Cherokee County, Northwest Iowa | Area lawyer has been running the "submit your sealed bid, top 5 bidders get invited to come sit together in a room around the big table, lawyer writes highest sealed bid on a legal pad, start passing the legal pad around allowing everyone to either raise their bid, or pass the legal pad onto the next guy, until bidding has ended" gambit for over 5 years now. I would bet that this lawyer has a big ad in the local papers about 40% of the time, advertising his next modified sealed bid auction. I think he has a gold mine going: settle someone's estate, oh, you need to sell the farmland? Oh, let me take care of that for you. chi-ching.
5 years ago I needed to attend a funeral 700 miles away on the welcome to the big table day, got permission from the lawyer ahead of time to have a friend of mine represent me, sent a check for the 10% down payment with friend. He got to sign the legal pad once, and he passed on the second round, and then tore up my check.
Is it an advantage or disadvantage to let the other bidders know who you are? i.e. bidding on the internet, or sending a friend ( a stranger to the neighborhood) to bid for you?
I just remember my Dad telling me about attending a land auction decades ago (he was just an observer), standing next to a guy from our neighborhood. Auction ended, some stranger had the winning bid. Dad said to the neighbor "I wonder who got the farm?", to which the neighbor replied "I did, that is a friend of mine from 100 miles away from here, he was bidding for me"! Never did hear the details of why he did it that way, I can only imagine. |
Sealed Bid Land Auction
