted - not a lot but a few
Duplicate epics: People enjoying raising their crafting skills are trying out the market, resulting in mostly crafted epics being sold. This supply is lowering the demand and price of nearly the entire epic market. Why? The price of nearly-as-good crafted gear sets a baseline and one can only sell a naturally found epic so much higher before it becomes absurd and unlikely to sell. There’s an exception to everything though and I’m sure there will be some epics that sell way better than others due to supply and stats - remember “Blinkstrike” when it first started appearing in Burning Crusade?
Crafted blues are taking over: From level 70 through 80, by far the highest volume of goods are crafted blues. In fact it’s so different from when Burning Crusade came out and almost all items then were found off mobs. Now you’ll essentially have to wade through pages of blue crafted gear to find those unique items. They’re not too hard to spot though and you always have allakhazam or wowhead.
New Epic market still not viable: Prices are generally too high / risky with the crafted gear pulling the epic market down. However, this makes deals stand out and if you’re fortunate enough to find one (and you should always check since it’s so quick and easy now), you can profit. I made a 600g profit off the Putrescent Bands I bought for 999g. Originally put them back up for 1999g, but after relisting, found a competitor. Naturally I had to undercut, and did so by only about 70g. Mine sold however and the other did not. Always be aware of competitors to your listed items and if needed, cancel yours and relist… it’s worth it. Just remember that if you have to go too low, just cancel and wait for theirs to sell, then relist back at a decent profit.
All the old tricks still work: Everything that I went over in the podcasts and in the earlier posts is still applicable in this market with this exception. Armor is now just as big a seller as weapons in general at the rare and epic levels. When you’re leveling your character and pre-BC, armor used to play second fiddle - except for the set pieces which at the time was a huge profit niche. Now however, it’s worth exploring as people have more money and are looking for those incremental upgrades.

Lich King Auction House - Current Lessons

tyson — Sat, 29 Nov 2008 18:58:46 +0000

So how are others faring in the auction house in the expansion’s infancy? For me, the server has cooled down a bit, with Celwyn still at around 1500g above what he started out with and about 3k in the auction house. I’ve had to lower prices a bit on some items due to competition.

However in an amazing twist, my horde side character on another server had 8 of 10 things sell in just one night, netting me an instant 1200g profit. It’s been a long time since I’ve seen a mailbox full of successful auctions (as I don’t deal in lower price commodities and have a basic threshold for how much profit I want).

Here are the lessons I’ve had to practice over the last couple days:

If something gets too low below average due to undercutting competition, just hold onto it until all the others are bought off and then put yours up for below average to get rid of it.
Learn which items are fast sellers or fairly rare. An example is the blue leather “chain gang” leggings with +117 to stamina and also some agility. I won an auction for about 82g, relisted for an immediate 299g and profited within hours.
Speaking of auctions, perhaps others out there has had wide success with them, but unless you are already starting your auction at a point where you are happy with the profit, then don’t bother. The auction house and general game design is simply not yet set up in a way that encourages heavy bidding unless you get lucky. Now if proxy bidding were implemented… it might become more lucrative and a fun thing to practice. Only auction during peak times and start from a profit in WoW as it is currently.
Be patient. The auction house is all about swings and finding deals. There are lots of times where you’ll log on and will find several, and many others where you’ll just log back off with nothing. I have never had a dry spell where it didn’t eventually rain, and occasionally pour.

Lich King Auction House - Blue Days Are Numbered

tyson — Thu, 27 Nov 2008 04:42:51 +0000

I bought my first lvl 80 epic item this morning. I saw it for 600g min and 999g buyout. It was the 600 that initially caught my eye. Since it had good stats for a wrist item I made a quick check with Allakhazam to find a couple previous sales (and I think I’ll try wowhead as well next time), so I know I’ll at least recoup what I put into it. It’s back up at 1999g. Best thing is that there is another for 5000g up.

Yes, it is with not much fanfare that my Lich King inventory is shifting from dealing in volatile blue (rare) items to tried and true fantastic deals from recipes and epics. Blue items are for the most part too saturated from level 70-80 but I still look and do find the occasional deal, and still do recommend looking in this market.

So why didn’t I sell the epic for say 4500g since there was another at 5k? You know, I just don’t think anyone will bite and I want them to buy it right now. Last thing I want is a price war with another seller so that we keep undercutting each other, and the market sees both the item not selling and the price continuously going down and simply waits. No, I’d rather sell it for an almost 1k profit right away. I actually have a feeling that it might not even sell at that price and I’ll have to drop it eventually, or if I’m undercutted.

Here’s an update on Celwyn. He’s got 3000g liquid and you won’t believe this - 4500g sitting in the ah in items. Why so much? First, I’ll preface that by saying that I’d receive 4500g if all my 8 or so items sold for the price I set them at. It never usually happens the way you think it will, but you can direct the overall flow and consistency all the same. Secondly, Lich King recipes are in! And, amazingly, I found two green 400 recipes in the ah dirt cheap. One for 45g and one for I believe 80g. They’re both up for 799g even though Allakhazam has them both at 1000g. I want to sell them before the market really has a chance to react.

Truthfully, one recipe is very specific in what it does (though ought to be fairly rare), and the other is just a collector’s recipe (not practical, but more aesthetic). I don’t believe either are worth what I’m selling them for. I’m nonetheless very excited at the potential increase of net worth.

Lich King Auction House - Turbulant but Still On Course

tyson — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 02:08:54 +0000

What’s happening has happened many times in the past. If you’re at it long enough, then you’ll weather almost any rough cycle. MMO economies are still about stats and rarity.

Celwyn is up 1500g up from the initial 2000g a bit over a week ago, with about 10-20 min a day just checking and reauctioning the items that didn’t sell. There is also about 1500g worth of items sitting in the AH if things pan out.

A couple of lessons have re-emerged during the last couple days. I bought a lvl 80 healing Druid’s robe for pretty cheap awhile ago and it just didn’t sell at 399. The median on Allakhazam was about 250g, but knowing the stats in the game (yet not the rarity of this particular item - only that it was alone at the time) I valued it higher. It basically depended on if this was a common drop. This is one of the rare times I don’t really care what the website says but at least it’s a baseline.

Anyway, I bought it for around 100g, and put it up again for 399.45g. After a few days of not selling, another pops up for 150g-200g buyout. I buy it out. That’s one of the lessons if I recall from about a year ago. If others emerge, it’s ok to buy them out as long as you feel you can keep the market for that particular item in check. In this case, since mine was alone for a few days without competition, I felt pretty confident in snatching the other up. However, I didn’t just leave my original one up. Instead, here’s how I made more than I thought I would.

I competed against myself, hoping that someone comparing the prices would notice a big gap but not the same seller. Apparently I was right. The next one I put back up for 490g even to make it look like a different number entirely. It was a long shot, but the next morning my robe for just about 400 sold, and by the end of the same day, amazingly the 490 one sold as well! Haven’t seen another of the same robe since so evidently they are sort of rare.

The other server, horde side - the side with much less activity - I see the same robe for a 200g buyout. I’m not biting. This server tends to undervalue things due to the inactivity. My theory is that most of the level 80’s on the server now are in guilds and focused on the initial high level dungeons and aren’t really concerned with the stray AH item. Whether or not the theory is true, most certainly the entire market is much less highly priced except for the new level 80 epics, which are actually about the same as on the other more populated server.

Happy auctioneering.

Lich King Auction House - Cooling Down

tyson — Sun, 23 Nov 2008 21:00:15 +0000

If anyone has a soft towel, may I borrow it to wipe my rose-colored glasses off for a minute? What was looking extremely positive as of the last post has come to, for the most part, a now steeper path of ascent.

The road blocks are several, though none insurmountable:

Fast devaluation of blues meaning timing matters more
More blues appearing when you thought yours was rare
People severely undercutting you

So I’ve revised my strategy just slightly. I’m still at about 500g ahead, with over 1500g in the auction house, but now have more inventory locked up rather than less inventory at a higher price. Now I am a little more frugal with how I buy up the near lvl 80 blues. The lvl 70-80 epic market is just now starting to appear (though too high and overvalued) for this character, but that means timing will be required to get good deals, and so I’d likely do better with checking more frequently, even if just for a minute.

And I’m going back to some staples of the past and looking forward to when recipes for crafted items start appearing. The only 400 level recipe I saw as valued at about 3000g which is too risky for me. I’ll look for better deals. I’ve had some luck actually with continued stability of the post 300 skill level recipes from Burning Crusade. Should be an interesting week ahead!

Lich King Auction House - Starting to Heat Up

tyson — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 16:03:49 +0000

The level 80 items are starting to show up with more frequency now. This means that you’ll start to find a single level 80 weapon or armor that really has value quite often and be able to turn a profit on it. I’ve done this several times now for easy 200 to 400g profits. Of course I reinvest profits after in appealing new items.

I’m sitting roughly at 1000g net profit in the last several days with anywhere from 1000 to 1500 gold sitting in the auction house in items waiting to be bought. If we round, then I started the process at 2000g when I first logged onto Lich King, am at 3000g in the bank right now, and have about 1-1.5k worth of items waiting for someone to click the buy button, which puts me at least at 4k. With the 80’s appearing more frequently, it’s a great opportunity for you to snag some of the rarely seen items for cheap when they obviously aren’t being researched by the sellers looking to turn a quick profit.

Too bad this is all on a server in which I know no one, nor have any other characters, on a level 9 Night Elf Druid. Ironic!

Lich King Auction House Progress

tyson — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 20:49:49 +0000

Well I still am only checking a couple times a day and simply haven’t had the time to start a Death Knight character yet. That said, I’m up about 200g on Celwyn to 2300+ with about 1000g worth of additional items in the auction house as we speak. Several have expired once or twice and I made about a 250g profit on a single blue weapon from one posting, but in general I believe I’m making good buys.

Here’s what I’m doing in case you want to try it on your server (or mine as the case may be!). As of now I’m not into pets (though I’ve looked) and if you’ve read any of my earlier posts you would know I’m not a big fan of the micromanagement of commodities or other large supplies of items, even though that’s where the “real” money is. I deal more in rarity and those few good deals… enough to make me a great living while at the same time only having to spend maximum 10 minutes a day actually playing the auction house. I might typically spend a little more time than that, but often that’s all it takes… a quick in and out with a couple items or none, and call it a day.

I still have my trusty wow.allakhazam.com site at the ready. Again, with the new expansion, any 70+ items will be most desirable, so I focus on blue weapons and blue armor. For non-WoW heads, that is just one step below the EPIC class of items because those simply aren’t available yet and when you see one it’s outrageous… 15000g, which I don’t have on any current character nor would I pay. I’m confident they’ll start appearing soon and when they do you’ll want to be there.

In the meantime, blue armor tends to be more in supply than weapons, which makes weapon hunting a bit easier but the timing a bit more picky. When shopping, especially for items you don’t know much about yet as in their actual rarity, as usual do not buy those items with even another like item up at the same time. If you see two or more of the same item, especially this early in the expansion you can almost guarantee it’s not too rare and you’ll have frequent competition. If one is 400 and the other 40g of course then nab it, but look for solo items and be careful of the crafted items as that’s a popular thing and there are many of those. Look for unique names. Then briefly tab out to allakhazam and check its median price, and post yours accordingly. You may have better luck on the alliance side now, but I’m having success on both. Good luck!

Lich King Auction House - First Purchases

tyson — Mon, 17 Nov 2008 19:07:00 +0000

Over the last few days I’ve discovered what presents a challenge to me in this game. It’s the auction house of course. Here I have a decked out (well, for me) level 70 Priest in crafted and won gear from a pretty decent dungeon and have I distributed his new talent points yet or seen the new areas?

Not remotely. Instead I’m logging on my podcast character and bought up 6 new items in one session, all within 40-200g each. All blues except for the epic robe I couldn’t pass up at 6g the first night I logged on.

I bought one lvl 78 blue Warlock/Mage weapon for 200 gold that I figure will go for at least 400, and several under valued blue armor pieces. At the time, there wasn’t any competition from like items and so I feel pretty justified in my immediate purchase. The stats were of course the main aspect, but if there are several others like them already up, well that’s just too much effort to expend in a “who can post it the cheapest” war, exactly the type of wars that are best avoided.

Neither of my first two purchases have sold yet. The epic robe I bought for 6g has another competitor who bid lower by a hundred, so I took it down and reposted somewhere in the 300’s. I won’t mind even if it goes down to 100g (unlikely) since I’ll have made 16x my money. The other item has as well had many more competitors but started out solo. But it’s still valued pretty high (too high in my opinion) so I expect still some profit.

Here’s the number I started the other night with: 2181 gold. Meanwhile, let’s see if we can’t get some talent points spent for my priest… what the heck is “Divine Hymm?”

Lich King AH Impressions

tyson — Sun, 16 Nov 2008 13:15:24 +0000

As it had been a few months since I’ve logged on to check the auction house, my big question going in was, “Is it much different than before?”

Yes and no.

Differences:

I saw level 80 items (even if they were just crafted)!
New categories added: glyphs are amazing for actual gameplay! But they’re crafted, so I expect to be keeping an eye on them to see if there are differences in rarity and therefore price
Some new stats on items like “spell power” which requires some investigation on how it’s different than the old “damage and healing” modifier

Similarities:

Prices of older items are actually taking a little while to go down as more people get the new stuff… so I’m still seeing maybe a 10-40% drop in overall value of most pre Lich King items on first inspection with definitely several exceptions in the 50%+ category. I expect this will keep going down fairly linearly.
No new auction house filters which I thought was odd. It would be great to have a “skill level” filter for searching out crafting recipes for example.
Still huge server differences in item/quality density
Still big differences between alliance and horde in item quality and density, with alliance having the big advantage

Observations:

Pet prices are inflated… some oldies like the White Kitten are already going for up to 100x the amount they sold for pre Lich King. I’d try and fit checking out pets into your routine somehow.
Extreme sales are already happening! On first logging on with Celwyn (from the podcast), within 1 minute in checking out the epics I saw the epic lvl 70 robe “Will of Edward the Odd” selling for 6 gold. The other two were still selling in the upper 600’s so I think I’ll make a profit here.
Insane jump in item powers post level 70, just as in Burning Crusade. Item modifiers are incredible and having played a priest through Karazhan several times (but not really further than that), I’m seeing things that are already competing with my epics in some ways and blowing them away in other stats.