Siegel Auction Today - Arizona And New Mexico Postal History

I watched a Siegel auction today for the above material and noticed that about 100 of the lots were passed because they didn't get any/sufficient bids. I was curious if anyone knows whether this is unusual for a postal history auction? Or is it possible that the subject matter is rather specialized or the minimum prices were too high? I won one lot for a relatively inexpensive cover, but only because it was related to a particular area that I collect unrelated to AZ or NM.

I believe that it was just too specialized. I noticed that some of the better items were passed and also that when there were two similar items, after one was won the second was passed.

I live in NM and I only know one collector who collects NM covers, and he only collects one county...

I don't collect covers but do collect NM state tax stamps. The stamp to the left is a perfect example. <--------

Not many of us!

AZ has a much larger collecting base for AZ material, and I know there are numerous collectors for the AZ covers.

I agree that it was quite specialized and a bit higher-end to boot, which put many potential casual buyers out of the picture as well.

Very nice material, however - the catalog is definitely a keeper for reference for the future.

I think it is unusual for a firm like Robert Siegel to have that many unsold lots. In the last Schyler Rumsey SESCAL sale, of the 16 New Mexico individual cover lots, half went unsold and six sold for under estimate. But the one cover to go for OVER estimate was the one I had to walk away from. Maybe New Mexico is softening, but I did not see it on that lot!

I collect one county in New Mexico. I know another guy who collects Grant County. New Mexico is considered "western mails," but does not have the following of other western states. The Arizona-New Mexico Postal History Society has several members who exclusively collect New Mexico. I will be watching to see if estimates come down in future sales.

His Grant County exhibit is excellent!

Thank you all for the interesting and informative commentary. Although I'm collecting covers in a rather narrow area now, maybe I'll look into Arizona postal history since we have settled for good there (I presume) in our retirement.

I think several of the points in the original post are accurate. The estimates were probably influenced by the high acquisition costs of the consignor. The market has changed substantially with collecting habits. The last of the New Mexico "moneyed" collectors (collector N) sold his collection to me last year and I sold intact to a collector who wanted a few pieces out of the colelction not related to it being a state collection (he wanted route uses and CSA uses).

For example, I was the underbidder at Risvold sale for the Mexican period "Nuevo Mexico" postmark that Birkinbine bought at $32,500 hammer price as well as the "Tome" marking that he bought at $52,500 - I was bidding on behalf of collector "N". They were estimated at this auction with low estimates of $20,000 each and went unsold. In this case the price was a reflection of lack of a New Mexico buyer with money as well as a lack of interest from a Mexico collector.

State collecting has always been dicey. A couple new people start into an area and prices are high, they sell or die and prices drop a lot. I will not buy covers (from any state) where my market is dependent on state collectors.

As to the Arizona material, Birkinbine was such a major collector with means for so long, nobody could even think of collecting. The price was paid at the auction for those habits. Maybe the material will show up in large lots and some new collectors can start.

I was probably the largest single buyer in the auction (on the internet) and I purchased Confederate related (all the Mesilla CSA) as well as items of significant postal history merit (mostly Butterfield route uses, etc). Many of those items brought very strong prices (three Mesilla's sold for $25,000 each where I had bought the previous two on the market for under $20,000 each).

Trepel did a great job with the catalog in an attempt to create interest in some very obscure material. Always a hard task.