Re: Help with Vtg. Mid Century Modern Dining Chairs
OK, well, here's what you have. A cheaply-made production chair that is at about the Ikea level of workmanship. Those round plugs on the back are screw hole covers, the lowest level of joinery you can possibly have. The maker didn't even bother to use a sharp sawblade to cut the corner angle braces under the seat, that's inexcusable. Those braces are there to stabilize the chair corners which are doweled due to the offset you can see underneath. The under-panel of the seat is hardboard, ugh. This is a hack build. If you are buying these to re-sell and make a profit, this is not what you buy. This set is real garage sale stuff, giveaway or something like $ 40 for the whole set. Sorry.
You have to develop a VERY sharp eye to buy and make money on pre-owned furniture. Only a few can successfully do it. If that's the market you want to get into, focus on a time period that interests you can then specialize in that segment. Go to the major auction houses and look at results on line for that category - who is buying what - and prices paid. Auction houses set market value, they are THE barometer. Learn the history and development of that era you choose to specialize in, and the people behind it (artists, designers, influences, builders) Then once you get your database of information, you buy only originals, not knock-offs. You know the value of something in the market before you buy it, not try to discover it afterwards, that's critical to you not making a bad buy like the chairs above. For example, I have a pretty keen eye for period furniture (18th Century) and the Reproductions from the 1980's that copied those early models as I know most the players from that era. I can identify a good piece in 30 seconds or less and know how well it is made and if its been refinished, etc, and the approximate market value of it. That's a dead category right now, but occasionally I come across a find and I know what I am going to sell it for before I pay for it. If you can't sell something for 1.5 times the price you paid for it, take a pass. Know what the market is looking for so you will have a ready buyer, it does you no good to hold onto pieces, you buy it and want to turn it in weeks, not months.
That's the skill you have to develop. Like everything else in life, to make money at it you have to get educated, and that requires study. Good luck.
Last edited by drcollie; 10-16-2020 at 08:08 AM.
Duane Collie
Straight answers from thirty-six years in the business.
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