Storage Auction

I've been curious about what the storage auctions in this area might be like.  I have been to a few auctions in the past and for the most part, I don't like them.  There is so much waiting around for the item or items you are interested in to come up,  you feel like it's a waste of time.  Then you may have someone bidding the price up so much that you won't  buy your item at that price.  If your emotions get involved in the process you can way over-pay.  I must admit I've had some good luck too.  I bought a great maple dresser that many people were envious of and I have really liked having for 30 years or more now.  I also bought the contents of a dusty old room for $4.00 about 35 years ago.  Very few showed up at that auction and even fewer because the weather was bad.  I would have bought more but I only had about $15.00 in my pocket.  That was when I was poorest in my life. 
There were some nice leather covered soda fountain stools in there, some rubber boots (that fit me), some display cases and a couple of other items that I don't recall.  I sold almost all of them at my Flea Market.  That may have been the only week I made money.
I happened to find the web site of the auction house that does a lot of storage auctions in Michigan.  It's named Blair Auctions.  There were several auctions scheduled for the next day.  Some not too far away.  My son and I decided we would go to one to see what it was like.  It was in Livonia, Michigan.  About 8 lockers were scheduled to be sold starting at 12:15 P.M.

We followed the advice on the website to 1. Dress appropriately for the outdoor weather..2. bring a flashlight..3.arrive early enough to register and 4. bring cash or credit card.
The rules vary from location to location but this place took credit cards.  You should also bring enough locks to lock up the units you buy.  I brought one, just in case.  

The weather was variably light rain, wind, sunny and all of the opposites.  People were instructed to park on one of the side streets, but a Livonia police woman was going to ticket everyone over there so all those drivers had to move inside the storage facility. We had a bit of fun commenting under our collective breaths about her. 
There were roughly 100 potential buyers and it took at least 45 minutes to register everyone.  It seemed obvious that there were quite a few "regulars" there.  
The same rules as you see on Storage Wars governed this auction.  The unit was opened and everyone paraded by checking out the contents without entering the unit or touching any contents.  The auctioneer gave any special instructions and changed into his auctioneer's voice and began.  His style was to begin at a higher level than anyone would start at and then come down until someone waved or signaled in some way that They wanted that bid.  One of his favorite sayings is,"The more you pay for it, the more you like it."  People who weren't interested in that locker were told which one was next and that they could go there and start looking.  It seemed not to work out that way.  They always waited for him to come down to the next unit before they raised the door.  One difference between the real auction we attended and those on television is that as soon as you win the bid on a locker, you had to give the auctioneer a $100.00 deposit.  You get that back when you've cleaned out the locker. You have one day to clean it out. You can't use their dumpsters to discard all the trash, so you need to find one someplace else.

We didn't buy a locker. The prices ranged from$80 to$800.  What's missing is the reveal.  What did someone find?  Why did they bid the way they did? Who was that hot chick in the white skirt? It's really interesting.  After all, I do have a minor in Sociology.